Outcomes for children living in families with parental substance misuse and mental health issues can include poor school outcomes, early substance use, early involvement with the justice system and mental health problems. This chapter will discuss how families require acknowledgement and support for these and related problems such as ongoing stressors, including parenting difficulties, financial adversity and limited social connectedness. We know that outcomes for children raised in families with parental substance misuse or mental illness can be poor, with compromised outcomes from early infancy to adulthood well documented. These include impaired cognitive development and educational attainment, adolescent substance misuse and antisocial behavior, and mental health issues (Kuppens et al., 2020). In order to improve outcomes for children, families need to be provided with a therapeutic support plan that takes into a consideration the interplay between substance misuse and mental illness and other risk factors, such as intergenerational trauma, domestic violence, and socioeconomic disadvantage.

The third edition of this book continues to focus on practice with families experiencing vulnerabilities in order to promote wellbeing and prevent violence abuse and neglect. Since the publication of the last edition of this book, global events have highlighted our collective vulnerabilities. Indeed, the word ‘unprecedented’ seems to be the word of our times - being used to describe the COVID19 global pandemic, catastrophic bushfires, floods and other disasters, mass migrations of people fleeing conflict zones and uninhabitable lands, and the global financial crisis. These events have not only increased our collective vulnerability, they have also shone a light on the disproportionate burden carried by some families and children, frequently due to structural and social inequality, and other vulnerabilities. Society’s soul and its commitment to creating a just and equitable society where children and their families can thrive has been laid bare. Global social justice movements have also gained momentum – exemplifying part of humanity’s eternal stance towards resisting oppression and inequality.

Supporting families during disaster recovery will be a growing focus for practitioners as the impacts of anthropogenic climate change intensify in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. This chapter outlines the key considerations in working with communities affected by disasters, and highlights best practice examples for building connectedness and psychological resilience. The effects of anthropogenic climate change (i.e., changes caused or influenced by people, either directly or indirectly) are widespread and rapidly intensifying. A lack of political and corporate action in addressing increasing greenhouse gases, land degradation and loss of biodiversity has exacerbated conditions for disasters and pandemics. Within Australia, changing climate conditions have resulted in longer and more severe bushfire seasons, shifting patterns and intensity of tropical cyclones, increased flooding, and periods of drought. This chapter will focus on the individual and community impacts of geological (e.g. earthquakes, landslides, and volcanoes) and climatic disasters (e.g. cylcones, bushfires, and drought), and the ways that practitioners can work with families to support their recovery.

Attachment theory is relevant in decision-making in out-of-home care as children’s early life experiences and relationships affect their wellbeing, sense of security, and future relationships (Bowlby, 1969). This chapter describes the development of attachment theory and key concepts, cultural considerations, use of attachment theory in child protection practice and practice examples of how attachment theory may be misunderstood and misapplied in out-of-home care. Attachment is a theory of how humans develop the capacity to form and maintain emotional relationships, and how these relationships influence our development and sense of self and others. In early life, attachment figures are typically parents, but over the course of development attachments can also form in other significant relationships. Children learn to regulate their emotions and behaviour through the attachment relationship. An attachment figure provides a ‘secure base’ and ‘safe haven’ from which to explore. In response to patterns of interaction, the child forms an attachment type, which is an adaptation to caregiver behaviour.

Staff genuinely seeking to improve their cultural competency can make a lasting positive impact on intergenerational migrant and refugee families seeking or coming into contact with their services. Collectivism, intensified patriarchy, white privilege, and neoliberalism are all critical lenses for understanding how to work well with them as they parent in a new land. These issues are discussed by drawing on the authors’ lived experiences and recent research. Australia and New Zealand (Aotearoa) are multicultural societies. In Australia approximately 21% of people speak a non-English language at home and in New Zealand 25.9% have an ethnicity that is not European or Māori (Stats NZ, 2019). Naming this group is challenging. In Australia, for example, ‘culturally and linguistically diverse’ (CALD) superseded ‘non-English speaking background (NESB) as the official term used in social policy in 1996 because it was seen as better for drawing attention to culture and not just language, and for not homogenising the people and generations it intends to encompass.

Social workers and other professionals often become involved in the lives of families due to concerns about the safety and wellbeing of children. Interventions that address such concerns by harnessing the protective and nurturing capacity of parents, and other carers, are a vital focus for work with families. However, children are rights-bearing citizens deserving of services and supports in their own right. This chapter therefore argues for a rights-based, relational approach to practice that is inclusive of children. The chapter draws on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) as a framework for supporting children as rights-bearing citizens with their own agency and decision-making capacity, and argues for relationship-based practice with children and families. The chapter explores how the guiding principles of the UNCRC can inform practice at the level of the individual child, the family, and the community, to increase engagement with, and to improve outcomes for, children. The UNCRC defines a child as any person from birth up to 18 years of age.

Fathers can have a significant impact on family functioning and children’s well-being and trajectory as an adult. There are contested perspectives on how to understand fathering and its influence on children’s development and wellbeing. Across these often contrasting perspectives, there has been a growing acknowledgement that the impact, positive or negative, of fathering is inseparable from the context in which the father and child are embedded. Knowledge on fathering has become more nuanced moving beyond the narrow focus on the impact on children due to the presence or absence of fathers within families. The emerging evidence base tells us that fathers who remain present but are harsh, neglectful or abusive actually have a more detrimental impact on child outcomes then an absent father. There often remains a tension where fathers who have problematic and unsafe parenting often assert positive intentions to be a caring and safe parent. Indeed, there may be a large gap between their behavioural self and their aspirational self when it comes to parenting and partnering.

There is a growing realisation that many varied and complex problems, from global warming to crime, infectious diseases, and child abuse and neglect, cannot be solved by one service sector or ‘silo’. This realisation has led to greater efforts to create ‘joined up’ approaches. This chapter explores how service providers can offer more holistic responses, and how different sectors such as health, education, housing, employment and social services can work together effectively. The first part of this chapter explores how practitioner and organisational roles can develop to respond more holistically to families with multiple and complex needs. The second part of this chapter explores how practitioners need to understand and manage the potential for conflict when working across such boundaries if this goal is to be achieved. As the close relationship between problems such as poverty, mental illness, homelessness, substance misuse, unemployment, crime, antisocial behaviour, poor health, low literacy and child abuse and neglect is increasingly understood, new ways of thinking and responding to this challenge are emerging.

Māori people are known as tangata whenua, the indigenous people of the land of Aotearoa New Zealand who traditionally existed in tribal collectives on customary lands with distinctive cultural identities. This chapter explores the evolutionary journey Māori whānau have undergone; from their inception and arrival in Aotearoa, to the effects of colonisation with the arrival of settlers, and the subsequent cultural revitalisation that led to their transformation. Whānau are the primary social unit of traditional Māori society which was multilevel, interconnected, collectivist and protective. In the Māori language, the word whānau means to be born, denoting a kinship affiliation by birth. Whānau groups were traditionally located in villages which formed sub-tribes known as hapū. Numbers of hapū situated in defined geographical territories formed tribal collectives known as iwi, and each iwi governed by a Chief (rangatira). Māori and non-Māori anthropologists described that whānau typically consisted of up to three generations living collectively and harmoniously on their traditional lands with an agreed language, belief system and values that guided their lifestyles.

Connections to family and culture are integral to the well-being of Aboriginal children. Australia’s colonial policies of child removal sought to fracture Indigenous Kinship systems and continue to have deep and intergenerational impacts on Indigenous communities. Family-led decision-making approaches are discussed as processes that can encourage participation of Aboriginal families but that are often implemented in systems that continue to fail to recognise Indigenous people’s right to collective self-determination. This chapter focuses on family-led decision-making approaches as a family-inclusive practice in the child protection context. Understanding the context of this practice as it relates to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, families and communities is crucial to developing an understanding of the merits and limitations of approaches taken to family-led decision-making.

To work effectively with children, young people, and families experiencing vulnerabilities, practitioners need to understand risk and protective factors that influence children’s safety and development. They also require familiarity with policy and practice frameworks that underpin responsive and critically reflective practice. Increasingly, workers are required to engage in trauma-informed, ethical practice, as discussed in this chapter. Risk and protective factors that contribute to, or shield children from, child abuse and/or neglect are present in all families, to a greater or lesser extent, and at different points in the family life cycle. Fortunately, most children thrive within their families and communities. An understanding of risk factors in child maltreatment, and the factors that protect children from maltreatment helps us to identify children and young people likely to experience poorer outcomes and to provide them with support.

Pregnancy and childbirth are critical transitions for women and their families, but also bring new risks and stressors. For many young women, antenatal care is their first major encounter with the health system. As such, opportunities exist to identify and receive support For issues such as intimate partner abuse, mental illness or ongoing impacts of childhood abuse. Pregnancy and childbirth also afford opportunities to engage men as fathers and explore women’s access to the supports to assist meet the challenges of parenting. For some women, pregnancy brings grief/loss or difficult decisions. Pregnancy is a major transition for young women affecting a large proportion of the population. Over 300 000 babies are born in Australia each year. Although this is a natural part of the human life cycle, it is not without risks. Pregnancy and childbirth are periods of major transition for women, with a range of factors that can contribute to negative outcomes and new roles to navigate.

Being a young person can be hard. It is the developmental period of someone’s life where you start to question who you are, and where you fit in. For many, it is a rite of passage into becoming an adult with shared responsibilities and a sense of belonging and purpose. For others, it can be a difficult transition based on your perceived support and access to resources. This chapter will further explore the terrain of being a teenager alongside support we can provide as professional practitioners. According to developmental psychologists and researchers, the adolescent period of life is complex and varied. According to the World Health Organization, adolescence may generally occur between the ages of 10 and 19. It is also suggested that it can be up to the age of 24 and 25. Globally, the definition of youth can also vary in socio-political contexts, with some prescribing the upper age of 35. Our local legislation within Australia provides further definition, with many western countries signposting the age of 18 as when you become an adult, with the rights and responsibilities to exercise your democratic right to vote, and legally consume alcohol.