By Candice Marcus - ABC

A four-year-old girl died after crashing into objects while being forced to ride a motorbike as her mother filmed her, a South Australian court has heard.

Supreme Court Justice Trish Kelly commented on the child's obvious fear in video footage shown to the court of her opening Christmas presents just days earlier.

Ashley Jean Polkinghorne and her partner Benjamin Robert McPartland are awaiting sentencing for manslaughter by criminal negligence over the death of the woman's young daughter Chloe.

The girl was repeatedly put on a 50-kilogram motorbike in the backyard of the family home at Ingle Farm in January 2012 and the mother and partner filmed the girl crashing into objects.

The Supreme Court was told the girl suffered severe injuries and was so swollen and bruised when taken to hospital that some other family members could not recognise her.

During sentencing submissions, Justice Kelly made particular reference to the video screened to the court of the child on her last Christmas Day.

"The footage I've seen of that child opening her Christmas presents is one of the most chilling pieces of footage I have ever seen of a child opening Christmas presents. It was utterly chilling," she said.

"This was a plainly frightened child on Christmas Day."

The court heard Chloe sometimes clung to her grandmother at the end of visits and pleaded not to be sent back home to Polkinghorne and her partner.

It was told the child had confided to a family member she was "scared" of McPartland.

Justice Kelly said both Polkinghorne and McPartland had sought to blame each other for the girl's death after she crashed.

In a victim impact statement which was read to the court, Polkinghorne's mother, Belinda Valentine, said her granddaughter's death had "shattered" the lives of other family members.

She told how she rushed to hospital and held her granddaughter as she died.

"She was like a broken doll lying in the bed in hospital with tubes and wires coming out of her," Ms Valentine said.

"At first I couldn't recognise her, she was so swollen and bruised and broken. It was horrific and unbelievable.

"They say people look peaceful in death. Chloe didn't. She looked battered and bruised and alone."

Ms Valentine says the inconsistent accounts Polkinghorne and McPartland gave to authorities after Chloe's death only made the family's grief worse.

"When those circumstances are shrouded in secrecy and lies it makes the depth of feelings such as anger, sadness, regret and frustration intensify beyond reason," she said.

The court heard Polkinghorne and McPartland left the hospital as soon as Chloe's life support was turned off and were not there at the time of death.

It was told the pair were smoking and laughing outside the hospital and were overheard saying that they could not believe police had not found their cannabis stash during a visit to the house.

Polkinghorne cried and shook her head at times during the latest hearing.

McPartland's lawyer, Anthony Allen, told the court it was a tragic case and his client accepted joint responsibility for Chloe's death.

"This case ... is really stupidity at its highest level that's had devastating consequences," he said.

Justice Kelly questioned that statement, saying the child was repeatedly made to get back on the motorbike despite her horrific injuries.

"Depending on what view you take, it's more than stupidity at its highest level, there is a sinister element to this. It's more than neglect," she said.

"She's virtually thrown onto the bike at one point."

Justice Kelly asked Mr Allen if the act of putting the child on the motorbike were a crime in itself, but he countered it was not. Justice Kelly responded it "should be".

Polkinghorne and McPartland will be sentenced later.

Read more: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-25/mother-filmed-fearful-girl-forced-to-ride-motorbike-before-dying/5344386

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.

By Anna Patty, Workplace Editor, Sydney Morning Herald

Almost 50,000 of the state's most vulnerable children are still not being seen by caseworkers from the Department of Family and Community Services.

The failure of the department to assess a growing number of at-risk children comes as officials admit that young people continue to suffer sexual and physical abuse while in the care of the state.

A year after the Family and Community Services Minister, Pru Goward, ordered her department to fill all child protection caseworker vacancies, the latest figures show it is unable to see 48,660 children at risk of significant harm.

The figure represents an increase of almost 4000 children from the same period last year. It means almost three quarters of all NSW children deemed at risk are not receiving a face-to-face assessment by a child protection worker.

Since September, Ms Goward's department has lowered the rate of case-worker vacancies from 13 per cent to 11 per cent.

But in some parts of the state, such as southern NSW, vacancies remain as high as 31 per cent. There are no vacancies in the state's far west or on the central coast.

Caseworkers told Fairfax Media on Monday that many vacancies were being filled by temporary staff. One manager said he and his colleagues were feeling more stressed this year than last. ''Morale has hit rock bottom and casework practice has deteriorated, especially when it relates to children being transferred around the state. They are being put anywhere there is a bed.''

In separate developments on Monday, a senior department bureaucrat admitted to the Royal Commission into Institutional Response to Child Sexual Abuse that predatory carers could still gain access to children.

Government figures reported by Fairfax Media last year showed that of 61,308 children and young people reported as being at risk of significant harm in NSW, 44,899 were not seen by a caseworker for safety checks in the 12 months to June 30, 2012.

The latest caseworker figures published by the department, for October 2012 to September 2013, show that of the 66,719 children reported to DOCS as being at risk of significant harm, 48,660 were not seen for a face-to-face assessment by a child protection worker.

In March last year, Ms Goward wrote to the former head of her department, Jim Moore, directing him to fill all caseworker vacancies.

The issue of staff vacancies has been in the spotlight since the murder of children including Tanilla Warrick-Deaves, 2. Warren James Ross, convicted of beating Tanilla into unconsciousness, faced a sentencing hearing on Friday.

The Opposition spokeswoman for community services, Linda Burney, said the fact that so many children were not being seen was a ''stain on the NSW government''.

"An entire year has lapsed since Pru Goward directed her department to fill all case worker vacancies - and it is shameful that almost nothing has changed," Ms Burney said.

Public Service Association assistant general secretary, Steve Turner, said he received many reports from staff finding it hard to manage ''extreme'' workloads.

Family and Community Services secretary Michael Coutts-Trotter said the figures reflected increased recruitment to fill vacancies.

A department spokesman said the numbers did not reflect the many children and young people assessed and receiving support services from a caseworker in a non-government organisation.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/crisis-over-atrisk-children-20140303-340jn.html#ixzz2uwbXianv