Barnardos’ Submission into the National Child Welfare Strategy

Abstract

Barnardos welcomes the opportunity to input into the drafting of the National Child Welfare Strategy. This is an important development and fits in with the overall National Children’s Strategy (2000), whose three overarching goals are that children will have a voice, children’s lives will be better understood and children will receive quality supports and services. Child welfare is the broad range of activities designed to benefit children, promote their well being, and strengthen or assure provision for meeting their physical, social, emotional and educational needs1 . This definition usefully illustrates that the welfare of children is the responsibility of their families and a wide range of professionals including social workers, paediatricians, nurses, teachers, psychologists, psychiatrists and foster carers operating through the statutory or NGO sectors. As a result the national welfare strategy must be inclusive of all these key actors to ensure its effectiveness although the dominate focus will be on the provision and delivery of family support services.