Union state secretary Tom Lynch said the situation was particularly bad in the state’s regional areas, like the North-West, where staff retention and recruitment was difficult and numbers were thin on the ground.

He said he was aware of one officer who should have a caseload of 15 children but was carrying 58.

Human Services Minister Jacquie Petrusma said in the budget, there was more than $51 million for the redesign of child safety services, out-of-home care, and the child safety services computer system upgrade.

She said under the redesign initiative, 31 new child safety services positions were announced with 19 of these to be filled over the next 12 months.

“All these initiatives will provide child safety services staff with more resources and support, as well as provide extra support for vulnerable children,” Ms Petrusma said.

But Mr Lynch said the 19 new positions were not exclusively for on-the-ground child safety officers.

The union had demanded at least 20 officer positions, at a cost of $2.5 million.

“That would give us the capacity with the current child in care to make sure that they all had assigned a child safety officer within the caseload caps,” Mr Lynch said.

“Giving workers acceptable caseloads will improve morale, reduce turnover, and people would be more attracted to careers in Child Safety Services.

“There are 320 children today who are in excess of the caseload caps, and therefore, not getting the support that they deserve and will continue to be at high-risk.”

Last week’s budget papers revealed that the service is struggling to met investigation timelines.

The aim is to have investigations concluded 28 days from a notification but the proportion of investigations that met this target had decreased from 34.7 per cent in 2014-15 to 19.7 per cent in 2015-16.