Child Youth and Family admits it should have acted sooner in the case of a Dunedin girl who ran away from a CYF home 43 times in three and a-half months.
The 14-year-old was removed from the Dunedin group family home to a secure residence on Wednesday, the day after the Otago Daily Times contacted CYF after an interview with the girl's angry grandmother.
In a statement, CYF southern regional director John Henderson said the number of times the girl had run away was "unacceptable" and CYF "should have moved more swiftly to find a better accommodation solution".
The woman, whose granddaughter and daughter are the same age, told the ODT she was at her wits' end after her granddaughter kept running away from the home and meeting up with her daughter.
While her granddaughter was on the run from CYF, the woman and the police had more than once found the pair drunk and she had at least once found them "stoned out of their heads", she said.
They visited drug dealers' houses, associated with gang members, shoplifted and stole a car together, she alleged.
On one occasion, she came home to find another of her daughters, a 12-year-old who had been with the pair, so drunk she had to be taken to hospital, where doctors found her blood-alcohol level was 252mg. The legal driving limit is 80mg.
Her daughter was also removed to a secure residence on Wednesday after being caught shoplifting, assaulting the woman and absconding from CYF care twice, usually while in the company of the other girl.
The woman said she had asked CYF repeatedly to do something about her granddaughter, whom she called a bad influence.
She wanted staff to move her to another location to keep the girls apart, but was always told CYF was "working on it".
She said CYF staff, even security guards hired by CYF to stop her granddaughter running away, had never looked for her when she was reported missing.
The woman admitted she was not a perfect parent. Three generations of her family had been involved with welfare and most of her six children had been involved with CYF.
Her granddaughter had been in CYF care all her life and her daughter was "no angel", but she was trying to keep her out of trouble.
"I just feel like a big victim trying to protect my child and I've been made to look like the biggest, meanest person here, just because I don't talk properly.
"I wanted help, not my daughter to be taken away, not to be told I'm an unfit mother."
Mr Henderson said the granddaughter was a "challenging young woman" and staff had tried several measures to try to turn her behaviour around, including hiring the security guards.
She "clearly" needed to be in a more contained environment for a period of time, where CYF could work with her more intensively, he said.
However, unless a young person entered the youth justice system - meaning they committed a crime - they could be contained in a secure care and protection facility for only a limited period of time.
"The long-term reality is that she needs to learn to live in the community like any other teenager and she won't learn to do that in a residence."
Regarding the girls being placed in the same family group home together, it had not been considered appropriate to send one of them to a home outside Dunedin, away from family and other supports, he said.
Mr Henderson said it was important to note most of the granddaughter's absconding related to her failure to follow rules about when she should leave and return to the home.
He said CYF caregivers and social workers did a lot of hard work with these young people.
"Our staff deal with some extremely challenging and troubled young people whose patterns of behaviour, by the age of 14, can be quite entrenched.
"Our caregivers and social workers work extremely hard to try to turn their negative behaviours around but they are not miracle workers.
"The fact is that both of these young women have behavioural issues, largely due to poor parenting."
The woman said she told her daughter this stint in the secure unit should be a "wake-up call" to her.
"[I told her] this is what life will be like if you continue down this road."
