Australian Childhood Foundation calls for election commitment to fund counselling, in the Shoalhaven and beyond

The Australian Childhood Foundation - which provides specialist trauma counselling to kids in out of home care through its OurSPACE program - wants the major parties to commit vital funds at this election.

In the Shoalhaven, there are an estimated 50 to 80 kids in out of home care, and relying on the ACF's specialist trauma counselling.

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Australian Childhood Foundation CEO Dr Joe Tucci said the ACF's OurSPACE is at capacity with its counselling; the waitlist is always long, and the number of kids known to be in need stretches into the thousands.

The service is under-resourced and needs more support, he said.

"At a local level, in a year there's 50 to 80 kids; across the state the waitlist is about 70 to 100 kids at any one time," Dr Tucci said.

"We know there are at least 3000 children across the state that have had a placement breakdown in the last six months, and they are to the most significant risk to have a whole range of downstream consequences - not finishing school, having mental health problems, or getting into youth crime.

"OurSPACE can really only deal with about 400 kids every year, and there's a lot of children out there that need this level of support."

The foundation's OurSPACE has become an key part of the out of home care system; is is funded by the NSW Department of Communities and Justice.

Dr Tucci explained that the counselling helps kids who have been removed from their family because they are not safe, and have experienced abuse and neglect.

It helps them to recover from trauma, and enables them to stay with a family long term.

The program also educates the carers looking after the kids, so carers understand how trauma affects their developing brains.

"Whoever forms government after the election needs to understand, that these kids not only need a safe family to be with, but they need specialist intervention to make the most of that safety," he said.

Research from the Australian Childhood Foundation showed that the most traumatised and vulnerable children and young people fared the most poorly in the child protection and out of home care system.

Cases in the OurSPACE program had suffered from a range of serious developmental and mental health problems including poor peer relationships (86 percent), anxiety (84 percent)) sleep deprivation (84 percent) and poor self-esteem (83 percent).

Almost half of the children and young people had been diagnosed with developmental delay and were failing to thrive early in their life.

The research also revealed more than half of the children and young people experienced poor educational trajectories, falling significantly behind their peers academically. Almost one in two were reported as not attending school or had attended four or more schools in the past 12 months.

Once in the program, they experienced a reduction in trauma symptoms; fewer were engaging in criminal activity; most had better stability in their placement, and were engaging more in school.

Pointing to previous inquiries into out of home care, Dr Tucci said the NSW system is not working to help as it should.

"The system is retraumatizing the very children it is designed to protect and care for," he said.

"The first thing is, I don't think the system is focused enough on ensuring stability and placement for children - the lack of stability really affects children's development.

"The second thing it hasn't learned is the need for therapeutic responses so they can heal from the trauma they've experienced.

"These kids have been sexually abused; physically abused; seen their mums often be victims of domestic violence, or been physically assaulted themselves.

"For a little seven-year-old to recover from that, to heal from the sense of danger and threat, is now part and parcel of why they need real specialist support."

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