Part B: Key Issues

Background

In summarising her extensive review of the international literature, Tweddle (2007) highlighted what, unfortunately, have become common characteristics exhibited by youth who are transitioning from the care system to independence. Compared with their peers in the general population, they are more likely to be:

• undereducated (not have completed high school)
• unemployed or underemployed
• earning lower wages (if employed)
• parents at a younger age
• incarcerated or involved with the criminal justice system
• homelessness at some stage of their lives
• living in unstable housing arrangements
• dependent on social assistance
• experiencing mental health issues
• without medical insurance (in the US)
• at a higher risk of substance abuse.

Not all young people experience this full range of negative outcomes when leaving care. Individual differences are observed, as Stein (2008) points out, because of different starting points and the diversity of family background and care experiences. He identified three different outcome groups, emphasising that each would require different types and amounts of support during and after transition. Stein defined these clusters as the (a) Moving on, (b) Survivors, and (c) Strugglers groups. “Moving on” included those young people who “welcomed the challenge of living independently and gaining more control over their lives” (p. 300). These young people made effective use of the help they had been offered and kept positive links with carers and some family members. The “Survivors” tended to include younger care leavers who had experienced disrupted placements and more movement after exiting, often related to homelessness and unemployment. They benefitted most from assistance from specialist caseworkers and mentors. His most disadvantaged group, the “Strugglers”, experienced the classic difficulties associated with care leavers and required most after- care support. Their needs should not be overlooked even though they seem to benefit least from this assistance.

Costs of Inaction

As summarised in the Transitioning to Independence sub-working group’s Discussion Paper for NFIWG, Morgan Disney & Associates (2006) have estimated that these different cohorts of care leavers cost governments within Australia an average of $40,000 per person per annum, with 55% being in the high-needs, high-cost categories.

These workers projected that the overall cost of support for the group of care leavers they studied, across their life course (ages 16 - 60), is over $2 billion.

However, it must be emphasized that these data were calculated only for those 1150 young people leaving care in 2003-4. If support were to be provided from 18 to 25 years, in 2010 there would be a total of seven cohorts of care leavers eligible to receive assistance. The total number of young people in this group, based on the data published in Child Protection Australia for the years 2003 to 2009, is over 13,000. Using the Morgan Disney average, this would amount to a total annual cost of $520 million, required because of the system’s failure to provide adequate initial support. This is a “hidden” cost in addition to the $2.4 billion annual expenditure by government in dealing with the consequences of child abuse and neglect (Bromfield, Holzer, & Lamont, 2010).

Research in the United States, summarised by Courtney, Dworsky, and Pollack (2007), demonstrated that better outcomes for young people in care were achieved (with a consequent result of significant cost savings because of reduced demand for expensive support services) in states where young people had the option to remain in care after 18 years. This critical research provided the major rationale and impetus for the introduction of special legislation (H.R. 6893: Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008) designed to extend the John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program (CFCIP; introduced in 1999). Section 201 of this Act encourages states to maintain eligible young people “in care” until age 21 years by providing matching federal funding. This is a model that could be considered for introduction in Australia as well.

The CREATE Report Card 2009: Transitioning from Care - Tracking Progress

The CREATE Report Card 2009 (McDowall, 2009) records the most recent data collected throughout Australia from interviews with 275 young people (15 years and over) preparing to leave care and 196 who already were attempting to achieve independence. These young people answered questions designed to reveal how the care systems, developed by state and territory governments, were either equipping them for transition or supporting them in adulthood. The overarching finding was that, while most jurisdictions had appropriate legislation and/or policies in place, and funded a range of services developed to support the identified needs of the young people, the care leavers were not receiving the assistance they required. “On paper” relevant issues appeared to be addressed; unfortunately, in practice, the good intentions distilled from many inquiries and reviews are not translated into useful support for the young people.

Inadequacies were uncovered in all domains of importance in the lives of care leavers, including those articulated in the Looking After Children framework: Housing, Education, Employment (and Finances), Health, Identity, Life Skills, and Relationships. In each area, problems were encountered in three critical Phases of the process of leaving care: (a) the Preparation Phase, which could reflect a gradual introduction during the whole time in care of the concept of “moving on” after reaching 18 years, but must involve clear, detailed planning from when the young person turns 15 years; (b) the actual Transition Phase that includes the leaving of a care environment and the establishment of an independent life; and (c) the After Care Independence Phase in which the young people are living their “interdependent” lives within the community (Mendes & Moslehuddin, 2006), drawing on services and support when necessary.

Preparation Phase

This for many young people could (and perhaps should) be the longest Phase in which the impact of several of the life domains already would be established. Ongoing Health needs and Education should have been addressed as part of life in care, as should Identity and key Relationship formation, and Life Skills development. After age 15, formal Leaving Care planning, in consultation with the young person, should begin; all necessary documentation (birth certificates, personal files, references) should be assembled, and any areas of special need and possible supports identified. All such requirements are to be articulated in a Transition from Care Plan.

However, the CREATE Report Card data indicated that 64% of young people surveyed had no knowledge of such a Plan being in place for them. While governments insist that Plans do exist, if the young people have not been involved in their development, the benefit of the process in setting guidelines for the care leavers’ future is lost. Research could focus on why Planning is breaking down. Possibly caseworkers are lazy or are unaware of their responsibilities in these areas; this is highly unlikely, given the motivation required to work within human services and the legislative framework in which they operate. It is much more likely that if shortcuts are taken it is because of the need to set priorities (acute cases entering the system receiving most attention) because of unrealistic caseloads. Also, large numbers of unallocated cases (eg. see data provided in a Report by the Ombudsman, Victoria, 2009) make it is unclear who would take responsibility for transition planning for such a young person. Relevant organizations (possibly including the Commonwealth government in an overseeing role) must direct more attention to improving the planning process (McDowall, 2010).

Findings from the CREATE Report Card also revealed deficits in specific domain areas that need to be addressed. For example, in Health, 9.5% of care leavers still found managing their health care difficult. Also, females were significantly more likely than males to access health services. For a service that is so necessary and visible within the community, every effort must be made in the preparation phase to ensure that all potential problems young people might face are identified and resolved.

In addition, education planning should be well advanced while the young person is in care. The observation that only 35.3% of care leavers in CREATE’s sample completed year 12 indicates that greater support and encouragement should have been provided to assist those in care to complete their education successfully. A related problem is highlighted by the fact that, of the 27% of young people still in care who already had left school, one-fifth did so because they had been expelled. support through appropriate alternate programs could help get these young people back on track to becoming productive community members.

There also is an expectation that other aspects such as Cultural Identification, Relationship formation, and Life Skills development would be well advanced while young people are in care. It was clear from the CREATE Report Card that young people, particularly Indigenous and those from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse backgrounds, valued contact with siblings and grandparents and wanted more involvement with these family members.

Planning needs to ensure that young people recognise the importance of contact with their community and chosen family, and whatever connections they wish to establish are facilitated. Assessment of their level of Life Skills acquisition when approaching transition (and implementing remedial action if necessary through appropriate programs) would ensure that, in future, 12.6% of care leavers do not report finding the preparation of meals and looking after themselves challenging.

Transition Phase

In the period of Transition, the time for actually leaving care, can be characterized as a “getting established” phase when emphasis is placed on finding a new home base for the young person and addressing immediate financial assistance issues. Data from the CREATE Report Card indicated that support in this period also was lacking. Of the group that had left care, 50% had to leave their placement on turning 18 years; 40% of those didn’t know where they were going to live on leaving. Overall, 34.7% had experienced periods of homelessness in their first year of independence for an average of 31 days. Almost 70% received some form of Centrelink payment (53.7% wholly dependent on this support); 21.3% found the management of finances quite or very hard. Positively, 25.5% were financially self-sufficient; however, 28.5% were unemployed. A further 13.8% were continuing their studies at tertiary institutions.

These observations highlight areas where more support is needed when establishing a new life for a young care leaver. Achieving the aspiration that “no young person should exit care into homelessness“ (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009a) still remains elusive. Special attention needs to be given to achieving familiarity with the Centrelink procedures, given that so many of the young care leavers initially depend on that support. In addition, extra effort should be directed at reducing unemployment in this cohort by helping them find suitable employment or making it easier for them to enroll in suitable education or training programs. Accessibility of transport becomes vital during this period.

After Care Independence Phase

The critical facets of this Phase of transitioning could be classified as Monitoring and Review. A major problem here is that, because of the relatively low priority given to supporting those who already have left care, often it is not clear who should assume responsibility for tracking the progress of these young people. The CREATE Report Card strongly advocated the establishment of dedicated Transition from Care (TFC) workers in major child protection centres within each state / territory. Using the figure of 13000 young people in the community, eligible for receiving support after leaving care, then the number of specialist workers required across Australia (assuming a notional caseload of 30) is 433. Table 1 shows the estimated distribution of workers required over jurisdictions based on the CPA statistics (AIHW, 2009) and the respective costs if the Commonwealth provided 50% subsidy to the states and territories to encourage the establishment of these specialist positions (the overall allocation required for this support would be approximately $14.56 million).

Specialist TFC workers would be responsible for monitoring the outcomes achieved by care leavers in their region. This would require workers keeping in touch with young people and having a record of their contact details. This is not done consistently at present. CREATE has worked on many projects in partnership with child safety departments in which it was necessary to make contact with young people to send them information; unfortunately, often this was not possible because young people could not be located (in some cases this applies even to those still in care).

Another essential function TFC workers would serve is to review young peoples’ progress, identify their current support needs, and in consultation with the young people, review and modify existing plans and proposals. Such reassessment is deemed necessary due to the statements by care leavers in the CREATE Report Card that most of the important issues in their lives, such as those mentioned above, were either not covered in their initial leaving-care plan, or the proposed actions were of little or no value in supporting their transition.

As well as ensuring that particular departmental workers are assigned responsibility for maintaining “official” contact with care leavers over the proposed seven-year transitioning period (18 to 25 years), it also would be important to establish mentoring relationships between the young people and community members to provide a continuous support base for care leavers as they move towards independence. CREATE’s Report Card cited the Victorian tripartite model (Mentoring, Aftercare services, and Brokerage funding) as one worthy of emulation throughout Australia since it deals with the essential layers of support needed by those transitioning from care.

Conclusion

The issues discussed above and the key general solutions proposed make the point that inaction in providing adequate initial support for care leavers will result in significant costs to government now and in the future. As McDowall (2008) observed, making programs available at the time of transition “would minimize the need for…later interventions and would result in considerable economic savings and generate better outcomes for the young people” (p. 18).

The remainder of this Report details the procedures followed in consulting with young people about current critical transitioning issues, and proposes a number of actions that the care leavers comprising CREATE’s National Youth Advisory Council suggested could be taken by governments to address the identified problems.