Submission into the Legislative Scrutiny Committee’s inquiry into the Care and Protection of Children Legislation Amendment (Every Child Matters) Bill 2026
In May, the CIJ provided a submission to the Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory in response to the proposed Care and Protection of Children Legislation Amendment (Every Child Matters) Bill 2026.
In doing so, the CIJ added its voice to the growing number of First Nations, justice and youth organisations and advocates expressing significant concerns of the Northern Territory Government’s reactive reforms to its Child Protection system.
We encourage you to read our full submission here, as well as those put forward by NT based and First Nations organisations who have long been working to promote both the physical and cultural safety and wellbeing of children in the territory. In particular, we share their concerns that the proposed amendments will erode the Aboriginal Child Placement Principle, a national framework that has been enshrined in legislation since the 1980s in response to the profound harms caused by assimilatory child removal policies, including those that led to the Stolen Generations. Should it be successful, the proposed amendments would likely expand the grounds for state involvement and intervention in ways that will disproportionately impact on First Nations families and their children. Given the already stark overrepresentation of Aboriginal children in the out-of-home-care and Child Protection systems, we strongly believe that any reform that is not designed and led by Aboriginal communities, organisations and experts is destined to repeat the failures of the past.