The maintenance of the physical and emotional safety of children about to be returned to their families following serious abuse is a complex and significant problem. This paper describes a treatment offered to such families which makes use of a residential setting, and which involved intensive work over the period of a week. This approach was cost effective, allowed for greater creativity by child protection workers, and impacted significantly on the lives of the families. This paper offers a philosophical as well as practical framework for treating at risk families in which a child is about to be returned.

The 1990 National Evaluation Conference, a conference devoted to current developments in evaluation, left the authors with many concerns. This paper, after describing a few of the contributions which were of relevance to human services, explores some of the dilemmas. Is program evaluation a research activity or not? What are the implications of the commercialisation of the public sector? Is evaluation a tool to induce employee conformity? These questions are raised, and their implications for human services discussed.

On the 2nd of September this year, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted by the Assembly in November 1989, came into force under international law, 30 days after the lodgment of the 20th instrument of ratification (by which time 31 countries had deposited ratifications). Shortly prior to that date, on 22 August, after some public controversy about the matter, Australia had determined to sign the Convention. The Convention, which stemmed from the 1979 International Year of the Child, expanded and elaborated within an international treaty, rights first enunciated (in non-binding form) in the 1959 Declaration of the Rights of the Child. It applies to a person under the age of 18.

Over 5 years ago, the Report of the Child Welfare Practice and Legislation Review Committee was published. That report - Equity and Social Justice for children families and communities, took, as one of its foundation principles, the proposition that Victorian law and practice should reflect internationally accepted principles of human and civil rights of children.