Checklist · Child Protection & Care Proceedings
Victorian child protection proceedings: stage-by-stage checklist for a parent’s lawyer (Children’s Court family division)
Checklist for a parent’s lawyer in a Victorian protection application: appearance and CMS portal filing, reports before the first return date, interim accommodation orders, conciliation conference, readiness hearing, witness summonses and the final hearing, with the orders available.
- Kind
- Checklist. Steps or checks to work through and tick off.
- Where it applies
- Victoria
- AI use
- Yellow AI can help in set ways. A lawyer checks specific points before use.
- Law stated as at
- 18 October 2026
- Status
- Maintained. Checked on 18 October 2026 against the 4 authorities it cites, for Victoria.
- Version
- 1
- Source
- Written for this library
When to use it
Use from the first instruction in a protection application in the Family Division of the Children’s Court of Victoria, by emergency care or by notice, until final orders. It follows Practice Direction No 1 of 2024; check first that it has not been replaced.
How AI may be used
AI may track dates and index the department’s reports and CRIS notes inside the firm’s approved environment; the lawyer takes instructions, decides the position at each stage and appears.
AI may
- Calculate the filing and service dates in this checklist from the listing dates, for the lawyer to confirm
- Index the protection report, disposition report and CRIS notes by date and author, inside the firm’s approved environment
- Prepare the witness list and the issues list in table form from the lawyer’s notes
AI must not
- Must not copy, keep or process CRIS notes outside what the practice direction and any court order permit; they are deleted or returned at the end of the hearing
- Must not copy, print or distribute subpoenaed material inspected electronically beyond the undertaking given in the inspection request
- Must not refer to the information exchange document or anything said at a conciliation conference in any later document
- Must not prepare any affidavit, report or statement of the parent’s evidence
The lawyer checks
- Appearance notified by 3pm the day before each listing, and the parent knows the lawyer must attend whenever they do
- The protection and disposition reports were served at least 3 working days before the first return date, and any shortfall was raised with the court
- CRIS notes and other departmental documents are handled, deleted or returned as paragraph 27 of the practice direction requires
- Before the readiness hearing, the issues in dispute and the witnesses are identified and the readiness hearing certificate is settled
Method: how the Green, Yellow and Red levels are decided. This is guidance for planning, not legal advice.
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The summary, the law it rests on and the AI-use guidance above stay public. Privacy.
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