The Order of St John of God came to Australia from Ireland in 1947. Its first work was in New South Wales for boys with learning difficulties. In 1953, the Brothers purchased the site that formerly housed the Methodist Homes for Children at Cheltenham and established the St John of God Training Centre. The St…
Connections UnitingCare is an amalgamation of several agencies brought together in May 2000. Connections provides services including adolescent community placement, adoption and permanent care and an adoption information service. Connections holds adoption records for all the Uniting Church’s babies’ facilities and children’s facilities. These facilities include institutions formerly operated by the Presbyterian and Methodist Churches….
The Presbyterian Babies’ Home opened in 1928 in East Melbourne. In around 1933, the Home relocated to Camberwell. It housed babies and children up to the age of four. In 1977, it became the Canterbury Family Centre. The Argus newspaper reported on the opening of The Presbyterian Babies’ Home by Lady Stonehaven on 26 October…
St Joseph’s Babies’ and Family Service in Glenroy was established in 1985 when the Sisters of St Joseph merged the St Joseph’s Babies’ Home in Glenroy with the St Joseph’s Receiving Home in Carlton. The Babies’ and Family Service was located in a small residential unit that had previously been part of the St Joseph’s…
St Joseph’s Receiving Home, Carlton, was established by Margaret Goldspink in 1902. In 1905 the Receiving Home moved to Grattan Street, Carlton, when it came under the management of the Sisters of St Joseph. It accommodated many thousands of pregnant women and also provided short term accommodation to infants. The Receiving Home closed in 1985…
St John’s Homes for Boys and Girls came into 1958. Previously, it had been called St John’s Home for Boys. The name change reflected a decision by the Board of Management in 1956 that St John’s was to move towards a cottage system of accommodation and could start to receive both boys and girls. The…
The Pirra Girls’ Home was established in 1961 by the Social Welfare Branch at Lara, near Geelong. It accommodated girls who were otherwise ‘unplaceable’ within the Victorian system. It had a capacity for around 27 girls aged from 11 and 15. In later years, it housed girls from 3 to 18. Pirra was closed by…
The Children’s Court Act 1956 (No. 6053) resulted from new thinking in regard to the problem of ‘juvenile delinquency’, and made some important changes to sentencing and to the numbers of offenders who also became wards. It commenced on 1 January 1957, and repealed the Children’s Court Act 1928 (No.3653). The Children’s Court Act 1958…
The Children and Young Persons Act 1989 (No. 56/1989) was implemented in stages up to 1992 and clearly separated services for children in need of protection from services for young offenders. The Act hastened the process of deinstitutionalisation in juvenile justice, and led to the closure of the few surviving ‘children’s homes’ in Victoria. It…
Langi Kal Kal was established by the Victorian state government in 1951. Located at Trawalla, near Beaufort, it was initially a prison for adult offenders, but it also received people under 17 years of age. Langi Kal Kal became a ‘training centre’ in 1958. In 1965, Langi Kal Kal became a Youth Training Centre specifically…
Dec 18, 2024
Nov 15, 2024
