A teen has been left in limbo without education for 305 school days as new figures spark concerns that at-risk pupils are falling through the cracks.

A former Hawke's Bay CYF caregiver who admitted to kicking, hitting and hurling insults at children placed in his care has been sentenced to 10 months' home detention.

The man accused of burning a 5-year-old child's face with a fan heater has again been remanded in custody.

A five-year-old Christchurch boy suffered severe third-degree facial burns after a man allegedly held a fan heater to his face.

When Robin Vinod turned 17, he couldn't sign a tenancy agreement or be responsible for bills - but that was when CYF left him to fend for himself.

A 13-year-old boy turned down an offer of sex from a woman more than twice his age but she followed him and enticed him into her bedroom, a court has been told.

X Factor boy band Moorhouse, judge Stan Walker and Whenua Patuwai took their smooth sounds to at-risk youth held in a boys home in a bid to turn lives around.

An 11-year-old boy fathered a child to a friend's 36-year-old mother in a case that has prompted the Justice Minister to ask why women can't be charged with rape.

Child Youth and Family has launched legal action claiming a woman was trying to blackmail them after it accidentally sent her somebody else's private information.

A Whangarei grandmother has slammed Child, Youth and Family (CYF) for dumping her two young nephews at her doorstep without providing enough money to look after them.

Irrespective of recent resignations, the reasons for the creation of the inquiry that bears his name still exist. Sir Owen Glenn explains why this important work needs to continue.

Prime Minister John Key says pouring resources into a $25 million suicide action plan is "critically important" to tackling New Zealand's high youth suicide rate.

CYF is reviewing the cases of more than 200 children thought to have been subjected to continued abuse and neglect despite repeated warnings.

A 12-year-old girl who took her own life while in foster care was not given proper support after she claimed to have been sexually abused by a caregiver, a coroner said today.

Police have appealed against the discharge given to the mother who left her children in a SkyCity Casino carpark while she and her partner gambled for two hours.

A 14-month-old baby found abandoned on a Christchurch street late at night is now in Child, Youth and Family care.

A communication breakdown between police and Child Youth and Family meant a teen was on the run for three months before crashing and dying in a stolen car.

Kiwi parents are "unwittingly killing'' up to 60 babies each year, and government agencies are failing to prevent the needless deaths, a coroner warns.

Child Youth and Family are supporting a teenager charged with a violent sex attack on a tourist visiting Waiheke Island.

A teenage mum has been charged with hurting her baby by holding his head under water.

Social workers failed to respond to 20 warnings that the children were being abused and neglected by their father, a convicted child rapist, and their mother.

When Alex MacKay was in a cell and heard his sister crying and pleading over the phone for him to stop and think before turning to crime again, he listened.

A father who forced his children to cover up their injuries after he beat, slapped, whipped and strangled them has been imprisoned for four years.