If Your Worship pleases: an Australian perspective on the role of the magistrate in child protection
✍ Scribed by Rosemary Martyn; Greg Levine
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1998
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 183 KB
- Volume
- 7
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0952-9136
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
This paper examines the hitherto unexplored role of magistrates in child protection. It reports on a series of interviews conducted by one of the authors with magistrates in the Family Division of the Melbourne Children's Court, Victoria (Australia) in 1993±1994. These interviews form part of a current, and larger, study of magistrates' decision-making in child protection. This paper critically examines the role of magistrates in planning for children in need of care and protection. Some of the questions that the paper poses include: do magistrates focus solely on judicial aspects or do they have a role in overall case planning for children? Do they have speci®c aims or objectives which in¯uence how they deal with children who come before them? Do magistrates mostly agree with the recommendations which social workers put to them? Are magistrates subject to constraints which may not be understood by other professionals? The ®ndings of the paper will assist in clearly de®ning the role of the magistrate in child protection, which has distinct advantages for all professionals who work in this complex area. The most appropriate outcomes for children can only be achieved when magistrates and other professionals work in partnership. *