Child Protection caseloads down

Caseload figures per child safety officer have reduced from 32 cases per officer at the time of the CMC report in late 2003 to 21 cases per officer at the end of 2006.

Child Safety Minister Desley Boyle said: “The enormous investment by the Beattie Government is paying off by bringing caseloads down despite the huge surge in reports of suspected abuse that flooded in to the new Department in its first years.”

“There’s no question that some offices still carry workloads that are too high and we continue to tackle this issue.

“Out of 48 offices, the offices of concern in terms of caseload include South Burnett, Mackay, Atherton, Ipswich, Woodridge, Logan Central, and Loganlea. Many of these offices are in high growth areas which has pushed up demand.

“That is why we have been working with the Queensland Public Sector Union on workforce modelling to establish criteria for what workloads are acceptable in different circumstances.

“This work has recently been completed and presented to staff and the QPSU and initial feedback has been positive.

“This new tool will allow us to allocate resources to areas of greatest need.

“It comes as our new IT system is now up and running giving staff instant access to state-wide records which should help to speed up case work.

“Importantly, the new IT system also enables managers to see exactly how many cases each officer has and how advanced they are with each case so that managers can assign new work based on who is best able to take it on.

Child Safety Minister Desley Boyle for the first time also released attrition rates for each of the seven Child Safety zones across the state.

“Ipswich and Western zone at close to 22% and the Northern zone at more than 18% stand out.

“People change jobs for a variety of reasons and with the labour shortage workers are in high demand and are more mobile than ever before.

“However, staff turnover is a world wide problem for child protection workers because while rewarding it is also often a challenging and stressful job. We have improved training with new officers now undergoing six months on-the-job training. There is also better support for officers,” Ms Boyle said.

Total Staff Attrition - Department of Child Safety by Zone

Source: Corporatelink HRIS extraction.

Notes:

·The attrition rate was calculated as total permanent separations over an average permanent headcount (for the department over the current financial year period 1/7/2006 - 1/4/2007).

Ends

Media contact: 3224 7477

11 April 2007