Stubbs Terrace Children's Home

Stubbs Terrace Children’s Home at 233 Stubbs Terrace, Shenton Park, was an inpatient unit for children and young people set up under the Mental Health Act. Residents could be aged between 4 and 17.

Delphine Jamet writes that young people were admitted to Stubbs Terrace for temporary care, for a wide range of reasons: “Some were in crisis, some required medical or psychological assessment and others were waiting for foster care, residential placement or a return home. Many had developmental or behavioural needs, including autism, though diagnoses at the time were often recorded using broad or outdated terms” (Perth History Database).

In 1991, it was reported that there were 15 beds at Stubbs Terrace; in 2000, there were 10 beds (Parliament of Western Australia Hansard, 23 October 1991; 7 June 2000).

In 2025, there were news reports about Stubbs Terrace treating 8 children aged under 12 for “gender identity disorder” between 1975 and 1980. The treatment involved separation from their families for months at a time. A transgender woman who had been at Stubbs Terrace during this period reported being subject to “constant surveillance, clothing checks, and humiliating inspections”. Reflecting on her time at Stubbs Terrace, she said, “What they did was a form of conversion therapy” (ABC News, 6 October 2025)

According to Jamet, the residents of Stubbs Terrace attended local schools – younger children went to Graylands Primary which was a designated placement school for children in state care, and older children attended local high schools including HOllywood Senior High (Perth History Database). Jamet writes that the system at the institution was rigid and punitive: “Children who attempted to run away or broke rules could be confined to bed for days at a time, excluded from activities or isolated from other children. Communication was restricted. Isolation rooms were used and children placed inside could see others playing outside, while being kept apart”.

The Superintendent Psychiatrist from Stubbs Terrace Hospital was a member of the Child Abuse Review Panel established in May 1984 to review the child protection system in Western Australia.