Child Protection Party

The Child Protection Party is a registered minor political party in Australia and South Australia[1] led by Tony Tonkin. Its platform is based around child protection.[2]

The Child Protection Party is the only political party who represents the voices of children. Children who are in care, disabled, intellectually challenged, suicidal, use drugs or have mental well-being issues require adults to listen to them and provide appropriate services which will meet their needs and make their lives happier and productive. They need a powerful voice in Parliament.

Although the Party was founded to advocate for changes in the child protection legislation, it strongly supports measures aimed at raising people out of poverty which is a major cause of child neglect and abuse.

The Party has developed or is currently developing a range of policies covering the following topics:

• Aboriginal Children. The Party is currently working with Aboriginal elders to develop policy. The Party acknowledges that this is a difficult topic due to the wide variety of Aboriginal cultures.
• Adoption. The Party is currently developing policy on adoption working with adoptees, the people who best understand the impact of adoption on a child.
• Anti bullying.
• Child Welfare Hearings. The current system is adversarial with parents, often without legal representation, facing a magistrate and the child protection department's panel of lawyers. The Party is advocating for the replacement of this adversarial system with child welfare hearings being held in a less confronting environment.
• Disability.
• Energy.
• Kinship and Foster Care.
• Legalisation of Marijuana.
• A National Approach to Child Protection. With 8 states and territories, australia has 8 different packages of legislation with differing definitions of child abuse and neglect, different processes for dealing with child protection issues and different penalties imposed for crimes against children.
• Residential Care. The Party believes that far too many children are removed from loving parents and placed in residential (out of home) care, often with traumatic effects upon the child.
• Social Worker Registration. The Party believes that all social workers who work with children must be members of a professional association, the Australian Association of Social Workers.

The Party believes that whenever a government is considering legislation on any topic the impact such legislation may have on children should always be included in deliberations.

The party unsuccessfully ran 2 upper house candidates at the 2018 state election with around 1.5% of the statewide vote.[3]

The party unsuccessfully ran 1 lower house candidate in the Federal election of June 2019. [4]