A Human Services Department spokesman said the unassigned cases in the North were either assessed as priority two or three and would be assigned to case managers in the interim.

He said there were no priority-one cases yet to be allocated in the state.

“As per policy, all priority-one cases are commenced on the same day,” the spokesman said.

“Cases yet to be assigned to a designated case worker are actively triaged with oversight provided by senior staff who will escalate the urgency of allocation as required.”

The government in October implemented a temporary team in the North to deal with an influx of child protection notifications which have not been allocated to child safety officers.

It was understood there were up to 148 unassigned notification cases which were mostly based in the North.

The government on the weekend advertised vacancies for child safety officers as part of its plan to boost the workforce by 25 positions and employ other frontline staff.

Human Services Minister Roger Jaensch said these positions were in addition to the 10 more child safety officers which were recruited in September.

The Department of Health and Human Services annual report, which was tabled in Parliament last month, showed there was a lower rate statewide of child safety notifications in 2017-18 than the previous three years.