Book launch: The Kids Who Have Been Through This – stories from children who have experienced homelessness and domestic violence

I recently had the tremendous honour of being part of the launch of ‘The Kids Who Have Been Through This – stories from children who have experienced homelessness and domestic violence’

The Together 4 Kids (T4K) Book Club brought together children and parents of toddlers and babies to write and illustrate a children’s story about their experiences of homelessness and domestic violence. The child authors hope their stories will help other children experiencing homelessness and domestic violence to know they’re not alone.

At the launch, several of the young authors read their stories. I had the honour, alongside Minister Nat Cook and Chief Executive of the Department for Child Protection South Australia Jackie Bray, of providing some reflections following the stories.

I came away in absolute awe of the incredible work that Relationships Australia SA and Together 4 Kids has done with these young authors. The event instilled a sense of hope – despite the significant violence they have experienced, their journeys through homelessness and the numerous ways in which they have been failed by different system responses – these young people show tremendous strength and are calling for systems change.

Australia’s National Plan to end Violence against Women and Children includes two commitments that are highly relevant here – to acknowledge children as victim-survivors in their own right, and to build a system that promotes healing and recovery. Connecting these two together, there is an acute need to build child-centred and age-appropriate services and interventions to support young victim-survivors healing and recovery.

It should not be enough that children merely survive the violence experienced, we must support them to heal, to recover and to thrive.