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Report left to collect dust:Professor Megan Davis.Credit:Edwina Pickles

We then produced the 434-page report,which included 126 recommendations that,if implemented,would significantly reduce the number of Aboriginal children entering care.

On the other hand,I was apprehensive. Child protection is an area characterised by government inertia. The grandmothers against removal we worked with kept saying the recommendations would “collect dust”,as is the case with most national and state reports on Indigenous policy. Was this report going to be yet another dust-gathering exercise? Or would the government read about the failures of its bureaucracy and its policies,hear Aboriginal calls for reform and fix a system that has been failing us and our jarjums – our kids – for decades?

The sector’s response to our report was overwhelmingly positive. Shortly after its release,more than 20 civil society organisations,including AbSec,the Aboriginal Legal Service,SNAICC (the national voice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children) and the Public Interest Advocacy Centre,wrote an open letter to then premier Gladys Berejiklian,calling on her to make serious and genuine change to reduce the gross over-representation of Aboriginal children in out-of-home care by implementing all of the report’s recommendations.

This letter had little impact. The department’s first formal response to the review – just five pages – acknowledged the “confronting” stories of Aboriginal children,families and communities attempting to navigate the child-protection system. It announced a handful of reforms,some of which were not even recommended in the report. This measly response was the textbook department “ritualism” my report spoke to;despite the outward appearance of compliance – endless glossy brochures and lip service to change – it shields an entrenched culture of non-compliance.

Inexplicably,the department deferred all recommendations for legislative reform until 2024,when it proposed to review the Children and Young Persons (Care and Protection) Act 1998 (NSW).

Since then the department has released two further progress reports. While some recommendations inch forward,key foundational reforms,such as those aimed at embedding much needed independent oversight of the system,have been largely ignored. Other recommendations remain stuck in the “scoping” and “planning” phases,with no detail provided about timeframes for their commencement,let alone completion.

One issue that particularly shocked us during the review was the number of Aboriginal newborns removed from parents shortly after their birth,often from the hospital,and sometimes without warning. And it wasn’t just the numbers that were concerning. We saw worrying examples of deficient and unethical casework in this area and recommended the department revise its policy on prenatal reporting and newborn removals as a matter of urgency. Bureaucrats cannot be conducting themselves in this manner on behalf of the state. We suggested the department implement a system to ensure the most at-need expectant parents receive early casework support.

Despite the clear and pressing need for reform in this area,the department’s last progress report stated that updates on these recommendations were “unavailable” and would be provided in the next reporting period. Meanwhile,Aboriginal newborns continue to be removed at unacceptable rates and questions remain about the department’s casework in practice.

Only a few months ago,a District Court ordered the department to pay costs in a case where its pre-planned removal of a newborn baby was “precipitously premature and lacked the required factual consideration”. In this case,the judge found that although the mother understood parenthood and passed fitness assessments,the department determined a plan in which the mother would be prohibited from breastfeeding and breast milk would be provided to the newborn through a bottle,without the mother present. We found department conduct toward mothers and newborns cruel and inhuman.

Two years after theFamily is Culture report was released,I again call upon the department to implement the full suite of recommendations,to engage in genuine partnership with Aboriginal stakeholders and communities when developing projects and policies,and to embrace the shift in practice that is needed to preserve and work with Aboriginal families.

Aboriginal children deserve better. Like all children,they deserve to flourish with family and their culture. We have presented a comprehensive road map that will make that happen. Now it is time for the department to commit to the journey ahead.

Megan Davis is a professor of law and UNSW’s pro vice-chancellor Indigenous.

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Indigenous justice