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Australian Children's Contact Services Association Conference "The Way Forward" On a sunny weekend in September, 2004 about 60 people met for the 7th ACCSA conference in Brisbane, Queensland. While most participants were from Australia we also had the pleasure of the company of Judy Newman the SVN Secretary from Canada, Guadalupe Lara from the Children's Hospital at Michigan and Anna Ward the New Zealand Children's Access Network Representative. The theme of the conference was The Way Forward and a pre-conference strategic planning day got members right in the mindset as they thought about and planned for the development of the Association. We clarified our mission as advocating for and supporting the development of a continuum of safe, quality, child-focused contact services. We articulated our vision that ACCSA will be The voice of supervised contact The leader in development of service models and standards Recognised for efficiency, effectiveness and accountability This mission and vision was advanced during the conference. Topics covered by the four keynote speakers and fifteen workshop presenters covered a wide range of legal, direct practice, service development and research matters. Justice Bolan of the Family Court spoke about the new protocols being developed for referrals from family courts to children's contact centres. We heard from Mary Lewis about the new Contact Orders Program being implemented across Australia in response to concerns about breaches of parenting orders. Service developments such as off-site supervision and practice issues such as the impact of parental mental illness on childhood behaviour were also discussed. Participants had the opportunity to discuss with Marian McCann and Rose Beynon about the Training Needs study being conducted by the main service funder, the Attorney-General's Department. The conference was hosted by the Centre for Social Change Research, Queensland University of Technology and sponsors included the Dept. of the Attorney-General, Qld Family Law Practitioners Assoc. and the Sunshine Coast Family Contact Centre.