Policy and reform
Having disability supports involved made a child protection report less likely to get a caseworker
The NSW Ombudsman investigated how the Department of Communities and
Justice handles reports that a child is at risk of significant harm. In 2024-25 the department
received 244,710 of them and closed 64 per cent without
allocating a caseworker, on a stated reason of lack of capacity or competing priorities
.
The Ombudsman made findings of maladministration. Buried in the pattern of what got
de-prioritised is a line this sector should read twice: In cases involving children or
carers with disability, the involvement of other services was too often treated as a reason
not to allocate a ROSH report to a caseworker.
30 August 2026 · from the Ombudsman’s own report · 1 source
What the investigation was
An own motion investigation, meaning the Ombudsman started it rather than responding to a
complaint, into the
practice of closing a large proportion of reports it receives about risks of significant harm
(ROSH) to children and young persons without a face-to-face assessment, and without being
assured that the child is not at ROSH.
Deciding whether a child is at risk of significant harm is, as the report puts it,
typically the first step in considering any child protection intervention
, and one of
DCJ’s core responsibilities under the Children and Young Persons (Care and Protection) Act
1998.
The scale
The two numbers are the story on their own. In 2024-25, DCJ received 244,710 ROSH
reports.
And: Based on a stated reason of lack of capacity or competing priorities, DCJ
closed 64% of these reports without allocating them to a caseworker for further assessment.
The Ombudsman is direct about what that has become. Closing cases on resource grounds
has become ‘business as usual’ and a tolerated cultural norm within DCJ
, and
the department’s triage policy, under which a report not allocated within 28 days is to be
closed, is not consistent with DCJ’s statutory responsibilities under the Care
Act.
Which reports lost out
This is where it becomes a disability story. The report describes
concerning practices when deciding which ROSH reports receive a response
, and says a staff
survey confirmed anecdotal evidence that performance targets had created an incentive for
some staff to preference or avoid allocating certain ROSH reports.
Two kinds of report were named as losing out. Those with
less immediate but longer-term risks to the child – such as chronic neglect, whether
medical or educational
. And then the disability finding, quoted in full at the top of this
piece: where a child or a carer had disability, the fact that other services were already
involved was too often treated as a reason not to send a caseworker.
Read plainly, that is disability support being counted as a substitute for a child protection assessment. The services around a family are not there to establish whether a child is at risk of significant harm, and the Ombudsman’s point is that they were being allowed to stand in for the assessment that would.
Our view, and it is a view. Of everything in this investigation, this is the finding most likely to be read as reassuring and is not. A family with disability supports in place looks, on a triage screen, like a family already being seen by somebody. The report says that appearance was doing work it should not have been doing.
What happens next
The Ombudsman made findings of maladministration, including
by reason of being inconsistent with statutory responsibilities
, and recommendations
covering Policy review and reform; legislative review; staff training.
Four
recommendations were made and, the report records, all four were accepted by DCJ.
A full report of the investigation was tabled as a special report to Parliament in February
2026.
Acceptance is not implementation, and the recommendations name a legislative review, which is not a quick thing. What the report does not say, and what nobody has published, is whether the 64 per cent has moved since.
How we did this
Everything here comes from the NSW Ombudsman’s Casebook July 2026: Investigations and complaint-handling case studies, a report to Parliament, read directly on 30 August 2026. Every quotation is verbatim and every figure is the Ombudsman’s.
We have read the Casebook’s account of this investigation, not the full special report, which the Casebook says was tabled separately in February 2026. So the methodology behind the disability finding, how often it occurred and how it was identified, is not something we can describe, and we have not implied otherwise.
This is a child protection investigation and only one of its findings is specific to disability. We have said so rather than presenting the whole investigation as a disability matter. We name no individual, no family and no case.
The paragraph beginning Our view
is opinion, built on the findings quoted above.
Sources
- NSW Ombudsman, Casebook July 2026: Investigations and complaint-handling case studies, report to Parliament, read 30 August 2026: the own motion investigation and its scope, the 244,710 ROSH reports in 2024-25 and the 64 per cent closed without allocation, the stated reason of lack of capacity or competing priorities, the business-as-usual characterisation, the 28 day triage policy and its inconsistency with the Care Act, the staff survey and performance-target finding, the chronic neglect and disability de-prioritisation findings, the maladministration findings, the four accepted recommendations, and the February 2026 special report to Parliament.
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