The Minister for Youth and Community Services Minister, Dr Denis Napthine, has launched three reports on the High-Risk Infants Service Quality Initiatives Project.

The reports are:

• High-Risk Infants Project Development and Early Implementation Report: July 1997-April 1999. (Project background and aims, together with initiative outlines and schedules)
• High-Risk Infants Known to Child Protection Services: Literature Review, Annotation and Analysis. (Latest research leading to improved services and work practices)
• Parenting Assessment and Skill Development Services Research Project, Phase One: Research and Analysis Report (Advice on better parenting programs)

Dr Napthine said the aim of the initiative is to tackle issues concerning risk assessment and management, court performance and better working relationships with the wider service system.

Major initiatives of the High-Risk Infants project include:

• Twenty specialist infant protective workers and a flexible HRI regional budget for advising others on risk assessment and intervention and to set up professional networks.
• A targeted Parenting Assessment and Skill Development Service (PASDS) to provide expert parenting capacity assessment Statewide to aid protective services decisions.
• Training programs and professional education sessions for protective workers.
• Establishment of demonstration projects focusing on risk management and inter-agency collaboration concerning high-priority infants known to protective services workers.

"In scale and complexity, this ambitious Department of Human Services initiative — in which the Government invests $5.6 million a year — is probably unique within Australia and overseas," Dr Napthine said.

(News Release, Office of the Minister for Youth and Community Services, July 14, 1999)