Family decision making the model as practised in New Zealand and its relevance in Australia

Family Group Conferences and youth advocacy: The participation of children and young people in family decision making

“…Decision making is the responsibility of the family, while the state provides appropriate services and facilitates the decision-making process. Literature on the use of FGCs promotes it as a participatory approach to decision making with an expectation that both families and children will experience it as such (Ban 1993;Maxwell and Morris 1992). However, research in 1991 on the use of FGCs in New Zealand found that, although children were present in 79 per cent of FGCs, there was evidence that some adults felt children should be excluded-on the premise that the requirement that she or he had to agree to a plan gave the child too much responsibility.…”

Family‐centred practice in the interface between child welfare and the alcohol and drug field

“…Many of the families of clients in alcohol and drug services have experienced "emotional cut-off points" which have left them isolated from family and friends. Yet there are sometimes more resources in the family and social network than is assumed [15] and it may be possible to tap resources in the extended family by reactivating dormant elements, as long as one is careful to avoid creating too much skewed reciprocity between family members.…”

“…A recent pilot programme of the Melbourne family agency, the Mission of St James and St John, has demonstrated the viability of drawing in extended family, as well as parents, into making decisions about the future of children who are about to be, or have been, taken into care [24]. This model of practice is based on innovations developed in New Zealand with Maori communities, for whom child welfare interventions have often proved to be counter-productive [15]. In many cases the outcome of sensitively facilitated family group conferences has been to empower and resource families to find their solutions to which they have a commitment.…”

Preliminary findings on family decision making project in the victorian child protection system

“…previous article by the author A (Ban 1993) discussed Family Group Conferences and the technique of Family Decision Making developed in New Zealand as a result of the Children, Young Persons and their Families Act 1989. The principles of the New Zealand model have been trialled for almost a year in a pilot study by the Mission of St James and St John in Victoria.…”