Case planning

For children where sexual abuse is a concern, the primary goal of case planning is to address underlying risks and strengthen protective factors, enabling the safety and support network to take responsibility for the child’s long-term safety. Effective interventions should support meaningful changes by addressing immediate harm indicators identified in the safety assessment, as well as factors that increase risk or vulnerability to future harm.

When concerns involve the child’s harmful sexual behaviours, case planning must focus on addressing the individual drivers, behavioural pathways, and contributing circumstances within the family system.

Include actions to support the healing and recovery of children and their family in case plans. Sexual abuse during childhood, especially when perpetrated by a trusted adult, harms children psychologically and physically. It can disrupt brain development, emotional regulation, and a survivor’s sense of self. 

Childhood sexual abuse is a significant risk factor for suicide, suicidal ideation and self-harm. Reducing the likelihood of poor outcomes for a child who has been sexually abused relies on supporting the child and their family to engage with therapeutic supports.

Strategies to address underlying risk factors

Once the assessment has identified the nature, extent and context of sexual abuse and subsequent risk factors for the child, family, and abuser, these must be addressed to reduce the risk of future sexual abuse. Risk factors commonly fall into three categories highlighted in the table below. 

When working with families to create a case plan, focus on the best approaches and actions for each family and network member to help achieve the plan’s goals.

Measure progress on the case plan with regular reviews where demonstrated significant change is identified, rather than only the completion of tasks or programs. 

Embedding safety and support network members

A crucial component of reducing risk and ensuring safety is ensuring the family’s strong network of supportive, trustworthy and positive family and community members are involved and present in the child’s life. (Refer to Safety and support networks.) 

This includes people who recognise the concerns, understand the risks, and take responsibility for helping the family to prevent future harm by managing the risk to any child who shares space with the abuser. 

This often requires the provision of education about sexual abuse, grooming, indicators and impacts of abuse to support network members. 

Post-abuse healing support

Child sexual abuse has ripple-effects that impact the family and community of both the victim and the abuser. A key component of healing is the provision of post-abuse healing supports. This is beneficial even when the child who was abused is not an immediate family or household member. 

For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families, culturally responsive therapeutic interventions should be considered and drawn upon in supporting healing and recovery.

Provision of healing support is crucial to help survivors process trauma, manage psychological symptoms across the life course and develop coping strategies. Explore all options for support, including professional counselling services, to find the most suitable approach for individual needs.

Child sexual abuse discovery or disclosure is a profound and devastating event in the lives of all those connected, including the family of the abuser. 

Families may require support to come to terms with the abuse that has occurred, and the long-term impacts the abuse will have on their family for the foreseeable future.

‘You can see that they’re [parents] not coping with it and being in a household of people that aren’t coping well, doesn’t help you because that makes you feel like ‘I’ve caused this’… Also, knowing that you’re getting help but they’re not makes you feel bad … it just makes the young person feel worse about it all.’ 

Female, 15 years (Warrington et al.)

Therapeutic supports can improve the post-abuse healing trajectory of victim-survivors and reduce the impacts of the abuse on non-offending family members. 

These benefits also reduce the likelihood of repeated sexual victimisation of the victim-survivor and the vulnerability of other child family members to future sexual abuse.

Protective factors

Case planning must consider how the non-offending parent and other family demonstrate their protective capability. 

The case plan needs to identify protective factors and activities or behaviours to mitigate the identified risks and safety concerns. When gaps or vulnerabilities are present, identify what protective factors and strengths can be used to protect the child. Use the following list to detail relevant case plan goals, as these factors have been shown to reduce the vulnerability of a child to future sexual abuse, even when a (alleged) abuser remains part of their family system. 

Protective behaviour support

A child should never be expected to protect themselves from sexual abuse. However, offering resistance can disrupt a potential abusers intended course of action (Wortley et al.).

The case plan can include goals which develop the protective behaviour knowledge and skills of the child so they may strengthen their capacity to resist or disrupt attempts at future sexual abuse. For example, education specifically for a non-offending family member, or a referral for specialised psychoeducation. 

Sexual development and healthy relationships education is not a ‘once only’ conversation. Children and young people require ongoing conversations throughout the developmental stages of their lives. For a child living in a care arrangement, and particularly for a child who’s care arrangements are not yet stable, opportunities for appropriate daily education are limited. Use case plan reviews as an opportunity to consider the child’s current understanding of sexual development and healthy relationships. Ensure needs and supports identified are allocated to a suitable adult or service. 

The case plan review cycles should include ongoing assessment of the child’s vulnerabilities and strengths. (Refer to Vulnerability and high-risk factors.) 

Supporting healthy sexual development and relationships

Supporting and educating children about their physical, sexual, and social development upholds their basic rights (Marson). Providing comprehensive education to support children’s healthy sexual, physical, and social development is essential to upholding their right to information that promotes their social and moral wellbeing, as well as fulfilling the government’s duty to protect them from harm.

Children who experience sexual abuse often face disruptions to their sexual development. To reduce the risk of future sexual abuse or harmful sexual behaviours, it is essential to focus on fostering healthy sexual and social development. Every child’s care environment should actively encourage and support positive understanding of relationships, sexuality, and sexual behaviour in everyday care.

A trusted, safe adult is crucial in supporting a child’s healthy sexual and social development. This adult must have the confidence, knowledge, and skills to respond to the child’s questions and concerns with empathy and without judgement.

Supporting caregivers to foster the healthy sexual, physical, and social development of children can be challenging. This work is often influenced by personal beliefs, values, and misconceptions about childhood sexual behaviour. Additionally, many caregivers may struggle to understand the risks and behaviours children may encounter online. The resources below can help caregivers plan meaningful conversations with children and address any questions or concerns that arise.

Cultural considerations

Best-practice case planning engages the family as experts in their own culture and recognises culture as a source of protection and strength. Cultural networks and communities can provide support for families where sexual abuse has occurred, uphold the resilience and strength of non-offending family members, and support the healing of children who have been sexually abused. 

Safe cultural connections and relationships with those family members who are protective will support healing for children and young people who have experienced sexual abuse. 

Culturally competent practice requires child protection practitioners to be led by the family to explore and use culturally suitable supports to achieve case plan goals. 

Consultation with kin, community, ATSICCOs, cultural practice advisors and Elders can provide valuable guidance to develop robust, realistic and achievable case plans goals that acknowledge and respond to the family’s cultural context and needs. (Refer to Cultural considerations for sexual abuse practice.) 

Assessing significant change

To assess progress towards case plan goals and review the safety of a child who has experienced sexual abuse, build and maintain strong relationships with the child, parents, carers, and members of the safety and support network to gain an accurate understanding of the child’s environment. Evaluate the validity of each person’s perspective by cross-checking with reliable and independent sources.

When reviewing progress towards case plan goals, consider the following prompts:

• What progress has occurred for each action in the case plan? How does each family member describe changes or progress so far?
• What does the child say has changed since the case plan was implemented?
• How does the child describe their sense of safety and comfort in the family home?
• How does the child view each member of their safety and support network?
• What has changed in relation to the child’s vulnerabilities and strengths?
• What has changed in relation to the non-offending parent’s protective factors?
• How does each person involved describe the impact of the abusive behaviour on safety, risk and family functioning?
• What perspectives or professional opinions are held by those working with the family regarding safety, risk and case plan progress?
• What progress has been made towards the actions and tasks listed in the case plan and have these reduced the presence or impact of risk factors identified in the assessment?
• Has there been any change in circumstances within the family that increases or reduces the level of risk to the child?
• What does the child say about how safe household rules are working?