Social policy refers to the development of welfare, social administration and policies of the government which is used to protect the society. Social policy is related to the government approaches of social services. There are many policies of the government which is developing by the government to protect society such as health policy, family policy, education policy and many more. In this report, the discussion will be made on the family policy in Australia. According to the Australian Bureau, a family is a group of people who have blood relations with each other and take care of each other. There are various forms in which families are designed and perform their responsibilities towards each other. Family has a large extended network of people which spread across the countries or in a small area of the same dwelling. The family is mandatory to perform the basic functions such as economic security, a sense of identity, exchange of love and guidance on social values. The core functions of the family such as care and guidance which is starts from the caring of children and end with the parent caring by children across the life cycle. The emotional care of the families for each other is essential for an individual wellbeing. Many factors affect the family such as early marriage and having children. The environmental policies such as social and economic policies affect the families. Family policy is developed by the laws and public directives which are designed to promote marriage or to aware the public about reproduction and raising children and many other issues (Botterill, 2017).
In the 1970s the marriage rate declined and young people delay marriage and having children. Their many problems arise in that year such as increasingly entered into a facto relationship and homosexual relationship which is become more widespread. It has been seen that the divorce rate was also increased and the families were getting separated from their households. Feminist and gay liberation movement challenged the old certainties about the family and sexuality (Mendes, Snow, & Baidawi, 2015). In the 1970s, it is observed that the substantial changes and variation in family structure and values. To solve these issues the Australian government design the policy to protect the families’ relations and child. Family policy also ensures the spousal support, child protection to solve the conflicts between the work and family. Until the mid-1980s government saw the families as the basic unit of social support and the respect their privacy unless the children were neglected or abused. After family policy, the countries are regulated with some aspects of family life such as the people are requiring the registration of birth, death and marriage (Bogenschneider, 2014). It has been seen that marriage, separation and adoption have been legalised so that the rate of divorces and population is reduced. This policy tries to ensure that the men support their wives and children which help in protecting the children from the abuse. In this policy, the government also provide social services and income security to families in the case of an emergency. To implement this policy in the country; the countries requires sufficient fiscal resources. Birth rates are less in Australia because their parent is less relies on their children. The family policy helps in reduces the overpopulation, child malnutrition, child labour, maternal mortality rate from the country. The communities contribute in funding to provide the homes for orphans and abandoned children so that the child labour rate and the death rate is reduced (Jacobs, 2017).
This policy is focusing on the protection of children, women’s and men’s from social problems. It is the responsibility of the parents to take care of their children in every stage of life not only in the pre-schooling (Daniel, 2015). In 2001, the Australian government implements policy with the name of “Families Australia” to the federal government and parliament on ways to increase the wellbeing of families (Ahl, & Nelson, 2015). The main vision of Families Australia is that the families enjoy the greatest possible wellbeing. Families Australia gets the greater support for the social, economic, cultural, spiritual; and developmental need of families. Families Australia is working to relieve the suffering, distress and help the helplessness people. There are many events organised for the wellbeing of the families of Australia such as National families’ week, conferences, policy forums, Annual Meeting of the National Coalition on child safety and wellbeing, families Australia Oration and many others.
Families Australia is a national leader of the country which is highly appreciated for the quality and independence of its work. This policy is governed and managed by the high authority to the highest standards. There are different types of services for families and children which help to improve services such as family services, childcare services and child welfare services (Mahon, Bergqvist, & Brennan, 2016). The national framework is Australia‘s first ever national plan to be endorsed by the Council of Australian Government which helps to enhance the safety and wellbeing of children. This policy again received the awards of third national framework action plan which were agreed to deliver the timeliness and quality. It becomes the first strategy working group which ensured the prevention and early intervention. After following this policy it also opens ten workshops around the Australian which involve over 400 participants from government, research sector and non-government (Adamson, Cortis, Brennan, & Charlesworth, 2017).
After all these achievements, the country still faces the issues due to default in Australian family policy. Current major issues in this policy are the falling marriage rates, increasing divorce rates and increasing childcare spending. In Australia, crude marriage rate of 5.4 marriages per 1000 people which were the second lowest on record as compared to the other countries (Widerquist, et al., 2017). Although, the marriage rate of people is increasing still the rate of divorce are increases. The one reason behind the falling marriage rate is that people taking a conscious decision to live together unmarried. It is observed that the relationship can reach at the uncertainty and emotional distress which results in a failed relationship and fear from the marriage (McDonald, 2015).
To protect the children from the abuse and other social factors which affects the children; society starts spending more on the facilities of children. Childcare has been used by both governments as well as the society. Middle-class families also spend on the childcare services. Child care is commonly used as an arm of government employment policy; due to spending more on childcare the cost of services is increased. Skill shortage is increasing due to increasing the use of Childcare (Thomson, 2017).
From the above analyses, it has been seen that there are still many issues faced by the country. To solve these issues the government of Australian has to take initiative towards the services and made a strong policy. The marriage rate id reduces in the country due to increasing the divorce rate in the country and the many other issues which are facing by the country.
It has been seen that the government of Australia face the issue of falling marriage rate due to the conscious decision of the people to live together without marriage. The living relationship without marriage has the risk of failing relationship of people due to many reasons such as uncertain child and many others. The government of Australia has to make the new rules and regulation to control the rate of failing relationship. It is necessary to put a restriction on the living together policies of the government. The government should also measure the rate every year and then analyse the reasons behind the issues of failing marriage rate. Evaluation of rate is necessary to resolve the issue of the country (Bibbins, Grossman, & Curry, 2017).
It is the responsibility of the government that the policy is implemented at every corner of the country. This policy is made for the family wellbeing but it mainly focuses on the child well-being which is not cover the entire people such as old age people. It is true that the childcare is important for the country for future benefits but it is also the responsibility of the government to take care of old age people. The state government has to organise the events to support older people so that they can also get the advantage of this policy and stay healthy. The government should ensure that the services will be available to the old age people or not (Robila, 2014).
The family policy is developed by the government for the wellbeing of families but the time of delivering the services is more beneficial for the society. However, the government of Australia provides many services by organising the various events. But there are many issues which are faced by society due to delay in services. The government should take care of the quality and time of the process of the delivery of services. It is beneficial if the services are met at the time of requirement and at the right place. Child care is beneficial for society but spending more money on it is not beneficial for society. The government could suggest and educate the people to take care of their children (Smyth, Hunter, Macvean, Walter, & Higgins, 2018).
Conclusion
From the above analysis, it has been concluded that Family Australia is developed by the Australian government as the family policy. It is developed for the wellbeing of families and children. The people of Australia face the issue of divorce, and decreasing the marriage rate. The government did not interfere in the personal matter of the people until the child abuse and child labour. To resolve these issues the government takes initiative by developing the family policy to support the people. Under this policy, the government organised the many events to support child care, and provide the facilities to the parents. Although the policy gain the many achievements still the Australians face issues such as failing marriage rate and child care services. To resolve these issues and the government should measure the quality and time of the process of delivery, and made new rules and regulation to develop the economy.
References
Adamson, E., Cortis, N., Brennan, D., & Charlesworth, S. (2017). Social care and migration policy in Australia: Emerging intersections?. Australian Journal of Social Issues, 52(1), 78-94.
Ahl, H., & Nelson, T. (2015). How policy positions women entrepreneurs: A comparative analysis of state discourse in Sweden and the United States. Journal of Business Venturing, 30(2), 273-291.
Bibbins-Domingo, K., Grossman, D. C., & Curry, S. J. (2017). The US Preventive Services Task Force 2017 draft recommendation statement on screening for prostate cancer: an invitation to review and comment. Jama, 317(19), 1949-1950.
Bogenschneider, K. (2014). Family policy matters: How policymaking affects families and what professionals can do. Routledge.
Botterill, L. C. (2017). Rural Policy in Australia: The Farm Family and the Farm Business. In Government Reformed (pp. 101-118). Routledge.
Daniel, G. (2015). Patterns of parent involvement: A longitudinal analysis of family-school partnerships in the early years of school in Australia. Australasian Journal of Early Childhood, 40(1), 119.
Jacobs, F. H. (2017). Evaluating Family Programs: Current Issues in Theory and Policy. Routledge.
Mahon, R., Bergqvist, C., & Brennan, D. (2016). Social policy change: Work–family tensions in Sweden, Australia and Canada. Social Policy & Administration, 50(2), 165-182.
McDonald, P. (2015). The evolution of population and family policy in Australia. In Low and Lower Fertility (pp. 143-159). Springer, Cham.
Mendes, P., Snow, P., & Baidawi, S. (2015). Response to Broadley et al.,’The ethical obligations of research with vulnerable young people who have dependent children’. Communities, Children and Families Australia, 9(2), 35.
Robila, M. (2014). Handbook of family policies across the globe (Vol. 10, pp. 978-1). New York, NY: Springer.
Smyth, B. M., Hunter, C., Macvean, M., Walter, M., & Higgins, D. J. (2018). Education for family life in Australia. In Global perspectives on family life education (pp. 93-113). Springer, Cham.
Thomson, J. (2017). Australian social work responses to family disadvantage and the removal of children. Communities, Children and Families Australia, 11(2), 5.
Widerquist, K., O’Connor, A., Williams, W., Hollister, R., Watts, H., & Levine, R. A. (2017). A retrospective on the negative income tax experiments: Looking back at the most innovate field studies in social policy. In The ethics and economics of the basic income guarantee (pp. 95-106). Routledge.
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