By Adam Cooper - The Age

A five-year-old boy died days after cutting his foot on rubbish in his family's filth-ridden Melbourne home after his parents failed to take him to a doctor, according to court documents.

The boy received a three-centimetre cut to his big toe when he stepped on an open can of cat food that had been discarded in the house and was piled among junk, food scraps and faeces that filled every room of the house, in Melbourne's north-western suburbs, the documents say.

On August 1, 2012, several days after the injury, he could not be revived by ambulance paramedics after the boy's mother had rushed him to an ambulance branch office. One paramedic said in a statement to police that the boy had grey, mottled skin when he was brought to them and that he had a filthy bandage wrapped around his foot.

According to court documents, the boy had a headache and sore neck the night before he died, and was heard by his older brother calling for help and looking ''very, very, very sick''.

The boy's mother, 42, on Wednesday in Melbourne Magistrates Court pleaded guilty to two counts of reckless conduct endangering serious injury, a charge that carries a five-year maximum penalty. She also pleaded guilty to failing to register the birth of a child.

The woman began crying as she sat in the front row of court after entering her plea. Her husband, the boy's father, faces the same charges as his wife. The father, 43, is yet to enter a plea and is scheduled to return to court next month. The names of the couple and their son have been suppressed to protect the identity of the couple's other son, who was eight at the time of his brother's death.

The five-year-old's death, and the state of the house in which he lived, has shocked police and court officials and prompted investigations into how his parents could allow them to live in what one police officer called a ''state of extreme squalor''.

''The inside of the house was filled with rubbish and debris throughout every room, consisting of general household waste, rotting and spoilt food, mould, faeces, broken furniture and household items, as well as soiled bedding and clothing,'' an investigating officer wrote in the hand-up brief.

''A foul odour emanated from the premises and an infestation of rodents and insects was evident.''

Photographs from inside the house, taken by police and tendered to the court, show rooms filled with shin-high piles of waste and junk and of food, mould and faeces splattered across furniture and appliances.

The boy's death prompted an investigation by Bernie Geary, the principal commissioner of the Commission for Children and Young People, and details about the case were conveyed to the office of Community Services Minister Mary Wooldridge. The state coroner is also expected to investigate later this year.

According to court documents, the boy who died was born at home, was never immunised or enrolled in school or kindergarten and only really had contact with his immediate family members. Neighbours told police the boy was quiet and withdrawn, had poor speech and always appeared dressed in clothing that was inappropriate for the weather.

The boy's father was an electrical designer at the time of his son's death, documents say, while his wife was the primary carer of the children.

Magistrate Charlie Rozencwajg last week told a hearing the details of the case were ''highly unusual and distressing''.

He was told last week toxicologists were yet to determine exactly how the boy died.

On Wednesday Mr Rozencwajg ordered the boy's mother to appear before the County Court in June. He extended the couple's bail.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/boy-5-died-in-squalor-court-told-20140319-352yb.html

Child protection workers have complained of being shuffled from office to office to cover staff vacancies, preventing them from getting to children in need.

After revelations the Department of Family and Community Services is failing to see a growing number of vulnerable children, a senior bureaucrat has also admitted caseworkers spend so much time bogged down in paperwork that they struggle to meet those at risk.

"Workers are having to make horrific decisions about which children they will visit and which ones they won't visit."

''Caseworker positions are being filled temporarily and they are being moved from office to office,'' Public Service Association assistant general secretary Steve Turner said.

''This doesn't allow for proper co-ordination and planning and it also creates low morale because workers don't feel secure in their jobs.''

On Tuesday the government's latest quarterly figures showed a reduction in child protection worker vacancies from 13 per cent to 11 per cent but there are still pockets around the state where they remain as high as 31 per cent. There are also a growing number of children not visited at home by the department.

''To have more than 10 per cent of your staff unfilled is a big slice of your budget,'' Mr Turner said. ''What other frontline service would risk running with 10 per cent vacancies?

''Workers are having to make horrific decisions about which children they will visit and which ones they won't visit.

''Vacancies need to be filled permanently to better manage notifications of children at risk. If the number of notifications is rising, there are questions about whether we have enough staff if all vacancies are filled.''

Family and Community Services secretary Michael Coutts-Trotter said that the latest snapshot on vacancy rate figures was ''an encouraging result but the current vacancy rate is still too high and we have to keep working to improve our recruitment".

One of the most senior bureaucrats in the Department of Family and Community Services has admitted time management is a key weakness in the department.

Kate Alexander, who is charged with improving child protection, told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that that reports of child abuse have increased dramatically since the 1990s.

''All of that has led us to, at times, in recent years, becoming a bit too forensic in our approach, and that means perhaps more time spent at computers than we would like and less time spent directly in the field with families,'' she said.

She told the commission that staffing numbers were adequate but caseworkers needed to be freed up for visits with young people at risk.

''We are working very hard at the moment, through a whole host of reform strategies, to increase our ability to free our workforce up,'' she said.

However, Ms Alexander acknowledged that serious reports of abuse were still slipping through the cracks.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/national/children-at-risk-because-protection-workers-too-busy-to-visit-them-20140304-345b0.html.