How are safety incidents managed in youth residential care?

Youth residential care or residential care is an out of home care service for children and young people who require a safe and nurturing environment where they can live when they’re unable to live with their families.

Residential care homes have trained youth workers available 24/7 and provide a home-like atmosphere which helps young people to focus on stability, belonging and preparation for their future.

Youth residential care is typically designed for young people aged 12 to 17 years. However, in some instances, children under the age of 12 might be considered. Read more about residential care, here.

Residential care homes must meet strict safety standards. Due to the vulnerable nature of young people living within these homes, care providers must adhere to, manage, and report safety incidents accordingly.

In this article, we’ll discuss how safety incidents are managed in youth residential care settings.

Purpose of incident management and reporting

Incident management and reporting in youth residential care aims to uphold the immediate safety, wellbeing, and protection of children and young people. Staff are enabled to manage risks, analyse areas of preventative action, and meet their obligations and the obligations of their provider/organisation.

According to the Queensland Government, Department of Child Safety (the Department), incident management and reporting prioritises the safety, wellbeing and best interests of children as per the Child Protection Act 1999.¹ As such, they’re committed to supporting care services to provide safe homes, including residential homes, for children in care.²

Legislative and policy framework

The legislative and policy frameworks which underpin safety and incident management in youth residential care homes in Queensland include the:

Child Protection Act 1999 – with specific reference to sections 122 (the Statement of Standards) and 13F around mandatory reporting relating to children in care. As per the act, any person involved in the care of a child is required to report suspicion about a child in care if they reasonably believe they’ve suffered, are suffering or are at unacceptable risk of harm caused by any form of abuse. They must report their suspicion to their chief executive.¹
Child Protection Regulation 2023 – which supports the administration of the Child Protection Act and provides additional decision making and operational processes.
Children’s Court Act 1992 – which hears matters involving child protection issues.
Public Guardian Act 2014 – this Act provides advocacy services for vulnerable children and young people in out of home care (including youth residential care).
Family and Child Commission Act 2014 – provides leadership, research and oversight over the child protection system.

In 2024, the new Child Safe Organisations Act commenced to protect children from harm when they interact with businesses and organisations in Queensland. Anglicare Southern Queensland is a proud Child Safe Organisation. As such, we’re committed to promoting the safety and wellbeing of children through adherence to the 10 National Principles of Child Safe Organisations. These standards prioritise:

Leadership and culture
Voices of children
Family and community
Equity and diversity
People
Complaints management
Knowledge and skills
Physical and online environments
Continuous improvement
Policies and procedures.³

Definition and types of safety incidents

In youth residential care homes, a safety incident is one that causes (or has the potential to cause) harm, injury, illness, death, or significant property damage to a child, young person, or staff member.⁴

The Queensland Government categorises incidents in two ways.

Category 1 – relating to critical incidents. For instance: death, life threatening injuries, missing or abducted children, major security incidents, rape, sexual assault or other serious assaults, significant mental health episodes, concerns requiring immediate response, alleged criminal behaviour, negative experiences during family time, or serious/life threatening injuries.

Category 2 – relating to major incidents. Such as serious injury, alleged harm, neglect, exploitation, self-harm, escalating risk taking behaviour, alleged criminal behaviour, serious threats, substance misuse, absence, and property damage.⁴

Immediate response to an incident

When responding to youth residential care incidents, staff should follow the steps of their organisation’s incident management guidelines. Though, as outlined by the Department, they may respond by:

Identifying risk factors and warning signs
Identifying if there is a risk of an incident occurring or if it’s already occurred
Assessing the incident
Responding to the incident (taking into consideration an appropriate response and whether it requires emergency service contact and whether there is an incident that requires medical intervention)
Reporting the incident.²

Reporting procedures

Organisations that work with children and young people in youth residential care settings have their own ways of reporting safety incidents.

At Anglicare, staff report incidents according to their level of severity. Here’s how safety incidents are reported in our residential care settings.

Category 1 – Critical	Verbal notification to be immediately reported to line manager and the Department or Child Safety After Hours. Incident reported within internal quality and safety systems and for the Department within four business hours.
Category 2 – Critical (major)	Verbal notification to be reported to line manager Incident reported within internal quality and safety systems before the end of worker’s shift and a copy of the report to be given to the Department by the next business day.
Category 3 – Significant Concern (non-critical)	No verbal notification required; however Incident to be recorded and posted in internal quality and safety systems before the end of worker’s shift and a copy to be sent to the Department by the next two business days.

Within an incident report, the following details should be recorded:

Details about who was involved and the nature of injuries (if applicable)
Where the incident occurred
When the incident occurred, including the duration of the incident event
How the incident occurred, including details surrounding the sequence of events
What action was taken in response to the incident.²

Post-incident review and debriefing

Post incident reviews and debriefs are important following safety incidents in youth residential care settings. They allow those directly involved and the broader service or organisation to analyse their responses and identify strengths and weaknesses of the response for continuous improvement.

They’re also important to identify opportunities for preventative action to reduce the likelihood of the incident occurring again. Additionally, debriefing can provide emotional support and improve the wellbeing of those involved by reducing stress for staff and clients.

Analysis and continuous improvement

Once incidents have been reported by staff, they’ll undergo investigation to help the organisation and the Department of Child Safety to understand what happened and why it did.

Most organisations will do their own investigation, and depending on the severity of the incident, it might also be investigated externally by the Department. When investigating, the causes and contributing factors will be looked at, and where possible, multiple sources might be investigated to understand the whole picture surrounding the incident. During the process and investigation review, all information will be recorded with recommendations to prevent the nature of the incident occurring again.

Continuous improvement

Continuous improvement allows organisations to take their learnings to embed them into practice. In youth residential care, continuous improvements from safety incidents promotes policy and practice updates, opportunities for specialised training and support for staff working directly with young people, communication of findings amongst other staff, as well as better performance and quality assurance. For Child Safe Organisations, quality assurance is one of the 10 standards they must adhere to.⁵

Roles and responsibilities

As outlined in the Department’s Incident management for residential care services document, youth residential care services in Queensland have a responsibility to respond to and report safety incidents in an adequate and timely manner. Their report should be clearly and objectively reported by key staff members and managers in their organisation’s management system and then escalated in a timely manner to the Department.

As part of their responsibility to report the incident, the report should appropriately maintain the privacy and confidentiality of all children and young people involved. ²

Staff and training support

Youth residential care providers must undergo ongoing training development opportunities. This includes training on safety incident reporting and management.

At Anglicare, our Practice Development and Quality Assurance teams work with our residential youth services to lead in better practice. Staff training and support for youth workers and other staff that might engage with young people includes opportunities for:

Complex case panel discussions
Instructor led training with internal and external led development
Community of practice to connect, reflect and collaborate on shared learnings
And more.

Challenges and areas for improvement

Across the sector, there are areas for improvement to better manage safety incidents in residential care homes.

Here are some challenges that service providers across Queensland face, and areas for improvement.

Challenges	Areas for improvement
Inconsistent reporting of incidents	Providers to improve/invest in better incident management systems for staff.
Capability and training gaps for staff and staffing shortages	Investment in ongoing skills development and training development opportunities from service providers and the Department.
Lack of communication between relevant staff, teams and stakeholders	Prioritisation of enhanced communication and staff handover feedback loop notes Involving young people in safety planning and co-designing policy creation/updates.

Other areas for improvement, across the sector which would enhance incident management in youth residential care homes, may include using more data to inform patterns and trends and improve interventions. Additionally, across the board, there needs to be better cross-sector collaboration with services co-designing procedures and sharing insights.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it’s important for safety incidents to be adequately managed and reported in youth residential care settings to ensure the safety of children, young people and staff. Every Queensland residential care provider must adhere to relevant response and reporting frameworks.

Anglicare is committed to providing safe and stable residential homes for children and young people. As a Child Safe Organisation, we’re committed to creating environments where young people feel safe and that they can thrive.

To learn more about or youth support programs, click here. Additionally, to learn more about residential care, click here.

How are safety incidents managed in youth residential care?

Purpose of incident management and reporting

Legislative and policy framework

Definition and types of safety incidents

Immediate response to an incident

Reporting procedures

Category 1 – Critical

Category 2 – Critical (major)

Category 3 – Significant Concern (non-critical)