Every Child Matters

Every child deserves to grow up safe, supported and connected to their family, community and culture.

The NT Government is strengthening the child protection system through the Every Child Matters reforms.

The Care and Protection of Children Legislation Amendment (Every Child Matters) Bill 2026 makes important changes to the Care and Protection of Children Act 2007.

The reforms aim to:

• keep children safe and central to decision-making
• strengthen early intervention and support for families
• hold parents accountable for meeting their children’s needs.

The changes provide clearer guidance for people making decisions about children, strengthen accountability across the child protection system and aim to provide greater stability and certainty for children and families.

What is changing

The reforms make changes across 7 key areas.

1. Safety first: principles guiding decisions

   The reforms strengthen the principles that guide child protection decisions.

   A child’s best interests remain the paramount concern, with safety the first consideration when deciding what is in their best interests. The law also sets out the other matters decision-makers must consider, in order of priority.

2. Child placement principles

   A new universal child placement principle applies to every child who enters care and sits alongside the Aboriginal child placement principle, which continues to apply specifically to Aboriginal children.

   Together, these principles guide decisions about where children should live when they cannot safely remain at home.

3. Proactive efforts

   The reforms introduce a formal proactive efforts framework that strengthens how the department works with children, families and partner organisations.

   The framework active and ongoing efforts to address safety concerns earlier, engage family and kin, connect families with support, undertake family finding and support safe reunification.

4. Family responsibility reforms

   Family responsibility agreements provide a voluntary way for families, the department and other services to agree on practical actions to improve a child’s safety and wellbeing.

   Family responsibility orders provide an additional level of court-ordered accountability where needed.

5. Greater stability for children

   The reforms aim to reduce repeated short-term care orders and prolonged uncertainty for children.

   They strengthen expectations for earlier work towards safe reunification, provide clearer timeframes for short-term orders and strengthen children’s participation and independent legal representation in significant decisions about their future.

6. Children and carers in court

   The reforms strengthen how children and carers participate in important court decisions about a child’s future.

   Children who are the subject of an application for a long-term or permanent care order will have independent legal representation, unless limited exceptions apply.

   This helps ensure the child’s views, wishes and individual circumstances are independently represented to the Court when significant decisions are being made about their future.

   The reforms also give eligible long-term carers a formal role in relevant court proceedings.

   Current carers who have cared for a child for more than 8 months will become a party to proceedings, giving them an opportunity to provide information about the child’s day-to-day needs, relationships, development and wellbeing.

   Together, these changes aim to give the Court a fuller picture of the child’s circumstances and ensure the people who know and care for the child can contribute to decisions about their long-term care.

7. Working with Children Check reforms

   Changes to the Working with Children Check system strengthen safeguards while making the system simpler and more efficient.

   These changes include:

   • extending most clearances from 2 years to 5 years
   • strengthening powers to respond when risks are identified
   • clarifying requirements for child-related work
   • improving information sharing
   • removing the current DCF exemption process.

   SAFE NT will lead implementation and administration of these reforms.

When the changes will commence

The Every Child Matters reforms will be introduced in stages.

Planning is underway across the Department of Children and Families as well as with other government agencies, courts, service providers and sector partners.

• Stage 1 reforms start on 31 August 2026.
• Stage 2 reforms are currently expected to start on 1 December 2026.  These include:
  • Working with Children Check reforms.

Implementation activities will continue, with full implementation expected by March 2028.

Information about when the reforms will begin and how individual reforms may affect people will be updated as details are confirmed.

Supporting children and families through the changes

The reforms are designed to strengthen support across the child protection system, from prevention and early intervention through to investigation, reunification and long-term care.

For children and families, this means a stronger focus on:

• addressing concerns earlier
• working with families and their support networks
• keeping children safely at home wherever possible
• making proactive efforts to support safe reunification
• listening to children and strengthening their participation in decisions
• maintaining important family, community and cultural connections
• providing greater stability when children cannot safely return home.

The individual circumstances of each child and family will continue to matter. The reforms do not replace professional judgement or require the same outcome for every child.

Supporting carers

Carers play an important role in providing children with safe and supportive homes.

Some reforms change how carers participate in court proceedings and may create new responsibilities for eligible carers.

We have developed information and guidance to help carers understand these changes, including:

• becoming a party to proceedings
• confidentiality requirements
• court processes
• where to seek information and independent legal advice.

We are also working with carer organisations and services to understand practical issues and support implementation.

The Northern Territory Local Court has published an amendment to the Children’s Court Practice Directions - Practice Direction 4E Care and Protection of Children. The amendment introduces a new subsection, Participation of carers.

Practice directions are procedural guidelines provided by the Chief Judge of the Local Court, to assist in the case management and function of the Court.

Practice Directions are to complement and expand on existing legislation, rules and regulations. They do not replace them.

Supporting our staff

Many of the principles behind the reforms already form part of good child protection practice. The new laws strengthen and formalise some of these expectations and introduce new requirements.

We are supporting staff to understand both the legal requirements and what they mean in practice.

Implementation activities include:

• updating policies, procedures and practice guidance
• developing training and practical tools for staff
• strengthening staff knowledge of the relevant sections of the Act
• reviewing systems, processes and templates
• providing regular staff briefings and implementation updates
• strengthening workload management and decision-making
• establishing the Family Assessment and Safety Taskforce to support priority work
• reviewing workforce, structural and resourcing requirements.

Training, guidance and implementation support will continue as the reforms are introduced.

Working with our partners

Keeping children safe is a shared responsibility.

The reforms affect more than the Department of Children and Families. To support implementation, we are working with:

• government agencies
• Aboriginal organisations
• legal services
• courts
• carers
• funded service providers
• other community and sector partners.

Engagement will continue as implementation progresses. This will include, targeted briefings, information and resources about the reforms most relevant to different organisations and sectors.

Feedback from children, families, carers, staff and partners will also help identify issues and refine implementation as the new arrangements take effect.

Factsheets and resources

More detailed information will be available soon in the Every Child Matters factsheet series:

• Stronger laws to keep children safe PDF (397.5 KB)
• Child placement principles
• Proactive efforts
• Family responsibility reforms
• Greater stability and certainty for children
• Working with Children Check reforms
• Carers and the new laws PDF (465.7 KB)
• Carers and court proceedings PDF (433.4 KB)

More information and resources will be added to this page as implementation progresses.