Some people may find content on this website distressing. Read more
Victoria - Legislation

Children's Welfare Act 1933 (1933 - 1955)

  • The Children's Welfare Act 1933

    The Children's Welfare Act 1933
    Details

From
1933
To
1955
Categories
Amending Act
Website
http://corrigan.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/vic/hist_act/cwa1933167/

The Children's Welfare Act 1933 (No.4152) amended sections 18 and 109 of the Children's Welfare Act 1928. It extended the definitions of neglect in the 1928 Act. The 1933 legislation contained new categories of 'neglected child', including 'being a female found soliciting men for prostitution…or found habitually wandering about…public places at night without lawful cause…'. This resulted in an increase of girls being placed in children's homes. A child 'living under such conditions as indicate that the child is lapsing or likely to lapse into a career of vice or crime' was another new definition of 'neglected child' in s.18 of the Act.

Details

The long title of the Act is 'An Act to amend Sections Eighteen and One hundred and nine of the Children's Welfare Act 1928.'

The Children's Welfare Act 1954 ( No.5817) repealed the Children's Welfare Act 1933.

Related Glossary Terms

  • State Ward (c. 1880 - 1990s)

    The terms under which a child or young person could be admitted to the 'care' of the Children's Welfare Department are set out in the Children's Welfare Act 1933 (as well as the Children's Welfare Act 1928).

    Date: 1933 - 1954

Publications

Books

  • Jaggs, Donella, Neglected and criminal: foundations of child welfare legislation in Victoria, Centre for Youth and Community Studies, Phillip Institute of Technology, Melbourne, 1986. Details

Online Resources

Photos

The Children's Welfare Act 1933
Title
The Children's Welfare Act 1933
Type
Document

Details

Sources used to compile this entry: 'Victoria: Legislation', in To remove and protect: laws that changed Aboriginal lives, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, 2008, https://aiatsis.gov.au/collection/featured-collections/remove-and-protect; Jaggs, Donella, Neglected and criminal: foundations of child welfare legislation in Victoria, Centre for Youth and Community Studies, Phillip Institute of Technology, Melbourne, 1986; Victorian Government, 'Victorian Government Submission to the Senate Inquiry into Children in Institutional Care (Submission 173)', in Inquiry into Institutional Care: Submissions received as at 17/03/05, July 2003, http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Community_Affairs/Completed_inquiries/2004-07/inst_care/submissions/sublist; Law Research Service, Melbourne Law School, Law Library, The University of Melbourne. 'Find and Connect Project - Victoria Legislation', 13 December 2013, held in the project files at the University of Melbourne eScholarship Research Centre.

Prepared by: Cate O'Neill