1. Intake
Purpose
Child Safety Services has a legislative responsibility to respond to information received about harm or risk of harm to a child, or an unborn child who may be at risk of harm after he or she is born. The purpose of intake is to receive information about child protection concerns from community members and other agencies, provide a response to the information in accordance with the responsibilities of Child Safety Services, inform the community about the role of Child Safety Services and provide information about child protection services.
Key steps
- Gather information about the child and family
- Assess the information and decide the response
- Record the response
- Provide information to another CSSC or other agencies
What ifs - responding to specific areas of intake
Standards
- All notifiers are treated professionally and with respect.
- Information is systematically gathered and analysed with decision-making guided by the structured decision making assessments.
- Child protection history checks are conducted and assessed prior to the decision about the response by Child Safety Services.
- The recognised entity is given a meaningful opportunity to participate in the decision about whether concerns for an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander child are recorded as a notification (Child Protection Act 1999, section 6).
- Any suspected criminal offence in relation to alleged harm to a child is reported immediately to the QPS (Child Protection Act 1999, section 14(2)).
- The information is recorded in ICMS in a timely manner.
Practice skills (key areas for reflection)
- Did I engage well with the notifier and would they feel confident to re-contact Child Safety Services in the future?
- Did I clarify information with the notifier to make sure I clearly understood their concerns?
- Did I gather all the information possible about the child, their family and other household members?
- Have I integrated all of the information gathered and critically analysed all the risk and protective factors when deciding whether there is a reasonable suspicion that a child is in need of protection?
- Is my assessment of the intake information holistic and focused on the child's safety and well-being?
- Have I considered what supports can be provided to this child and family?
Authority
- Child Protection Act 1999, section 6-11, 14, 21, 21A, 22, 122, 159M, 159O and 186
- Policy no. 528-1: Intake
- Policy no. 111-1: Operation of the case management protocol between commonwealth agencies and state/territory welfare authorities for unsupported young people and the provision of youth support payment
- Policy no. 372-2: Recordkeeping
- Last updated
- 22 July 2009
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