Reducing the rate of over‐representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out‐of‐home care (OOHC) is a key Closing the Gap target committed to by all Australian governments. Current strategies are failing. The “gap” is widening, with the rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in OOHC at 30 June 2020 being 11 times that of non‐Indigenous children. Approximately, one in five Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children entering OOHC each year are younger than one year. These figures represent compounding intergenerational trauma and institutional harm to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and communities. This article outlines systemic failures to address the needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents during pregnancy and following birth, causing cumulative harm and trauma to families, communities and cultures. Major reform to child and family notification and service systems, and significant investment to address this crisis, is urgently needed. The Family Matters Building Blocks and five elements of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Child Placement Principle (Prevention, Participation, Partnership, Placement and Connection) provide a transformative foundation to address historical, institutional, well‐being and socioeconomic drivers of current catastrophic trajectories. The time for action is now.

Restoration of Aboriginal children (also called reunification) is an under-researched area despite being the preferred permanency outcome for children. To investigate the rate of restoration for Aboriginal children, the factors that influence restoration, and to explore the experiences of parents whose Aboriginal children have been restored, and their children. Analyses were conducted using data from the NSW Department of Communities and Justice Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study (POCLS). The quantitative sample includes all Aboriginal children in NSW who were on final Children's Court care and protection orders by 30 April 2013. Qualitative data were extracted from the POCLS survey instruments. Of the 1018 Aboriginal children in the study, 15.2% were restored. Around 40 % of children entered care following just one (or no) substantiated Risk of Significant Harm reports. Children entering care under the age of 2 years were the least likely to be restored. Parents expressed dissatisfaction with child protection agencies and family support services both at the time their child was removed and in the restoration period. Parents and children expressed the importance of being supported to maintain family relationships while children are in care. Despite policy priorities to the contrary, few Aboriginal children are considered for restoration. More support is needed for Aboriginal parents interfacing with all stages of the care system and following restoration. Additional research is needed to understand the factors underlying decisions to remove Aboriginal children from their families and whether restoration to their family is considered or achieved.

Family and extended kinship systems which nurture healthy, happy children are central to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures. Since colonisation, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities have been impacted by intergenerational cycles of trauma, stemming from colonial violence, genocidal policies and discrimination, including the forced removal of children from their families. Becoming a parent offers a unique life‐course opportunity for trauma recovery and preventing intergenerational trauma. However, identifying or ‘recognising’ complex trauma carries significant risk of harm for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents due to reactive prenatal child protection involvement potentially compounding experiences of trauma, and limited benefits due to lack of culturally appropriate support. The Aboriginal‐led participatory Healing the Past by Nurturing the Future project aims to co‐design safe, accessible and feasible perinatal awareness, recognition, assessment and support strategies for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents experiencing complex trauma. This paper presents views of 38 workshop participants to determine prerequisites for ensuring benefits outweigh risks of assessment to safely recognise parents experiencing complex trauma, consistent with screening criteria. Six essential elements were identified from thematic analysis: high‐quality holistic care; cultural, social and emotional safety; empowerment, choice and control; flexible person‐centred approaches; trusting relationships; and sensitive, skilled communication.Key Practitioner Messages: The impacts of colonisation and rates of Aboriginal and Torres Strait children in out‐of‐home care mean that there can be a myriad of issues facing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents with regard to perinatal child protection involvement. The benefits must outweigh the risks of identifying parents experiencing complex trauma. Assessment must be offered within foundations of supportive relationships and holistic care in culturally‐safe, empowering settings, where choices are respected and skilled communication approaches are used.

First Peoples continue to face intergenerational harms as a result of settler systems of intervention in the lives of their families, including the forced removal of children. First Peoples resistance includes advocacy for systemic change, in particular, focused on foundations of greater accountability in child welfare systems, and recognition of First Peoples’ right to self-determination. However, achieving these necessary structural changes remains a pressing challenge. Using the example of the recent Aboriginal-led review of child welfare in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, ‘Family is Culture’, this paper explores the cycle of inquiry and response, and the repeated failures to enable self-determination or strengthen public accountability and oversight. Drawing on concepts including legitimacy and the rule of law, we conceptualise this pattern of reviews as a ritual of redemption by settler child – welfare systems, distancing themselves from ‘past’ wrongs while refusing to address the harmful foundations of these systems, thereby perpetuating the violence imposed on First Peoples children, families and communities. This contrasts with First Peoples’ frameworks for child welfare reform, which must be urgently realised in order to establish such systems on more just and effective foundations.

The juxtaposition of available enabling technologies and low demand for telecommuting focuses attention on the need for businesses to understand how more flexible and innovative workplace strategies can help them gain competitive advantage. The integrated workplace strategies approach leverages settings, technologies, and management practices to support more effective ways of working and achieve the seemingly contradictory goals of reduced costs, improved performance, enhanced flexibility, improved air quality, and reduced traffic congestion.

The importance of self-determination in restoring the wellbeing of Australian First Nations peoples is becoming understood. For thousands of years, Aboriginal women gave birth on Country and Grandmothers' Lore and Women's Business facilitated the survival of the oldest living civilisations on earth. Following colonisation, however, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander practices of maternal and perinatal care were actively dismantled, and self-determination by Aboriginal people was destroyed. This had significant implications for the wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and their Cultures and practices. A Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses-based systematic review of research about programmes of birthing and perinatal health care for Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and their children was undertaken. The review's primary aim was to assess the Cultural context of programme development and delivery, its secondary aim was to assess the Cultural appropriateness of programme components. Electronic databases SCOPUS, PsycINFO, Medline, and CINAHL were searched for peer-reviewed studies published in English in Australia between 2000 and 2023. Twenty-eight publications met inclusion criteria. Included studies were assessed for their methodological characteristics, birthing-support characteristics, perinatal care and continuity of care characteristics. Overall, programmes were limited in meeting the Cultural needs of women, children, and individual Communities. The role of Aboriginal Communities in identifying, delivering, and reviewing programmes was also limited. Findings articulate the importance of self-determination in maintaining strong Indigenous Cultures and informing the Culturally appropriate development and delivery of Culturally safe programmes of perinatal care for Aboriginal women, children, and Communities. Programmes and services for use by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people must involve Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and their Communities in processes of programme planning, delivery, and review. The evaluation of a programme or service as "Culturally safe" represents a determination that is most appropriately made by service users based on their experience of that programme or service.