Psychology
The Care and Protection Act (1998) defines out-of-home care as the provision of residential care and control that is accorded to children or young individuals, either for a fee, reward or gain.
Approaches of out-of-home care include:
Foster care- This is centered on the provision of care to a young individual by a substitute family
Kinship care- Care offered by an individual with pre-existing ties with the individual concerned,
Residential care- It focuses on individuals of 10-17 years and has the role of providing a stable environment for living that fosters life and work skills to an individual,
In Australia, children courts are in existence in a mission to protect children and deal with welfare matters. The courts deal with abandonment issues of children, also, those that have been neglected and mistreated as well as those that generally lack adequate parental guidance, ‘delinquents’. Although they may differ in structure in different states of Australia, they operate under standard principles of child welfare, such as adoption of similar conflict resolution strategies and the heart of their proceedings focus on children’s welfare and rights (Tilbury 2013)
Furthermore, courts take into account the psychological and social needs of children cases and determine their decisions based on the outcome of this assessment. Different courts are in existence to handle the different nature of cases presented to them. For instance, specialist courts are those that has limited jurisdiction and overseen by judges that specialize in that specific field.
Regardless of nature of court, the legal system has special provisions when it comes to childcare and in the determination of the best alternative that will allow a holistic development of the child or young individual concerned.
References
Children and Young Persons. Care and Protection Act, 1998
Tilbury, C. 2013. Therapeutic opportunities lost. Australian Journal of family law, vol. 27.
