When the unimaginable happens, such as having a child removed and taken into care, Parent Partners are helping parents to navigate the Child Protection System in Newcastle, NSW.
We are proud to support the Parent Peer Support Project, with partners Family Inclusion Strategies in the Hunter.
About Parent Partners
The project employs a team of parents with a lived experience of having a child removed and placed in care. Parent partners have successfully navigated the child protection system in the past and want to use their experience to help others. The project is a pilot project currently funded til mid 2020 by the Law and Justice Foundation, NSW.
How the project works
Parent partners support people in court, they provide opportunities for parents to connect with other parents and with Parent Partners in the community and they have developed a series of information resources that help educate parents about this very complicated system. While they don’t provide legal advice, they do listen and provide helpful ideas from their own lives, having walked this same path in the past.
“We know what it’s like to have children removed and placed in care. It is hard and exhausting, and you feel alone. It can really help to get support and information from people who have been there and who understand what it’s like.”
— Parent Partner
Why Parent Partners are so important
We know that children do better when their parents can participate in court and other child protection processes and we know parents are better able to participate in this process if they are supported to do so. Parent Partners offer the best outcomes for children in care as it supports parents at a stressful and vulnerable time, when key decisions are being made about their children’s future.
When are they available?
Every Thursday the Parent Partners are available to support parents in Children’s Court in Broadmeadow, NSW. See the flyer for more information. The group also run a morning tea on the 4th Monday of every month.
