Will mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse improve or harm child protection?

As the 6th National Child Protection and Welfare Conference gets underway in UCC, social workers are asking if mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse will improve or harm their ability to protect children, writes Health Correspondent Catherine Shanahan.

Middle-class kids bush-drinking on a Saturday night, children wearing summer clothes in winter months — not the kind of issues you’d expect to be referred to child protection services, but it happens.

The examples are cited at a roundtable discussion with a group of social workers concerned that the existing child welfare and protection system is in no way ready for the imminent introduction of mandatory reporting.