Tasmania's Children's Commissioners latest assessment kids in care

In Leanne McLean's latest monitoring report on the out-of-home care sector, just 47.1 per cent of visits were made within the required time frame, which represented a drop of 9.1 per cent on the previous year.

In response to the decline, the Department of Education, Children and Youth People said the statistic reflected a change in approach by the department's care team.

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"Child safety officers are part of that community of support, but must work side by side with other people who know and care about the child who are critical in providing long-term and sustainable relationships," the department stated.

"Care teams enable children to nominate people who are important to them and who they trust to support them."

Ms McLean's new report found that between 2020-21 and 2021-22, the number of children in care in Tasmania declined overall, but Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in care increased.

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She noted that Tasmania continued to have the third highest rate of children in care among all Australian states and territories.

Ms McLean said there remained to be a lack of detailed data about whether children in care had a disability.

She said active foster care households continued to decline in 2021-22.

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Ms McLean said expenditure data continued to show a decline in government investment in the out-of-home care system in Tasmania compared to 2020-21.

"Over the last 10 years, there has been an overall upwards trend in the amount that the Tasmanian Government invests in care services," she noted in her report.

"However, since a peak in 2018-19, government investment, as measured by real recurrent expenditure across both residential and non-residential out-of-home care services, has declined by $18.9 million or 19.6 per cent.

"Overall investment by the Tasmanian Government per child for both residential and non-residential care has remained similar with a slightly greater increase in investment in residential care over the last two years."

Children and Youth Minister Roger Jaensch said the state government invested $60 million each year into out-of-home care services for family-based care, salaried care packages, sibling group care, residential care, emergency care and respite care.

"Costs associated with out-of-home care vary year on year depending on the number of children requiring care, and the intensity of the care they need," he said.

"There has been no reduction in program funding."

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