Photo: 123RF
The Children's Commissioner says there are not enough safety nets to protect children from harm.
On Thursday, a report by the Aroturuki Tamariki - Independent Children's Monitor found at-risk children are no safer now than they were after a series of recommendations after the horrific death of a 5-year-old Malachi Subecz.
Subecz had suffered months of abuse at the hands of his carer, Michaela Barriball, including being beaten and burned, before he was murdered in November 2021. Barriball will spend at least 17 years in prison over his death.
Malachi Subecz. Photo: Supplied
In the wake of his death, a review by Dame Karen Poutasi was commissioned and six government agencies reviewed their work.
But the latest report - Towards a stronger safety net to prevent abuse of children - stated: "We are not confident that tamariki in similar situations to Malachi are any more likely to be seen, or kept safe by the system, than they were when Malachi died."
Children's Commissioner Claire Achmed said the safety of children needed to be urgently prioritised by the government.
She told Morning Report it needed to step up and act so not one more child dies of abuse, of harm in their home.
"These agencies aren't sufficiently interacting and hardwiring in a true focus on putting children at the centre, and that is what I'm still really concerned about, because it means that these children are going unseen, unlistened to, to the degree that they need to be," Achmed said.
"I think if children were being put at the very centre of this system, we would have seen the ICM report coming through with more progress having been found."
She said we needed to build stronger partnerships between our statutory child protection system and our community-based child protection system.
