National parenting support strategy could strengthen Australia's efforts to protect children

National parenting support strategy could strengthen Australia's efforts to protect children Sadie Harley Scientific Editor Andrew Zinin Chief Editor Australia has no shortage of policies relating to children. In fact, these policies are often in the headlines. Billions of dollars are invested each year trying to improve outcomes for children and young people. Yet we continue to see stubbornly high rates of child maltreatment and family violence, mental ill-health, school disengagement, youth offending and child protection system involvement. The problem may not be that we are doing the wrong things. It may be that our policy architecture lacks the most important piece of the puzzle: parents. Inconsistent support For three decades, I have examined child maltreatment, child protection systems and family welfare. Across these areas, one theme repeatedly emerges: we are remarkably willing to invest in systems that respond to problems, but much less willing to invest in parents—the people who have the greatest influence on children's lives. Parenting is one of the strongest determinants of child well-being. Warm, responsive, consistent parenting is associated with better mental health, stronger educational outcomes, healthier relationships and lower risks of abuse, neglect, violence and offending. But for all its importance, parenting remains largely invisible in policy. Support for parents is fragmented, inconsistent and often only available once families reach a crisis point. We have pockets of excellent practice, but these don't add up to a coherent national parenting support system. Imagine if we approached health this way. We would never expect better health outcomes if we only invested in hospitals and ambulances, and not primary care physicians and vaccination programs. Yet when it comes to parenting, we often treat support as optional, episodic or targeted only to "problem" families. Missed opportunities One of the most significant findings from the Australian Child Maltreatment Study was not simply that child maltreatment is common. It was that many Australians experience multiple forms of harm. Abuse, neglect, family violence, bullying and adversity rarely occur in isolation. Harms accumulate across childhood and often have lifelong consequences for health, education, employment and relationships. These findings reinforce the fact that we can't rely solely on statutory child protection services to solve problems that often emerge long before a notification is made. By the time a child comes to the attention of child protection authorities, opportunities for prevention may already have been missed. This is why many researchers and policy leaders have advocated for a public health approach to child well-being and safety. Rather than focusing on responses after serious harm has occurred, public health approaches seek to reduce risk factors, strengthen protective factors and provide support across the whole population. But to do this, we need to include parents. Invisible parents Parents go unmentioned across a broad range of policy areas. In youth justice, debate often focuses on policing, detention, sentencing and community safety. Yet decades of research show many young people who enter youth justice systems have experienced significant adversity, including abuse, neglect, family violence and family disruption. When governments discuss youth offending, parenting is often mentioned only in the language of responsibility for what has happened—not with a preventive lens. If we genuinely want fewer young people entering justice systems, we must think ahead. That means supporting parents and caregivers long before problems emerge or become entrenched. The same pattern appears in child sexual abuse prevention. In the midst of last year's safety crisis in early childhood centers, we interviewed parents about their role. They want to keep children safe, but many lack confidence, resources or opportunities to learn how to talk with their child about body safety and consent or recognize grooming or other signs of harm. The same lesson emerges from contemporary debates about consent and respectful relationships education. Across Australia, schools are being asked to deliver education on consent, respectful relationships, gender-based violence and online safety. Schools have a crucial role to play, but they can't do it alone. Research with school leaders, parents and communities consistently points to the importance of school–family partnerships. Children develop attitudes about consent and respect through everyday interactions with parents, siblings and the broader community, not just at school. When parents are engaged and supported, school-based violence prevention education becomes more powerful. When parents feel excluded, uncertain or ill-equipped to continue conversations at home, opportunities for learning are diminished. What would better policy look like? Social policies with a bigger role for parents would normalize parenting support as something for all families, not just those in crisis. They would make evidence-based resources easy to access through trusted universal services such as maternity care, child health services and schools. Effective policy should recognize that parenting challenges evolve over time. The support needed by a parent of a newborn differs from the support needed by parents navigating online harms or adolescent mental health difficulties, for example. A modern parenting strategy would also promote diversity, seeking to support all manner of care arrangements and cultures. Supporting parents isn't about blaming them or suggesting they alone determine children's outcomes. Children's well-being is also shaped by a range of things, from housing to poverty to education. But because parenting is so important, it deserves more attention, not less. If we are serious about doing better at protecting and raising children, parents are key. This means not treating parenting as an invisible private matter and recognizing it as essential social infrastructure. Provided by The Conversation This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.