CANBERRA, Oct. 20 (Xinhua) -- A review prompted by the alleged murder of an Aboriginal girl has called for a major reset of the child protection system in Australia's Northern Territory (NT).
The NT government on Tuesday released the final report of an independent three-month review into the Department of Children and Families (DCF), which was commissioned following the April death of a five-year-old Aboriginal girl known posthumously as Kumanjayi Little Baby for cultural reasons.
The review called for a system-wide reset of child protection in the NT, making 45 recommendations for change that have all been accepted by the government.
Kumanjayi Little Baby was found dead on April 30, five days after she went missing from a home in an Aboriginal community on the outskirts of the central Australian city of Alice Springs.
A 47-year-old man was subsequently charged with her murder.
The review found that her family had been known to the DCF and that Kumanjayi Little Baby was repeatedly exposed to domestic and family violence.
It said that child protection services in the NT received 16 notifications involving Kumanjayi Little Baby, including two while her mother was pregnant with her, all of which related to domestic and family violence, but that a risk assessment was never carried out.
Tabling the report in parliament, NT Child Protection Minister Robyn Cahill said that the system in place did not recognize the risk that Kumanjayi Little Baby was placed in.
"Her mother was left, in the review's words, effectively responsible for protecting her children while experiencing violence herself," Cahill said.
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, a federal Senator for the NT and relative of Kumanjayi Little Baby, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that the deceased girl was let down by the system. ■
