about our funding reform
DoCS has released a Funding Policy, which outlines the broad direction for the Department’s funding practices over the next five years.
The policy was developed following consultation with the community services sector to ensure that the best possible services are purchased for children, young people and their families.
The policy has three key themes:
- strengthening the service system – services will be supported to increase their capacity and help build a robust service delivery system
- the shift to performance-based contracting – to link funding to results and give services the opportunity to demonstrate the benefits of the services they provide
- diverse funding options – to ensure that the best placed provider is selected to deliver the service required by using a variety of funding approaches and incentives to develop service capacity
We encourage services to read the policy and consider how they can get ready for funding reform.
To help your service make a smooth transition to the new funding arrangements, DoCS has prepared responses to some Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs).
A series of information sheets are also available to help you stay up-to-date with DoCS’ funding reforms:
- Funding Reform Update January 2008
- Funding Reform Update February 2007
- Funding Reform Update March 2006
Good Practice Guidelines
The Good Practice Guidelines for DoCS Funded Services is one of the key initiatives outlined in the Funding Reform Policy. There are nine Guidelines in total, each written as an explicit statement of outcome. The Guidelines aim to:
- promote quality outcomes for clients
- guide staff in service development
- enable quality improvement, evaluation and accountability
- develop a consistent and high level of quality across services.
performance monitoring framework
The performance monitoring framework for funded services complements the Funding Policy and its overarching vision:
To achieve the best client outcomes with the available funding, through rewarding enhanced performance and better sharing of responsibility for managing service delivery and service risks with service providers.
See the SAAP services page for more details on the roll out of the framework.
