Queensland government finds hilarity in child safety issues

Queensland's child safety minister, Phil Reeves

How's this for sensitivity? There are, let's say, 'issues' with the Queensland Department of Child Safety. A few things that probably need to be addressed. The Australian publishes an article and describes how a young mother who was not only brutally raped but witnessed her boyfriend and two others beaten to death by the same perpetrators, had her young son removed from her care by the Department. They took him one week after she was raped.

She has barely seen him since, and she will never regain custody of him, because he is in the care of the minister until the age of 18.

The young mother wants to tell her story.

She wants to identify herself and explain that she didn't expect a fight to break out that night, and that she did all she could to save her son.

She is not guilty of any offence.

But the law prevents The Australian from identifying her because it would identify her child. "I don't really know what started things off that night (but) I lost my son because I had him in a bad environment," she said.

"If I was a mind-reader I would have rung the cops before it all started, but I can't go back in time and change that."

Amanda Gearing covered the trial for the local newspapers in Queensland.

"I don't know how much child safety interviewed her or how much they found out about what she did or why she was there or what her mothering ability was," she said.

"Suffice to say they took the child into custody.

"Now for a woman who has just been most viciously raped multiple times by a pair of killers to then have her only child removed with not very much, maybe, research or background would have been a most unspeakably painful thing to happen to her."

Now, there is apparently no doubt that this woman's boyfriend was a dodgy character mixed up in some dodgy business. She had the kid in a bad environment, sure. But to be given no chance at reforming her life and raising her son? That's a life sentence for someone who is already a victim.

I'm sure you're with me here when I say that nothing about this case would suggest that it's a laughing matter, right?

Well, in the course of research for the article, The Australian naturally sought comment from the Queensland Child Safety Minister, Phil Reeves.

Mr Reeves declined to be interviewed. A reasonable person might call that cowardice- especially if there was a solid explanation for the Department's treatment of the young mother- or of the family in the other case mentioned in the published article, the family whose 8 month old baby died while in foster care. However, the response to the issue by one of Reeves' own advisors was nothing short of sickening.

A senior media advisor for Mr Reeves, Matthew Hyde, tried forwarding on the briefing and accompanying questions provided The Australian. Mr Matthew Hyde obviously accidentally hit 'reply' when he meant to hit 'forward', unintentionally sending a response to The Australian that was extremely revealing of the Queensland Government's attitude toward the matter:


"Try not to laugh," he wrote.

How out of touch, how much of an inhuman monster would you have to be, to find anything remotely funny about the story? Taxpayers are paying this scumbag's salary... If we had a decent government in this state we would have seen his head roll the day after the item was published.