[hiddensecrets]

Does anyone know if you can become someone's legal guardian?

A young friend of ours has come to stay as he literally has no where else to go. He cannot go home due to abuse (and they wont take him back). He cannot go to his fathers due to similar reasons (and court orders). He has no other family or friends and my DH and I are it. He is 17 years old.

We want to help him but we live in Community Housing (sort of a subset of the Department of Housing in WA). Basically there is a chance we will be told we cant have him (despite having the room as he and my son get along like a house on fire and no one of different genders will be sharing). We are going to the landlord tomorrow to discuss the matter at hand because if he cant stay he is on the streets.

However we were told that if we were to become his legal guardians in all sense of the world (and his mum has no issue with it) that he would be able to live here as he would legally be one of our children (and the landlord has admitted that this is true.

The social worker at centrelink seems to think it is as simple as centrelink (department of human services) documenting him as our dependent, and then the department of housing will see him as a dependent and then the community housing will do. But is there more to it than that?

We will do everything we can to stop this young man from going back on the streets, including going into private rentals if need be (it will cost more but it will keep someone of the streets so its worth it).

[anabh]

I think you might be talking about two different things. To be his legal guardian and be responsible for all facets of his being until he turns 18 including medical etc, you need to go through the courts. To have him classed as a dependent for centrelink and housing reasons, it may be as simple as what centrelink said?