Children and Youth — Issue No. 32 — Thursday, January 12, 2017 (HTML)

Present: Jane Thornthwaite, MLA (Chair); Melanie Mark, MLA (Deputy Chair); Marc Dalton, MLA; Don McRae, MLA; John Martin, MLA; Dr. Darryl Plecas, MLA; Linda Reimer, MLA; Jennifer Rice, MLA

2. The Acting Representative for Children and Youth made a statement regarding his new position and answered questions from Members.

3. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions regarding the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth Report: 10 Years of Advocacy: Representative’s Report Card - 2015/16 Annual Report and 2016/17 to 2017/18 Service Plan of the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth (October 2016)

4. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions regarding the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth Report: A Review of Youth Substance Use Services (May 2016)

5. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions regarding the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth Report: Too Many Victims: Sexualized Violence in the Lives of Children and Youth in Care (October 2016)

7. The Honourable E. N. (Ted) Hughes, Q.C. appeared before the Committee and answered questions regarding the Statutory Review of the Representative for Children and Youth Act.

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON
CHILDREN AND YOUTH


CONTENTS
Page
Introductory Presentation by Acting Representative for Children and Youth	711
B. Richard
D. Thomas-Wightman
Office of the Representative for Children and Youth: Operational Update and Annual Report and Service Plan	717
B. Richard
B. Naughton
D. Thomas-Wightman
Representative for Children and Youth Report: A Review of Youth Substance Use Services in B.C.	721
B. Richard
B. Naughton
C. Ellis
Representative for Children and Youth Report: Too Many Victims: Sexualized Violence in the Lives of Children and Youth in Care	727
B. Richard
B. Naughton
D. Thomas-Wightman
Statutory Review: Representative for Children and Youth Act	733
T. Hughes
B. Richard

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Good morning, everyone. I’m Jane Thornthwaite, the MLA for North Vancouver–Seymour and the Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth. I’d like to wish everybody a happy new year and welcome you back to the Legislature.

I thought that first of all, we’d introduce the members from our committee that are here and our very capable staff, but a special shout-out and welcome to our brand-new Representative for Children and Youth — acting representative for now — Bernard Richard.

We are so pleased to have you. I very much appreciate you coming, and we’re so looking forward to having a fruitful discussion in addition to the agenda items that we have set out today. To begin with, perhaps we could all introduce ourselves, the folks that are here, so that you kind of know who everybody is and where they’re from.

As I said, I’m from North Vancouver–Seymour and the Chair. I’ve been the Chair since the beginning of this session in 2013.

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Deputy Clerk and Clerk of Committees): Good morning, everyone. I’m Kate Ryan-Lloyd, Clerk to the committee.

D. McRae: I’m Don McRae, MLA for Comox Valley. Congratulations on the acting appointment, and we look forward to February.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Bernard, did you want to introduce yourself and then your staff?

B. Richard: Sure. Bernard Richard. I’m the acting Representative for Children and Youth. I’ll have more to say about that. With me are Dawn Thomas-Wightman — she’s the deputy representative; Bill Naughton, our chief investigator, responsible for critical injury and death investigations; and Colleen Ellis. I’m not sure of your title yet. I still have a lot to learn, Colleen, but you are responsible for monitoring, for the purposes of today’s discussions.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Excellent. I should actually mention, in the gallery we’ll also have Ted Hughes, who will be presenting later on today. Thank you very much for attending the beginning of our sessions.

On our agenda today, we have three reports. We have the review of 10 Years of Advocacy: Representative’s Report Card. We have a consideration of a report, A Review of Youth Substance Use Services. Then we’re going to have lunch. Then Too Many Victims: Sexualized Violence in the Lives of Children and Youth in Care will be after lunch.

After that, we’ll do the statutory review process and have our Hon. Ted Hughes to present. Any other business that we have, we can discuss then.

If everybody okay with the agenda as it is? I’m seeing nodding heads. All right.

M. Dalton: Yes. I’m the new member. I’m Marc. Nice to meet you. Marc Dalton. Congratulations on your appointment.

B. Richard: Thank you very much for having me. I almost feel I have to apologize for the cold weather in Victoria. I can assure you it’s been colder in New Brunswick, but it is plus 9 today in Moncton and raining — really the type of weather I expected I would find here and that everybody had told me about. Maybe next week.

It’s a privilege for me to be here. Of course, I’ve occupied similar positions in New Brunswick, where I held the positions of Ombudsman, Child and Youth Advocate, and right to information and privacy commissioner all at one time. I don’t recommend that to anyone, by the way.

I have to say that it’s a privilege to be here, because you exist as a committee thanks to the foresight and vision of former Justice Ted Hughes. No such committee
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exists in New Brunswick. There is a standing committee on legislative officers for all eight officers. It rarely meets. I think, given the three positions I held…. Multiply that by seven years. I think, in total, it’s less than a handful of times I’ve been before a legislative committee. And as a former member of many committees from both sides of that vision, I think that’s regrettable.

I think it’s a tribute to B.C. that there is this much focus on children and youth, particularly vulnerable children. So it’s a privilege for me to be here. Thanks for having me. I know we’ll meet fairly often, hopefully. You’ll decide in February, given the weather that I’ve brought with me, whether I should keep doing this or not.

I want to take the time to thank you for appointing me as the acting representative. I know that was your decision to make. Obviously, I appreciate the unanimous recommendation of the selection committee. I know that’s never an easy thing to do.

I’m really excited to take on the position. As I’ve said many times, I have many interests but few passions.

The status of vulnerable children, youth mental health, children in care and indigenous children in particular are things that I’ve devoted a great deal of time to in the last several years. So it is a privilege for me to be able to work in British Columbia on those issues — and many others, I’m sure.

I’m in a bit of an odd position, in a way, because all of these reports that I’ll be talking about were released before I became the acting representative. I have reviewed the reports and have very capable staff with me here today, and I’m sure we’ll be able to address any questions you may have.

As I mentioned, the short time I’ve been in the office so far has mainly been spent getting to know people here and in Burnaby. Hopefully soon, I’ll head up north as well. I haven’t been able to do that.

I’ve met a number of stakeholders, including people who I’m sure we’ll be dealing with on a regular basis, including the Premier, the Minister of Children and Family Development, the MCFD’s deputy minister. The Chair of the committee, of course, I met previous to the holidays. The opposition critic and the Deputy Chair of the committee. The Deputy Clerk of the Legislature, Kate — many times now we’ve talked and met over the last few weeks. A couple of months, exactly. And, of course, the hon. Ted Hughes. We’re all familiar with his work and his report that led to the formation of the office. I’ve also met with the special representative of the INAC minister while she was in Vancouver — just before the holidays as well.

I’ve got a number of upcoming meetings scheduled. I’ll begin speaking publicly before this month is over. In fact, I met with a group of interns here yesterday to talk about our office.

I’m anxious to introduce myself and to build a network of contacts, particularly with indigenous leaders in B.C. The relationships are important to me, and they’re important to the office. As you are well aware, indigenous children and youth comprise more than 60 percent of the in-care population in B.C. One of my key priorities is to help reduce that percentage and improve services to indigenous children, youth and their families.

Other priorities I’ve talked about early on include the issue of youth aging out of care in B.C. and how they can be better supported — in fact, I would say, well before they’re ready to age out of care. I’m sure we all share the same goals and objectives of having as few children as possible in care settings or requiring services from the ministry and other ministries. Ultimately, I think we’d all want to be able to provide services early on and prevent children from coming into care in the first place.

I’m also very interested, as I’ve said, in youth mental health and have been involved in initiatives in New Brunswick but also nationally, including one based at McGill University and co-funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Graham Boeckh Foundation, with 12 sites across the country. I know both these issues are of interest to the committee, as well, and that you’re well aware of them.

Another priority for our office, and one which I’ve discussed with the Premier and the minister and the deputy, is a reset on the relationship between our office and MCFD. As the previous representative has documented in her outgoing message, that relationship has become somewhat strained during the last year. I hope to change that, albeit I know that the nature of the work is one where there will always be a healthy tension between an independent office such as ours and any government in power.

The RCY will continue to be a strong, independent voice for children, youth and families and will not shy away from speaking out on government policy and practice when they are not working or when we feel they can be improved. We only have the power of recommendation, and I support that classic view of ombuds-kind work. We need to make a case for anything we recommend. I also believe, because of my past experience as a member of the Legislature and as a cabinet minister, that we have a responsibility to make recommendations that actually can be implemented.

One of the concerns early on in the mandate is the fairly low percentage, from my perspective, of recommendations that are actually implemented. I want to pause and take a look at that and consider that with the help of the staff.

With any change in leadership comes an opportunity for a fresh start, and I’m hopeful that the reset that I’ve talked about can result in improved cooperation between our office and the main ministry with which we interact. Certainly, it seems to me that there is a willingness to do that. With the deputy, we’ve talked about reviewing the
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existing protocol, the existing relationship. As with any similar office, obviously, you want a clear mandate, and we have legislation that provides us with the work that we need to focus on. It’s not a broad mandate, relatively speaking.

In New Brunswick, the mandate was much broader. But as I like to remind the people in my office, in New Brunswick, I had no communications staff, no HR staff and really no dedicated research staff, so we really had to make it up as we went. We relied heavily on articling law students and other students to help us with systemic reports. I really feel privileged to be in an office that is well resourced for the mandate we currently have.

It has been a whirlwind, the last few weeks, I have to say. In my very first week on the job, I did a number of media interviews, some of them with national media on the high-profile death of an indigenous young woman who had recently aged out of care and whose body was discovered in a tent in Surrey.

This incident brought to the forefront two of the issues I’ve already identified as a priority for our office. We simply have to do more to support and protect the most vulnerable youth as they turn 19. They’ve already lived and gone through unimaginable trauma. We need to make sure, as the de facto parent, that we prepare them for a transition into adulthood. My view is that we’re not doing enough of that.

We also must do better for indigenous children and youth and their families. It’s a changing landscape. I have to recognize that the…. This is an area in which I was working in New Brunswick just before I moved here. In fact, I continued to be in touch on a specific project to restructure aboriginal child and family services agencies in New Brunswick and incorporate aboriginal cultural counsellors and prevention field workers within the agencies.

I’ve had ongoing discussions with INAC over the last three years, and I recognize that there has been a change, federally, in the last year. Some of it is due to the change of government, absolutely. Some of it is due to the hard work of Cindy Blackstock and her ongoing crusade to end the discrimination as it pertains to aboriginal child and family agencies. There is a changing landscape, a reason to be optimistic, and more funding coming federally. So I think there’s an opportunity there to really, once and for all, make a significant change.

Yesterday I also took part in my first screening meeting. That’s a process in our office where investigative staff and members of the executive review the multiple reportables of critical injuries and deaths of children and youth in care or recently receiving services from the ministry. I can tell you it was my first one. It was a heartbreaking exercise, and I hope that never changes for me. I never want to get used to hearing and reading those stories and deciding which ones we need to look closer at.

I’ve not been on the job long. That, probably, will be obvious to you as the morning unfolds. But I’ve quickly come to understand the range of challenges that vulnerable children and youth face in this province and the depth of the task that lies ahead. I don’t underestimate that.

I am reassured to note that the RCY’s capacity is also much greater, as I’ve mentioned, than what I’ve known in the past. It’s a well-resourced office with vital capacity, including our advocacy team, our monitoring unit and our critical injury and death review and investigations team. Those will enable us to continue with the full workload that lies ahead. It’s a busy, busy pace.

I want to give just a brief update of, maybe, highlights for you. We’re currently working on five reports, all of which are expected to be released in 2017. A report on Alex Gervais, an indigenous youth who spent the majority of his life in care and tragically died after a long-term placement in a hotel. A report on the death of a young man with complex mental health needs who died while staying in a hospital setting. A review of staffing issues in B.C.’s 23 delegated aboriginal agencies. A review of the educational supports and outcomes for children and youth in government care. We all know the outcomes don’t match the outcomes for children who are not in care. Our next B.C. adoption update — another follow-up to our June 2014 report, Finding Forever Families.

RCY would also continue to monitor issues that affect children and youth in B.C. and contribute to discussions about improvements that can be made. To that end, our office has recently been involved in exploring the establishment of secure care programs in B.C. This process, spearheaded by the B.C. Pediatric Society, has also included participation from the Ministry of Health, MCFD and B.C. Children’s Hospital. I’m actually a member of the action committee for children and teens of the Canadian Paediatric Society, so I’m well aware of the work that they do.

If there are any questions up to this point, I’m happy to respond before moving on to the three specific reports.

This is the opportunity for committee members to ask Mr. Richard any questions specific to his background. I know that two of our members and one of the members on the other side were actually on the selection committee for choosing you to be the representative. You will have much more information on Mr. Richard. But if there are any questions or comments that any of the other members have that they’d like to ask or comment on, now is your time.

Other than that, if there isn’t, then we’ll let him go on to his first report.

B. Richard: Oui, en français ou en anglais. Au Nouveau Brunswick les micros sont pour la traduction simultaneé et non pour l’enregistrement des rencontres. Mais oui, en français ou en anglais.

Just wondering. Your work in your capacities in the past with aboriginal youth in New Brunswick — can you elaborate on that?

B. Richard: Sure. I was asked, about three years ago, by the Assembly of First Nations chiefs in New Brunswick to help them, in negotiation with INAC, in restructuring the agencies that they run. They’re independent agencies in New Brunswick.

In fact, one of the things that I like about B.C. is that the province is quite involved in the area of indigenous youth and actually invests some money. That’s not the case in New Brunswick, I can tell you. In the ’90s, I was the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs, and I was told to stay away from any financial commitments with a ten-foot pole. So that is one thing that I like about what I see here.

In New Brunswick, there are ten existing agencies. About eight years ago, I was involved in and responsible for a report called Hand-in-Hand, which recommended restructuring the agencies into three — along the lines of Mi’kmaq, Maliseet and Elsipogtog. Elsipogtog is the largest indigenous community.

B. Richard: Child and family services agencies. They provide protection services for indigenous children in New Brunswick.

B. Richard: Once I left my position as a legislative officer, I was approached by the chiefs to help them implement the recommendations. So I’ve been working with INAC to identify the possibilities.

Actually, just before I left, INAC approved the creation of the first…. I’ll call it a pilot, although it may be that others will…. Eight Mi’kmaq communities along the eastern coast of New Brunswick will join together as one agency. It will add new resources in terms of more culturally appropriate services, with the help of elders, who would be designated as cultural counsellors for the agencies, work with staff to make sure that…. Not all employees in these aboriginal agencies are, in fact, aboriginal. I think that’s the case here as well. So provide advice on appropriate indigenous customs but also work with youth and families to make sure that they understand the richness of their own heritage. It would seem obvious, but it’s not always the case.

This change is taking place as of the start of the next fiscal year for these eight Mi’kmaq First Nations. Elsipogtog, I suspect, won’t be far behind. It would be a single community agency. It’s easier to make that change. I can tell you that it wasn’t easy with the eight other ones. There are a lot of differences in opinions and competition and different sizes of communities. But I’m quite hopeful for that change. It comes with a commitment, working with St. Thomas University and Dalhousie University, to graduate more indigenous social workers and to recruit them into the agencies.

Obviously, that will only be done over a period of time but quite a strong commitment to support the agencies. The province has given in-kind support, not much financial support, to the…. Certainly, they have supported the initiative, and they have been part of a working group with the feds and the First Nations leadership to promote the change.

I’m quite excited about the change. It’s not easy. Any change is difficult. I think, in the long run, this is the kind of direction that we need to take in order to provide the right services but, more importantly, I think, to support families before drastic action is required.

We can have the best child protection services in the world. They’re still child protection services. My view — and I think it’s the view of Justice Hughes and, certainly, the view of Plecas, as I read his report — is that, obviously, the best solution is to leave kids in their families if that’s possible. It won’t always be possible, but certainly, the overrepresentation is something we need to be ashamed of as Canadians, and it needs to be dealt with.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Thank you for your presentation. It was nice to meet you and have an introduction back in December. Congratulations on the acting appointment. I imagine it’s a steep learning curve, having spent eight years at the representative’s office.

I do have a few questions around the priorities. I know we’re going to get into the advocacy report as the next item, but if you can speak to domestic violence as a systemic issue. The coroner’s office released a report that there were 100 deaths within a five-year span. These numbers aren’t decreasing. The representative’s office has written a number of reports — Christian Lee — and the impacts. Schoenborn. Domestic violence has been a huge issue on the radar of the representative’s office.

And if you could speak, perhaps, to a poverty reduction strategy. The centre for policy initiatives released
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a report today speaking about B.C. having the second-highest rates of poverty for children in this country. We don’t have a legislated poverty reduction strategy. Is that on the RCY’s radar to be reporting out on? Or if you have any initial thoughts today as we kind of launch into a new year.

Thank you. I have more questions, but I’m going to go easy on the first round.

B. Richard: I’m sure you do. I know you know more about the office than I do. I’ll be probably asking for help from the staff that are with me.

Domestic violence is something…. From having gone through the screening exercise yesterday, we know it’s prevalent, certainly, in families that require support from the province and from the ministry. Clearly, many of these cases…. It’s upsetting to read them. I’m sure you have been through that process.

Many of them are, obviously, kids maybe requiring protection and care. But they’re ripe with instances of substance abuse and use, domestic violence, sexual abuse and physical abuse, of course.

It’s a critical issue not only here but across the country. There is some good work that’s being done, and I know the office has taken a very strong position on these issues. It’s something that I will continue to do.

In part, my earlier answer or presentation indicated that one of the things that I’m interested in is…. You know, we’ve made something like 200 recommendations over the past few years. Many of them have not been implemented. I’m quite interested in reviewing all of those and looking at them to see if we should be tweaking them — to understand why they’re not being implemented.

Are they doable? I don’t know, but I’ll be reviewing all of them. Certainly, domestic violence will be one of the issues that we’ll be talking about in the next little while.

D. Thomas-Wightman: I guess we can just add that we have not sat down as a team yet to talk specifically about some of those priorities. So Bernard, as the representative, will decide which priorities he wants to pay attention to. Obviously, domestic violence is something that we’ve been very interested in. Some of the asks that the previous representative had around supports on reserve for indigenous women involved in domestic violence is something, likely, that we’d recommend that the representative continue to ask for those pieces.

We will also likely be recommending that there’s some review and oversight of the provincial domestic office at Children and Families and how that’s working, considering the report out — the coroner’s report.

We plan a strategy meeting very early on in the year. The representative, very new into his role, has identified, obviously, the indigenous children piece. But domestic violence is on our radar for sure.

B. Richard: As well, I want to say that one of the things that I want to do…. The work of this kind of office is not to make recommendations; it’s to effect change. I want us to focus on where we can be most effective and where we can actually help change happen.

That will be important for us to try and not to be all over the place. You’ve identified an important issue. I’m not saying that, but I do want to make sure that we are not so focused on multiplying reports and then move on to the next one. I want to make sure that we can have an impact that really matters and that is concrete.

On the other issue. I come from a province where there is a poverty reduction initiative. It’s been in place for a number of years. It’s totally non-partisan. The initial initiative was co-chaired by the Premier and the Leader of the Opposition. I think now they’re honorary co-chairs, if my memory serves me right. The group would be co-chaired by community members. It has helped.

I think that on poverty, we need a clear focus on what we want to attain. It was surprising to me to read this morning that B.C. has the second-highest poverty rates. I wouldn’t have expected that. I’ve been more looking at the child poverty rates over the years, and I know that Toronto and Saint John, New Brunswick, have had quite high child poverty rates as cities. But I hadn’t taken a look at the relative provincial rates in quite some time, so it was surprising for me to see that.

One of the reasons that I was interested in coming here is that it is a province that fiscally and financially appears to be doing quite well, that has the means to make some change. So that is certainly something that we’ll be looking at.

I can say that poverty is often one of the factors that comes up in a lot of the work that we do. If you can address poverty, you can address lots of other issues in any province. I served under a Premier who would always say that the best social program is a job. I understand that reasoning. It just doesn’t work for everyone in any society in the world.

I appreciate the comment. I’m desperately trying not to be political in my answers, because I’m not a political person. I have been — but not anymore. Certainly, poverty is an issue that we’re well aware of, and it comes up in our work.

You spoke, also, in December about the young girl who had passed away in the tent city. Is the representative’s office going to be doing a review under the CID mandate of the office, or do you have any initial observations that you can share about that situation?

B. Richard: Well, I can say, certainly, that it’s a case we’re well aware of, that we’re gathering information and that it’s one of the cases that was actually talked about yes-
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terday in that screening process that I talked about. We haven’t made a decision on exactly what we would do with it. In principle and because she’s aged out of care, it falls outside of the mandate of our office. But certainly, it is an issue, that of aging out, which has been talked about a great deal since I’ve been here.

It’s certainly an issue of interest for us, and it aligns with some of the reports that we’ve already published. Do we want to reiterate? At times, it’s a good thing to repeat the need for more supports for these particularly very, very vulnerable youth.

We’re talking about youth that have had very traumatic lives. They require the kinds of wraparound supports that, frankly, don’t exist yet in British Columbia. I hope they will soon, because the costs are horrendous. I’ve really taken notice of the Vancouver Foundation report. I may not be totally in line with every detail of that report, but I do believe in the principle that if we invest early in prevention and early intervention, we will save in the long run as a society.

Having been a politician, I can say it’s hard to think outside of the four-year mandate. It requires more long-term vision. I’ve been there. I can plead guilty to that. But I think the reason for the existence of this type of committee as a select standing committee of the Legislature is that it allows people from all political perspectives to think longer term and to make recommendations in that regard.

One of the things that I’ve noticed as I’ve spent time in this building is that we often, in British Columbia, aren’t as national in thinking in terms of what other jurisdictions are doing. It’s never apples to apples as you visit one province to another.

But when you look at things like…. You mentioned already a couple of times that the RCY office is reasonably well resourced. But is there a jurisdiction in Canada that we look to as sort of the best-practice jurisdiction with a combination….? Whether it is a similar RCY office, legislation, ministry capabilities?

Oftentimes we think we’re doing it by ourselves in British Columbia. You talk about the political process. If we have examples to either strive towards or perhaps to actually say: “You know what? There are elements in British Columbia where we’re actually doing a really good job….” It’s not good enough, because with children there’s always more to be done. That part I respect.

Is there a light in Canada that we should look to as an example to achieve or to role-model or to, perhaps, soften some of the challenges we have?

B. Richard: Certainly, there’s a variety of experience across the country. I’ve had the privilege of sitting on the Canadian Council of Child and Youth Advocates, and I chaired the Forum of Canadian Ombudsman and the Canadian Council of Parliamentary Ombudsman. And I’ve had some experience internationally because I’ve chaired an international group of French-speaking ombudsmen as well.

There’s a great variety in the mandates and the situations in the office. But across Canada, I would say New Brunswick is the best for the breadth of the mandate. It’s a very broad mandate. If you go to the legislation there and you look at the schedule, it includes all ministries, school districts, health authorities. Every single public agency that provides services to children is included. It’s a huge, broad mandate.

On the other hand, it’s a tough place to work, because the resources haven’t always been there. Access to information has been a struggle. I had to take the government to court to get an amendment to the legislation to have the kind of access to information that this office enjoys in British Columbia. Not every province has a standing committee. We’ve talked about that as well.

So for some things, I think British Columbia is best. For other things…. Certainly not Quebec. Quebec is still providing these kinds of services through their human rights commission. I think that’s horrible.

New Brunswick has just recently changed the Child and Youth Advocate’s mandate to the Child, Youth and Senior Advocate, which was a shocker to me. It’s hard to imagine a mandate that is so diverse. We know that seniors, although there are obviously vulnerable seniors in society, tend to be better organized than children, and certainly than vulnerable children, I know, from the organizations that exist in New Brunswick.

Of course, there’s a variety of experiences. Ontario’s done some great things in the area of youth engagement — I think probably second to none in the country in that area. That’s something that I haven’t talked about that we want to do in our office. We had a successful event called Ignite Your Spirit last year, and we’ll be repeating that this year to engage more youth, to hear from them. They know what it’s like to be in care.

I think there’s good everywhere. I’ll listen in to what the news has to say later today. But I hope to be able to present, as well, to the committee on the statutory review, because it is a unique time, every five years, to look at the mandate and see how we can improve it.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Thank you very much. I don’t see any more nods or hands up. But I’d just like to make a couple of comments.

First of all, I very, very much appreciate your comments on the reset and also your comments that your office’s job is not so much to make recommendations but to effect change. I know that was one of the concerns that the ministry has had over the years, just getting bombarded with a lot of recommendations, many of
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which are not included in the Ministry of Children and Families mandate.

Some of those recommendations — at least a quarter, I think — affect other ministries. So there were specific reasons as to why some of them were not attained.

I really appreciate that, and I also appreciate your interest in resetting with the ministry and the ministry staff. Certainly, our committee…. Sometimes we feel like we’re stuck in the middle. A reset or a refresh is always refreshing, so we appreciate that.

B. Richard: And it works both ways. Of course, the deputy, Lori Wanamaker, and the minister and the Premier — as a matter of fact, all three — have indicated that they are prepared to participate in the reset. It’s not just from our perspective but from their perspective as well, so I’m encouraged by that.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Excellent. Well, thank you very much, and good luck on that.

Now we’re going to move on to the reports that are on our agenda. We are actually bang on time. That’s refreshing. Just to give you an idea of time frames, we’re going to take from 10:45, which is now, to 11:30 to discuss the advocacy report card, and then from there to 12:20, the second report. Obviously, you’ve got some flexibility there, but we do want to keep to the agenda.

B. Richard: Having chatted with former Justice Hughes earlier, I know he has a commitment later in the afternoon, so I’ll do my best to accommodate. If we need to make some changes to allow him to present, I’m prepared to do that as well.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Okay, just appreciate that I try to keep people as much on time as possible. So there you go.

Welcome, and thank you for your presentation on the second agenda item: update from the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth and review of Ten Years of Advocacy: Representative’s Report Card — Annual Report 2015-16 and Service Plan 2016-17 to 2017-18 of the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth.

Office of the Representative
for Children and Youth:
Operational Update and
Annual Report and Service Plan

B. Richard: It’s a long title, but I hope not to spend a long, long time on this first report.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): All the members have read the report, so recognize that we’ve all read it, and we’ve got it in front of us.

B. Richard: As you might expect, the report begins with a ten-year retrospective from the previous representative discussing accomplishments and talking about areas that still require work, described as urgent work. This includes more help for youth leaving foster care and improving indigenous child welfare services to areas that, as I mentioned before, I’m deeply committed to moving forward on and areas that you can expect me to talk about in the future.

The report goes on to show that 2015-16 was the busiest year ever for the office. The office dealt with 2,096 advocacy cases. It was a single-year record since the creation of the office in 2007. In fact, since 2007, there have been 17,291 advocacy cases.

We also issued a total of 13 public reports. In addition to working with individual children and youth and their caregivers, advocates participated in more than 100 community relations events and activities, including facilitating workshops on child and youth rights, presenting at conferences and hosting information booths. Thirty-eight communities were visited as RCY advocates interacted with children and youth, and investigators conducted interviews throughout the province.

Looking at our CID unit, between April 2015 and March 2016, the office received reports of 138 deaths and 665 critical injuries of children and youth, a more than threefold increase since March 2011. As a result of the increase in CID’s workload, the office received an increase in funding last fiscal year to ensure mandated duties could be fulfilled, and we thank you for that.

CID public reports issued in the last fiscal year include Paige’s Story, a report with which I know you are all familiar.

Other CID reports released last fiscal include Cyberbullying: Empowering Children and Youth to Be Safe Online, a joint release with the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner, and The Placement of Children and Youth in Care in Hotels in British Columbia, the office’s first joint report with the ministry. Not all bad. There is some collaboration at times.

As noted in the annual report and service plan, CID was continuing work on two other reports, both of which were released in October. Too Many Victims: Sexualized Violence in the Lives of Children and Youth in Care — we’ll talk about this later. And Last Resort: One Family’s Tragic Struggle to Find Help for Their Son — we’ll address this report at a later meeting of the committee.

There are currently two additional investigations underway — one to be released early in 2017 and one later in the year. RCY’s monitoring unit continues to play a key role in the organization in terms of oversight, research, evaluation, review and audit. It’s a critical part of our work, because if we don’t have access to accurate information, it makes it very hard for us to assist ministries in making the changes that are required.
[ Page 718 ]

This past fiscal year, public reports from monitoring included Growing Up in B.C., a joint report with the provincial health officer, looking at how B.C.’s children and youth are doing right now. That’s something that I’d like to see updated perhaps every couple of years.

We in New Brunswick worked with the New Brunswick Health Council in publishing the State of the Child. Every year we did it. It was an annual report. I’m not sure it’s needed annually, but I think it is good to look at stuff like teen pregnancy, dropout rates, obesity rates, child poverty. I think those are pretty good indicators of how children are doing and good information for MLAs and for government departments.

As well, we’ve released The Thin Front Line: MCFD Staffing Crunch Leaves Social Workers Over-Burdened, B.C. Children Under-Protected and, the third, B.C. Adoption Update.

As I mentioned earlier, three reports currently underway from the monitoring staff are a review of delegated aboriginal agency staffing, a review of educational supports and outcomes for children and youth in government care and, next, B.C. Adoption Update.

Our current fiscal year budget sits at $8.83 million, operating, and $50,000, capital. We currently have 56 FTE employees operating out of Victoria, Burnaby and Prince George.

I would be pleased to answer questions on the annual report and ten-year review.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): On page 25, you identify the needs for the Ministry of Children and Families. It indicates that there are 38,000 protection reports made. There are 7,216 kids in care, and 4,387 are aboriginal. And 876 kids are registered for adoption, 368 kids are placed for adoption, 700 kids age out of care, and 63 kids are in custody. Then we’ve got 5,356 kids receiving services from Community Living.

My question would be: at the high level, does the ministry have the capacity to meet these needs? Do they have the staff? You just mentioned The Thin Front Line report. Do you have any comments around whether the ministry has the capacity to meet that demand…?

B. Richard: In fairness, I’ll allow others to come in on this if they’d like to. It’s a little early for me to be able to say. I mean, certainly, we’ve identified issues; there’s no question about that. Sometimes it’s about how you choose to invest the resources you have as well. It’s a bit early for me. As I’ve said, I haven’t worked on these reports. So I’ll invite, perhaps, Bill Naughton to comment on your specific question.

B. Naughton: I think the issue of capacity is a key one and one that we’ve examined in multiple reports and that we’re continuing to examine.

The representative has already referenced our current work with the DAA staffing report. Ms. Ellis may want to chime in to correct me as I direct comments on that.

I think one of the shifts in the office recently has been to look at the fundamentals of the child welfare system and the capacity of that system to deliver the kinds and levels of service that we think would be appropriate for B.C.’s children and youth. I think you’ll see, as we continue through 2017, that kind of core work, looking at what supports the work, really becomes an increasing focus for us.

In investigations — although we look, obviously, at individual circumstances and sometimes tragic incidents involving children and youth in care — the focus has to remain on the system within which social workers and others are responsible for providing care to this population. How do they work within the system, and how is the system resourced and structured?

In many cases, I think we’re able to make good suggestions about how to reshape that in order to get better and sometimes much more economically effective outcomes. That, I think, will be a continuing focus for us in 2017, and to continue to look at the foundational pieces like staffing, education and training, which really have direct impacts for children in care.

B. Richard: I might add only this — and Dawn, you can chime in, as well, if you’d like: not all the services at the ministry are delivered by staff. As you are well aware, a number of caregivers and agencies are staffed by people who are not employees of the ministry. That’s an important focus for us. I think we perhaps haven’t spent enough time looking at the quality of those services. I think we should be looking at those, as well, and the level of oversight for those services. We’ll be talking more about that in the coming months.

It’s a complex organization, quite a large organization and certainly not a simple province as well. You have a significant urban area but also vast rural areas, sparsely populated. You have over 200, I think, First Nations communities. It’s a very diverse province and not easy to service — I’d be the first to admit that — certainly compared to where I’m coming from. So I want to take time to consider your question and to respond more fully in the future.

D. Thomas-Wightman: I think I’ll just add, to that question, that social workers tell us consistently that they can’t. So in most every report — in the delegated agencies report, The Thin Front Line, in the Alex Gervais report…. That’s a theme that’s coming out — that they can’t meet the standards. The adoption numbers — they can’t keep them up. This year those numbers are significantly down from last year. They blame staffing. They don’t have enough time to be able to do the work, to do the standards. So specifically from social workers, the message is that they can’t meet those standards.
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That’s why some of the reports we have, going forward, or that we’ve done, around The Thin Front Line, highlight some of those issues. They’re not able to meet the standards. They’re not able to complete cultural plans, plans of care. Those are important pieces of work for social workers to do — and hopefully, support the transition out of care if they have those strong plans and strong cultural plans. In short, I’d say they’re struggling.

D. McRae: A couple of points, if I may. When I look through the report…. We talked a little bit about advocacy a minute ago. I totally respect that your office is independent, and I like it to be independent. Though I’ve had in my time in Victoria an opportunity to work in the social sector — pretty closely, I would argue — the one thing I notice with advocacy….

I think there’s always a time and a place for it, and I’m not criticizing it. But in British Columbia, there is a lot of advocacy. It might be something to consider: examining the role that the RCY office is able to play, the number of non-profits that are providing advocacy and what the ministry is able to do as well. If there’s duplication, perhaps those three entities could find a way to use their resources….

There’s a lot of good work to be done. Can it be done in a way that is more efficient to achieve the same outcome? If it means that perhaps one group or another needs to pull back to get the same outcome and refocus in other areas…. That is a suggestion I may throw out.

I know with the Ministry of Social Development, with a huge caseload and lots of advocacy, as well, from those same sectors, you could argue that perhaps there are examples where outcomes can be equal without duplication. So I just throw that to you, and I don’t…. I know that you’re relatively new.

The other thing I was…. I’m going to throw some points, and then they’ll be in Hansard. One of the things that puzzled me, as an organization, when I looked through the report…. I’ll be blunt about this. There is one personality that dominates this report in every photo. When you have a large organization…. I would argue the RCY is staffed by some incredibly competent, passionate, able people.

If it was purposely to highlight one individual’s accomplishments, that is fine. But I also think that as an organization, it is also an opportunity to highlight the skilled individuals that exist within the organization. If there’s a reason not to include them in the pictures, well, I’m not privy to that, and that’s fine. It’s not ours to tell you how to do it. But I think I’ve heard from others that it was puzzling that they did not see others in the pictures.

Third piece, performance indicators in the back of the document. I’m not 100 percent sure how performance indicators are arrived at. I would argue, from my time in social ministries, that perhaps it needs to be examined how to measure great work.

For example — and it was mentioned earlier — is it really the number of reports that is the important part, or is it the change that is effected? I would argue that the most important thing is change. If the measure of how good an agency operates is the number of reports it puts forward and the change doesn’t happen, that is not an effective change.

The other thing I look at is response time. A 100 percent response time for inquiries when you have three days to do so and 60 staff and you meet 100 percent — that’s great. Maybe it’s time to look to do performance indicators to see where improvements can be made because, obviously, you’re really good at that one. So I would challenge, as organizations grow, please consider areas that perhaps could be built upon or strengthened.

Lastly, and this is more anecdotal than not, we have a lot of great social workers in British Columbia, men and women who work incredibly hard in communities large and small across the province. It’s a really tough job. I think you know that very well from your time in New Brunswick.

One of the things Mr. Plecas highlighted and I’ve heard from people on the ground in the social sector is that at the best of times, morale is challenging because you’re dealing with such passionate or challenging or devastating circumstances.

I think anything the RCY office can do to assist the morale to be strong in the social sector…. You know, when things go badly, I think it’s important to say that. But I’ve heard from other individuals that sometimes morale is suffering, especially from the media. It’s not so much what individuals in the office say, but it’s the perception when they read something in the Vancouver Sun or a local paper. They know they’ve worked hard, and yet they know they didn’t get a chance to have their say.

For our social sector to be strong, the employees there — managers and front-line staff…. As long as we’re always considering that those who are good…. If morale’s not good, it will challenge them to do their job.

So those are four areas: advocacy, dominant personality, performance indicators and the importance of keeping morale as strong as we can in a very tough but incredibly important sector. Those are just things that I noticed in the report.

B. Richard: Sure. They’re all good questions. So let me see if I can get at it.

In terms of advocacy, obviously you’re right. B.C. is well-endowed in advocacy. I think every part of that has some value, provides some contribution to the quality of life in the province and to policy development. At the end, elected officials decide. No matter who does the advocacy, governments decide what’s done with that.

The difference with the kind of office that we have is that…. I have been a member and am still a member of a number of non-profit groups that do all kinds of ad-
[ Page 720 ]
vocacy in youth mental health and the state of aboriginal children, for instance, but we don’t have access to information.

An independent office reporting to the Legislature, with the kind of access to information that we have, can make a difference. For an individual family or a youth to be dealing with a ministry is very intimidating. It’s very intimidating for me, and I have a law degree. Think about most of the people that we serve and that the ministry serves. They really don’t know even where to start. They need advice, information. We have access to files.

One thing that I have to say about B.C. is that we have tremendous access…. There are some issues, and we’ll need to work our way through that, but generally speaking, tremendous access to the ministry’s file. That didn’t exist in New Brunswick and doesn’t exist in several provinces.

That kind of access is vital to advocating in individual cases. There are a lot of groups out there who advocate for policy issues and policy changes and groups and communities, but few — I would argue none — have the ability to advocate for individual children and families like this office does. So it’s critical to the well-being and to resolving issues.

The majority of our employees work in advocacy. The majority of our work is in advocacy. It doesn’t make the headlines. You won’t see that in the Colonist or the Sun. That’s working with ministry staff, resolving issues, getting services that might not otherwise be obtained. You know, we spend a lot of time on what goes wrong, but a lot of issues are resolved at that level before you ever read about it in a report or in a newspaper.

About the focus on the rep. I’ve said publicly what I believe to be true. I think you’ve had a superb Representative for Children and Youth here over the last ten years. She’s a scholar and a tremendous fighter on the ground for those who are least able to speak for themselves. This was her last report. To focus on her on the last year of her tenure…. She was renewed by the Legislature once. I think it’s not inappropriate to focus on her on this year. I hope not to have as many photos of myself in next year’s report. We’ll work on that for sure.

I can tell you it hasn’t taken a long time for me to realize the quality of the staff that work in our office. Really, from my own experience — I’ve worked alongside all of the advocates that existed from 2006 to 2011, when the Child and Youth Advocate’s mandate was added to my Ombudsman mandate — this is a very, very strong office.

It is a province where advocacy is strong in general. I recognized that. I heard it from New Brunswick, read it in the national papers. I think that’s to your credit as a province. It’s the spirit of the west to some extent, I think, to question authority, to be independent.

These are independently minded people that you have in your province. Many come from other parts of Canada, other parts of the world. I think it is to the credit of the province, and I’m totally bowled over and impressed by the quality of the workers that we have. There will be lots of focus on them in the months and years to come, whether I’m here or not.

Key performance indicators. I think any credible organization requires performance indicators. In fact, I think, from what I’ve been told, the committee has asked the office to provide indicators of its accomplishments and how it measures its success. I agree that there are different ways to do that, and that’s certainly something that I’m focused on. I’ve said before that I don’t want to dwell on that. I’m not going to…. I don’t feel the pressure to publish 13 reports in 2017 because 13 reports were published in the last fiscal year, right?

I really want to focus on how we can effect change, because that’s what’s most important. That’s what people need. They don’t look upon us to publish reports, multiply our recommendations, be out in the media. They want their issues — and they’re significant critical issues — to be dealt with. That’s what we need to focus on. But part of that work is publishing reports and being out in the media.

We talked about this early on in my mandate. I will be the external face of the office. When reporters call, I’m the one who will answer requests for interviews, and there are quite a fair number of those. You have a more aggressive press out here than on the east coast, I’ve noticed already. There’s no getting away from that, but certainly, this was a particular year.

I couldn’t agree with you more about the work the social workers do. They often called our office, I have to say. Many of the calls we have are from social workers. They feel they need help, a bit of a nudge, because they’re inside of a system, right? They’re inside of a box, and it’s harder for them because it’s so hierarchical. Sometimes they see something needs to be done. They just can’t make it happen from inside, so they enlist our help.

I would even take it one step further. I would say that a child protection social worker does the hardest job in the province. I’ve said that in New Brunswick. It’s harder than the Premier’s job and, certainly, much harder than mine. I get to review what they do. They have to decide whether they’re going to take a child away from their family. I don’t know if I could live with that. In fact, I’ll say: I couldn’t do that job. It’s a tremendously difficult job. We’ll support them every opportunity we have, publicly and privately.

L. Reimer: I just wanted to concur with what my colleague said but also…. I think you’ve already identified this. One of the things that I thought was lacking in this report was some sort of performance indicator with respect to how we are working with the ministry, how we can effect change and how that is going to be measured.
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There was really very little…. I mean, I think the advocate did a wonderful job of identifying issues, as evidenced by this report. Moving forward in the future, I’d like to see some sort of performance indicator. Perhaps, possibly, you’re going to have to identify some systems by which you work with the ministry to effect the change that you want to see.

That’s just my comment about what seemed to be absent from the report. There were lots of references to stakeholders but not the ministry-type thing.

Certainly, as part of the reset and the renewal of the protocol that we have with the ministry, that will be part of our discussions. I mean, I should say that there are thousands of points of contact between our office and the ministry every year — tens of thousands. Generally, for the most part, they go well. There’s a collaborative relationship. We couldn’t possibly do the job that we do without the collaboration of the ministry.

There have been some areas of tension, and we’re hoping to reset that relationship, as I’ve said. I think it’s a fair thing to do after ten years, in any event, especially with the new office holders. I’m hopeful that we can do that. Whether we can reflect that in KPIs, we’ll see. Certainly, I’m interested in considering how we can reflect that, but it should be obvious as well.

I just want to reiterate the representative’s comments. We have excellent working relationships with the ministry. At the political level, sometimes it got a little back and forth, but that did not affect our day-to-day interactions. I talk with the provincial director on a daily basis, and as the representative said, we resolve a number of issues before they get to the media or before they get to reports. I wouldn’t want to minimize that strong working relationship that we’ve had. I agree that a reset is a good time with the new representative coming.

We also talked about performance measures in the past around our relationship and effecting change, but because we only have recommendations and give advice, we couldn’t make an order for the ministry to do something. So it was left in their hands to make the change that was necessary, and that’s why we didn’t do that in the past — not to say we can’t do it in the future. But it was a long discussion with the committee around that performance measure. At the end of the day, we decided it was…. Advice, advice, advice — if they don’t take it, they don’t take it, at the end of the day, right? It was a difficult one to measure, and that’s why we made that decision.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Thank you very much for that discussion and clarification.

On page 68 of your report…. I’d just like to draw the attention of the committee to the progress on recommendations. You’ll notice — I did a quick calculation; excuse my math — that 61.5 percent of the recommendations that the representative’s office has submitted to government have been implemented, have substantial progress or have some progress.

I think, generally speaking, when you’re dealing with a lot of recommendations that are cross-ministerial — and this is specific to MCFD — that’s not a bad record, even by the results that are indicated in this report. I think that, with the comments that all the members have made, it’s a really good direction that you have embarked on.

We very much are really, really looking forward to working with you and listening to further comments. Further suggestions for the office and priorities are really, really well received, and we thank you for that. We thank you for your comments.

The next report is the consideration of the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth report: Too Many Victims: Sexualized Violence in the Lives of Children and Youth in Care.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Oh, sorry. I jumped way too far here. Don’t want to screw up the numbers here.

Consideration of the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth: A Review of Youth Substance Use Services in B.C., May 2016. That one will go to 11:50.

Representative for Children and
Youth Report: A Review of
Youth Substance Use Services in B.C.

Obviously, given the substance use and abuse situation and crisis — it’s not too strong a word; I think it’s been used by almost everyone — this report is probably more relevant now than when it was released in May of last year. The review looked at publicly funded substance use treatment services for youth ages 13 to 18, focusing on services delivered by B.C.’s health authorities, which, as you well know, are funded by the Ministry of Health. Specifically, it examined how available these services are and how responsive they are to the needs of specific groups of youth, including indigenous, LGBTQ and pregnant or parenting youth, as well as the policy and standards that guide them.

Information for this review was gathered through a survey of all publicly funded service providers who offer youth substance use services in B.C. as well as interviews with service providers, health authority representatives, the Ministry of Health, the mental health and substance use agency and the First Nations Health Authority. The review was guided by an external advisory committee,
[ Page 722 ]
experts in the field of substance use who helped verify data collection methods and commented on the findings of the review.

Why did RCY decide that this review was important? Simply because substance use challenges for youth are evident in the everyday work of this office. In the screening exercise I’ve talked about a couple of times…. Obviously, it’s stayed with me overnight. I wouldn’t risk a percentage, but a high number of those cases have aspects of substance abuse involved, either with the youth or with the families.

B. Naughton: Just a rough tally from yesterday. I think we were looking at just over 35 percent of the reportables had substance use involvement associated with them.

B. Richard: So it has a tremendous impact on the work of our office but also on the work of the ministry.

Substance use–related abuse, poverty and trauma cause children to be taken into care, unfortunately, every day in the life of this province. In our everyday work, many stories are heard of youth who are struggling with substance use issues and are unable to find appropriate services when they need them. Sometimes these calls come from desperate parents and other times from youth themselves seeking assistance. In addition, data collected from the critical injury and death reports we receive from MCFD shows that during the period 2011 to 2015, 17 percent of the approximately 1,500 critical injuries reported to my office were primarily attributable to substance use.

We know there are many cases where the substance use won’t be part of the file but is part of the problem. These injuries included overdoses and other injuries where substance use was identified as an immediate cause. In the same time period, 14 of the 183 deaths of children and youth were attributable to substance use. These are very conservative estimates, since substance use often contributes to accidents or death but may not be classified as the primary cause.

These sobering statistics made it clear that we needed to take an in-depth look at publicly funded substance use treatment services for youth. What did our review find? Well, generally, that there is major work to be undertaken in British Columbia — and, I hasten to say, elsewhere in the country — to pull together a true system of substance use services. The findings of this review point to a lack of standards, a lack of quality assurance processes, a lack of clear provincewide direction and leadership, and a lack of proactive planning — which have all led to numerous gaps in the system.

The service system is piecemeal and can leave youth, for long periods of time, without adequate or available services as they try to access treatment. This means that the opportunity to prevent longer-term consequences and costs to society for them — to their families, of course, but to society as a whole — is often missed. From an overall provincial perspective, services and supports differ considerably between health authorities in terms of how easy or difficult it is for youth and their families to access them.

A number of barriers for youth seeking treatment were identified in the review, including difficulties in moving from school or hospital emergency departments to community-based services where they can face wait times that discourage them from seeking further supports. Sometimes that time when it is the optimum time for providing services can be short, so providing services in a timely fashion is absolutely essential.

Other barriers to services include a lack of flexibility in hours of operation, lack of developmentally or culturally appropriate options, and issues of trust stemming from discrimination toward those with substance use problems. This review also found that there is a long way to go to meet the needs of B.C.’s diverse youth population, including indigenous youth, and recommended that the appropriate ministries and the health authorities take steps to eliminate the stigma and discrimination toward youth with substance use problems, through broad-based educational activities aimed at both professionals and the public.

In the process of conducting this review, our staff met many dedicated service providers whose efforts to build a system of care have been sometimes frustrated by a lack of funding and a lack of priority for substance use services at both the health authority and provincial levels. I’ve been encouraged by it. Obviously, this report is dated in May. I know there have been a number of initiatives undertaken since that time. However, despite these limitations, these service providers deserve appreciation for their dedication to helping youth who are struggling with substance use issues.

Of course, with fentanyl now posing a much greater risk to our children and youth, the issue of substance use has become even more urgent. You’re all aware of the stats from the coroner’s report, late last year, of 755 total drug overdose deaths in B.C. Ten occurred among children and youth, ages ten to 18. It’s just over 1 percent, and relatively, it’s small. But it’s also double the number of youth overdose deaths in 2015. In the 374 overdose deaths in B.C. in 2016 involving fentanyl, six were youth between the ages of ten and 18. The coroner’s report shows that overdose deaths linked to fentanyl in youth remain low but also show signs of increasing.

Our substance use report called for a single point of leadership and coordination that would collaborate with regional health authorities on developing and implementing a fully resourced strategic plan to focus on prevention, early intervention and residential treatment
[ Page 723 ]
when that’s needed. This plan must include adequate resources and should pay specific attention to the service delivery needs of indigenous youth and families.

Another recommendation in the report was to undertake a broad-based educational effort to eliminate stigma and discrimination toward youth with substance use problems.

As noted in the conclusion to the report, there is major work to be undertaken to pull together a true system of substance use services. This work will not be easy, but B.C. has excellent resources in the form of ongoing research and people who can help build this system.

For change to occur, the province must show concrete and meaningful leadership by ensuring that programs and services are guided by standards in clinical expertise and that there is adequate and earmarked funding. I’m afraid that this is a problem that’s here for the long term. It’s become quite painfully obvious in that we need to be very focused if we’re going to deal with it.

The lack of appropriate programs and services for youth in substance use issues was personified in our October 2016 report Last Resort, which documented the case of a Métis teen whose parents were unable to access suitable, culturally specific services to help address their youngest son’s escalating substance use problem. His parents eventually turned to the youth criminal justice system because they felt it was their last resort to obtain the timely help their son desperately needed. Tragically, he died while in a full-time attendance program.

The issue of youth substance use is a complex one. Beyond more residential treatment beds, youth also need access to harm reduction to prevent overdose deaths. It’s time to have a much more concerted effort to bring into existence drug education programs informed by evidence.

Specifically for children and youth in care, we need to take a hard look at why these kids are using drugs and try to address those issues that they face — early trauma, abuse, neglect, lack of opportunity, housing issues, lack of placement, stability, etc. — rather than focusing solely on drugs as the problem.

As our report called for, I would like to see the creation and maintenance of a comprehensive system of substance use services that consistently meets the needs of B.C. youth and their families in communities across the province. For the sake of B.C.’s youth, government must take concrete action on these issues.

M. Dalton: Thank you for the report. You mentioned that 35 percent of children in care have substance abuse issues. I want to clarify that. That’s overall, because there’s also…. You wouldn’t think that children between one and nine or ten would be into drugs. Maybe there are some. So I’d be interested in knowing what figures there are among those that would, say, be teenage years or ten until 19 — what the figures are there.

B. Richard: Yeah. I was referring more to critical injury and death reviews that we do. Of those, 35 percent involve substance use as a direct causation.

B. Naughton: In the most recent screening process. I think, as we’ve talked about, if you looked across a four-year period, substance use constitutes about 17 percent of the overall total of critical injuries to children in the province.

B. Naughton: Because there’s no doubt, particularly with the opioid crisis, we are certainly seeing that reflected in terms of the increase in overdose in the youth population.

M. Dalton: Just a couple more comments. You mentioned that it’s 1 percent death among children. If it’s, let’s say, 8,000, 10,000, I think it’s 0.1 percent. If it’s ten, that would be over 10,000. Anyway, it’s about 0.1 percent rather than 1 percent.

M. Dalton: Okay. The last point I want to bring forward — and it’s more of a global comment or question — is: now that the representative’s office has been in place for ten years, are we tracking children and youth, those who have been in foster care? Has there been any tracking over the years, seeing what the impact is, whether it be in substance abuse, mental health, suicide — all these traumatic situations and difficult challenges that are faced? Has there been any tracking? Is it something that is really a consideration? I think that would be very valuable information.

B. Richard: There is some research on that, but I’ll let Bill and perhaps Colleen comment.

B. Naughton: I think it’s fair to say we don’t have the resources to do the kind of long-term longitudinal tracking for the entire population.

Recently, however, in connection to the Alex Gervais investigation, we became very interested in a cohort of children who, like Alex, had passed through the care of a specific agency. We have been tracking and looking at the outcomes for those children as they have aged out of care. That may very well form the basis for some subsequent public reporting.
[ Page 724 ]

Of course, the young woman who recently died in the tent — it was widely reported — was part of that cohort. She was part of the group of children that we’ve been following closely as part of our work.

I think, at some point, if we had a capacity — potentially, in a joint research project with the ministry — the kind of access to information that that would require, a longitudinal study of that nature would be enormously valuable. I’d be very excited to have the ability to take that on.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Thank you for the report. Fentanyl is a huge issue, as you can appreciate, all across the province, with a particular emphasis in the Downtown Eastside, so thank you for illuminating the importance of trying to be proactive on this issue.

Some of the recommendations that I’m reading from this report talk about the importance of having a public awareness campaign destigmatizing, raising awareness, giving capacity. So I just wanted to thank you for those remarks. Hopefully, we can try to get in front of this crisis.

I have a few kind of technical questions. One is: you talked about improvements that have been made since the report was released in May. I’m curious to know if any of those improvements are linked to the three recommendations that were identified in this report. One talked about a single point of contact. The other talked about a five-year strategic plan. The other talked about a public awareness campaign. That’s the first set of questions.

The second is: what I found most fascinating was the back appendices that list all of the beds and services available to children and youth throughout the province. I think that is really important information to share. What stood out for me is that for the north, which constitutes half of the geographical land base of this province, the only access to treatment beds that you can get in the north is in Prince George. I’ll ask more questions, but are you stating that there are no treatment beds beyond Prince George to service our young people that are in need of treatment? I’m curious to know that.

The other piece was: out of all of the data in the back, there’s no K-to-7 awareness around substance use in the schools,, with the exception of the Fraser region. So the Interior, the northern and the Vancouver Coastal regions do no awareness training in elementary school. I thought it was also fascinating that there’s only one region that is actually doing any prevention work around substance use. Can you speak to that?

I know it’s more granular on a report that you didn’t author. But those are the pieces that stood out for me.

What I meant when I said there were…. I’d noticed — and certainly, it’s hard not to notice — that there have been commitments made rather than specific improvements. I couldn’t point to specific improvements and whether they relate to our recommendations or not, but certainly, there have been strong commitments in B.C. relating to the fentanyl crisis. No question that in B.C., because you are at the front edge of the crisis, the rest of the country is looking at what happens here. I read this week that Toronto has just announced some initiatives.

B.C., I think, needs to be in front of those initiatives. Certainly, I remember, on the news network, watching a significant press conference where the coroner and the Premier…. So commitments at a very high level have been made with regard to addressing this significant crisis in public health. You’re well aware of it from the riding that you represent. That’s encouraging.

In terms of public education and awareness, taking these kinds of very strong public stances has an impact on the public. Now, it has to be followed up with real improvements on the ground.

We can talk a bit more about more of the specific questions. Colleen, would you like to address those?

C. Ellis: Yes. The one thing I can speak about…. You mentioned the beds in Prince George. The information that is in the appendix is still in place. There have been some announcements recently in terms of beds. The Pacific Community Resources Society — it used to formerly be The Crossing in Keremeos — will be opening 22 beds for 17- to 24-year-olds this year, relatively soon.

HOpe Centre, Lions Gate Hospital in Vancouver Coastal, for 13- to 18-year-olds. Those will be concurrent mental health and substance-use treatment, and those will be ten beds. Then the Interior Health, Central Okanagan. It looks like they will be introducing four withdrawal-management beds.

That’s the addition in terms of the beds across the province. I haven’t seen anything that indicates that there will be more beds in the north.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): That was part of it. The third piece was around the one region that’s doing kindergarten-to-grade-7 education around substance use, and the other pieces. It just underscores, I think, your recommendations that there isn’t a consistent awareness campaign or strategy to do substance use awareness.

B. Richard: That was the major representation, and it’s a single point of leadership on this very critical issue. We believe that there needs to be a
[ Page 725 ]
consistent message but also consistent services throughout the province. We recognize, of course, that it’s more difficult to serve remote areas because the numbers are just not there, so that will be an added challenge. But there needs to be a consistent level and quality of care available for a growing number of people dealing with this tremendously difficult issue.

D. McRae: A couple of points, I guess. I’m not from the north; I’m from Vancouver Island. I know when we talk about supports, especially medical supports, and youth, it’s a challenge. I live in a community of 65,000. If we use something, as an example, say child psychiatric services, the individuals that are able to provide the service are all at capacity, and it’s hard to get more resources into our communities. We have 65,000.

As you go farther, more rural-remote communities, I would expect there are challenges that way as well. Professional talent is limited, and oftentimes they want to concentrate where the bigger urban areas are. I think, in a perfect world, it would be great to have more resources spread around the province.

A question I have, if I may. I have an opinion on it, but it’s just my opinion. Social workers do a specific job. I know that oftentimes it then goes into the medical expertise area, because there is a lot of overlap. Yet, at the same time, I wonder if that’s always the best, because sometimes they do not have the training. They might have the experience but not the training in medical areas to make decisions that actually have some ramifications.

For example, in the Social Development Ministry, social workers — incredibly hard-working social workers — are often tasked with deciding nutritional supplement programs. But that’s not necessarily, I would imagine, a course that is often taken in one’s formal training; whereas, medical nurses, doctors, etc., may have that area.

Do you have thoughts on that? If I may be so bold, in a general sense: how do we align social services and medical expertise and the overlap therein? Sometimes a doctor or a nurse is phenomenal in their profession, but they’re not able to provide some of the social supports that are necessary, and vice versa. Yet I think we ask them to do both.

Do you have any thoughts on that particular area? How’s that putting you on the spot? Then I have a question.

B. Richard: Thank you for that. I think because we’re referring to the issue of substance use and abuse as a crisis, as an epidemic…. When something like that happens, you pull all of the resources that you have. So I’d go beyond…. Obviously, medical personnel need to be involved. But also community counsellors and police have to be involved. The methods of policing have to be adapted to the issue of substance abuse.

Honestly, I think eliminating or reducing the stigma attached to drug use…. Some youth, particularly youth in care, are reluctant to approach authorities for help. As is often the case in some of these issues, I think, in fact, the numbers we have are actually quite low compared to the real problem that’s out there.

I think it’s going to take a multifront approach, well coordinated provincially, well resourced, in order to deal with this very significant issue. I’d want someone to help. I’m not sure exactly if I understood what you meant, but certainly, that involves medical personnel, social workers, nurses, nurse practitioners, but also community workers that can identify and encourage youth dealing with drug addiction to get help and assist them in getting help. That’s not always obvious.

One experience that I had in my previous life was talking to a First Nations chief of a small community in New Brunswick who told me that 60 people out of 600 people in his community — that’s including babies — were on a methadone program. I was floored. He said that doesn’t include those who don’t give a darn about treatment. There are those out there as well. Those are the kinds of numbers that we’re talking about.

It will take a significant effort across the board, involving many professions and professionals and service providers, if this is to be tackled at the front part of it.

D. McRae: Two more points, if I may. In the recommendations that were made…. This goes back to our earlier conversation that we had with the ten-year report. I look at the recommendations. There’s some real positive opportunity there. I agree. But then when I look at some of the ways we’ve chosen to word those recommendations, it almost is setting up an opportunity for failure.

For example, under recommendation 2. The specifics, I’m okay with. But when you use wording like “fully resourced,” it’s very hard to measure what fully resourced is.

If someone wishes to say to government, “You failed there,” it’s a guarantee, because it’s such a nebulous amount of funding. “Some resources” or “improved resources,” but when I see the words “fully resourced,” that becomes a very charged word.

Then recommendation 3. Again, I don’t think anybody has a problem, probably, with the general outcome that we’re trying to achieve. But the goal of eliminating stigma…. Eliminating means there is no more stigma. That is impossible to achieve.

So when I read those kinds of recommendations, I think the value is still in them, but we are also, again, saying, down the road, if we wish to, that government isn’t doing the job, because we will not eliminate stigma. We will not fully resource, in certain people’s opinion. Can we do better? Definitely. Do the civil servants and the politicians on both sides of the House wish to, and does your office? I totally think they do. But I think it’s easy to say that we did not succeed in those.

When I see those kinds of recommendations, it saddens me. As we go forward, though I will not be there to
[ Page 726 ]
participate in this role, I look forward to seeing recommendations that are more tangibly achievable.

B. Richard: Okay. Those, I think, are fair comments, and they reflect some of the things that I said earlier. If we can agree that we can do better and that we want to do better, that’s a good starting point. I’m good with that. We can agree that we can provide better services and improve what’s out there and reduce stigma. I think I can go along with that. Thanks for your comments.

J. Rice: I’d be curious to know some of your ideas around how we better serve children and youth with substance abuse issues in the north or in rural and remote communities — particularly since the vast part of our province, 70 percent of our province, is rural or remote. Yet using the example that Melanie provided…. Northern Health Authority has produced a few reports lately talking about our child poverty rates. Our health outcomes for children are some of the worst in the province.

What are your ideas about better servicing kids and youth in northern and rural-remote areas?

J. Rice: Oh. It’s not intended to be a tough question. I’m getting to know you, as we all are right now.

B. Richard: Thank you for the question. Certainly it is a challenge, without a doubt. It’s a challenge for, I would say, indigenous communities in particular because so many indigenous people don’t live in their communities. I’ve been told — I don’t know how accurate it is — that almost 70 percent of indigenous people have left their First Nation and now live in urban settings.

The trend towards urbanization is worldwide, in any event, so I’m not surprised that it’s the case in B.C. But it makes it much more difficult to serve communities that are isolated, remote, where you don’t have critical numbers of people to provide, for instance, physical treatment centres. It makes it more difficult.

Even if you improve the number of treatment beds in the north, they won’t be in every community. So even by adding the numbers of beds — which we believe needs to happen and needs to happen urgently, given the critical nature of the crisis that we face with fentanyl, carfentanil in particular, and other drugs — certainly it will be a bigger challenge to provide the kinds of services that we’ve talked about, residential services more specifically, in remote areas of the province. Because we know we can’t be in every community, it will require the province to offer assistance to those who need to travel for those services, to provide supports for them, to provide supports for their families.

Families are critical in a treatment program — the support of family and friends. So if you isolate someone from their community and from their family, you also, to use Mr. McRae’s descriptor, are setting them up for failure. There’s a greater chance they won’t succeed if you can’t also provide the kinds of supports that they need.

It’s a bigger challenge. I’d be the first one to admit that. But I think it’s one that can be addressed in different ways. So different solutions for different regions but a high quality of response and availability of treatment when it’s needed, at the right time, is also critical.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Thank you very much. I just have one comment. In my other responsibilities as parliamentary secretary for child and youth mental health, I can concur with what Ms. Ellis commented, that there have been several announcements since this report was published.

Probably one of the more renowned one, in addition to the residential care sites that were already alluded to, is the child and youth mental health hubs. There are five that are going to be rolling out. One has already been rolled out. Others in the near future, all across the province, will help to deal with a lot of the children and youth issues, including substance abuse. I just wanted to put that out there.

I really do appreciate the inventory that’s in this document. It’s actually quite helpful for us and something to hang on to.

Before we move on to the next report, I just wanted to draw people’s attention…. We have some visitors in the back. These are people from the Senate of the Parliament of Kenya. They are led by David Ethuro, who is the Speaker.

Welcome not only to the Legislature of British Columbia but also to the proceedings of the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth. We hope you enjoy your visit to Victoria.

They are here, apparently, from January 9 to 12, not when the House is sitting. That’s when it’s really going to be exciting, but we’re very happy that you’re here to witness at least a little bit of the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth and our brand-new Representative for Children and Youth, Bernard Richard. Welcome.

Moving on, now we’ll get to the report that I jumped to the last time. This one is the last report before our lunch break. We are a little bit ahead of schedule. There is lunch, but the lunch isn’t here. I think we should at least start this and maybe be able to…. We’ll see when the lunch gets here.

Mr. Richard, since the lunch isn’t actually here, why don’t we resume on your next report, on sexualized violence?
[ Page 727 ]

Representative for Children and
Youth Report: Too Many Victims:
Sexualized Violence in the Lives
of Children and Youth in Care

B. Richard: The last of the three reports. In that report, we looked at the prevalence and nature of sexualized violence committed against children and youth in the government’s care during a three-year period. This report — it’s the first of its kind in Canada — was the result of an aggregate review of 145 reports of sexualized violence against 121 children and youth in the care of MCFD and the province’s 23 delegated aboriginal agencies between 2011 and 2014.

As you are aware, the ministry is required to notify my office of all critical injuries and deaths of children or youth who have received a reviewable service during the past year. Critical injuries may include incidents of sexualized violence. So we had that information to draw from.

The review incorporated data from those completed reports, along with the voices of social workers who were the legal guardians of these children and youth, as well as knowledge gained from an exploration of best practices around child and youth sexualized violence. It also included an overview of current ministry and DAA policies and guidelines that make reference to the issue of sexualized violence and how social workers should address the issue. The review also examined the identities of the perpetrators, their associations with the victims and the settings in which the incidents took place.

Finally, it compiled information on responses to the sexualized violence by the criminal justice system, social workers, anti-violence experts and other service providers. Taken together, these sources of information allowed our office to highlight the systemic issues that create heightened vulnerability for sexualized violence against children and youth and to look at what can be done to address these vulnerabilities.

It’s important to understand the issue of sexualized violence against children and youth in care in a wider context.

Despite significant legislative changes in Canada in the last 30 years, increased public understanding of sexualized violence and encouragement for victims to come forward, we know that the majority of sexual offences are not reported to authorities. This makes it difficult to determine the prevalence of sexualized violence perpetrated against children and youth.

However, despite these limitations, police-reported sexual offences have been found to occur about five times more often among children and youth than among adults over the age of 18.

Clearly, we are all aware that no child or youth should ever experience sexual abuse. But such assaults are more egregious when they happen to already vulnerable young people who, for reasons beyond their control, cannot live with their families and whose protection is the responsibility of the state.

The numbers from this review alone are extremely troubling. As I’ve just said, it’s very unlikely that the true total of such incidents committed against children in care during that period…. It’s likely that it’s far higher, as reporting is often delayed by these young, traumatized victims or never completed at all.

One number produced by this review is particularly staggering: 61 percent of the children and youth who experience sexual violence were aboriginal girls, despite the fact that aboriginal girls comprised just 25 percent of the total number of children in care in British Columbia during the time period covered by the review.

While this review looks at sexualized violence against children and youth in care over a three-year period ending in 2014, recent statistics are just as troubling. Of the victims of reported sexualized violence in 2015-2016, nearly twice as many were aboriginal girls than non-aboriginal.

This review found that there is not one specific policy or set of practice standards to guide B.C.’s social workers in their role as the guardian of children or youth who experience sexualized violence while in care. Consequently, actions taken by social workers in these cases are varied and inconsistent, leaving children and youth potentially at risk for further abuse and long-lasting harm.

This review found that guardianship social workers do not feel well trained — they told us — to respond appropriately when a child or youth in their care has been subjected to sexualized violence, although it is known that the response from adults to the sexualized violence against a child or youth can either be beneficial or it can result in greater struggles and greater needs for support in the long run.

Knowledge of protective factors and prevention strategies is missing from social workers’ training, a glaring gap in the education of those who are responsible for the safety of children and youth who are already vulnerable when they come into care. The ministry needs policies and standards that more specifically address sexualized violence and guide its workers on the job.

Adding to this problem is that the required and appropriate supports for children and youth in care who have experienced sexualized violence are too often nonexistent, inaccessible, under-resourced or not delivered in any culturally appropriate, safe way.

What can be done about these findings? In fact, there is much that we can do both to prevent the abuse in the first place and to better support children and youth who have experienced it so that they don’t have a lifelong vulnerability to sexualized violence.

This report’s number one recommendation was that the ministry create and implement a broad strategy to
[ Page 728 ]
address sexualized violence against children and youth in care, with a particular focus on aboriginal girls.

Strategies directed at indigenous children and youth should be developed in consultation with delegated aboriginal agencies and First Nations organizations.

Key to the success of this strategy is the provision of a B.C.-wide education and training program for social workers, educators, police-based community and victim service workers, police and others on how to detect the signs of sexualized violence, its potential impact on children and youth and the importance of communication and co-ordination across service types when a child or youth in care is a victim of sexualized violence.

The second recommendation in this report centred on creating strong child advocacy centres, such as the Sheldon Kennedy Centre in Calgary. We really believe that it’s a good model for children and youth here.

The report recommended that “the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General lead the development and implementation of a network of child and youth advocacy centres in B.C.,” with the first phase establishing several such centres serving aboriginal children and youth and their communities.

Thirdly, the report asked that the Premier identify a lead minister responsible for creating and implementing a five-year strategy for preventing and responding to sexualized violence against children and youth in B.C. The strategy should be created in partnership with relevant ministries, indigenous organizations and anti-violence organizations. It must be evidence-based and should include a strong culturally based indigenous focus from inception.

I’d like to note that while a recently developed government policy framework acknowledges that sexualized violence is a problem, neither MCFD nor the provincial government as a whole seems to fully grasp that the prevalence of this violence requires urgent response. Without this acknowledgment, it is challenging to develop and implement a framework for prevention and response that would meet the needs of these children and youth.

Further, where programs and services do exist, there is evidence that caseloads are high and wait-lists are long. And although the province has committed funding to some sexual assault initiatives through its civil and criminal forfeiture program, these are still time-limited, one-time-only grants without continued funding.

The government of British Columbia is the legal parent of children and youth who, through no fault of their own, have been removed from their families and placed in care. It’s a huge responsibility, as many of us know as parents. Steps must be taken to prevent and respond to sexualized violence against children and youth in British Columbia. We must do right by our most vulnerable children and youth through strong, collaborative action. All children and youth deserve the chance to become self-sufficient adults.

D. Plecas: Bernard, thank you for that, and thank you for all that you’ve said this morning. It’s very clear the committee made a very good decision in bringing you here — other than what you’ve done for the weather. Before you got here, we had good weather.

My question is about the whole business of under-reporting. Forgive me if I’ve missed it, but I don’t see that that has been addressed in this. I ask that because just from my understanding of this issue, that is one of the single biggest problems. Whilst these are things that we can talk about with regard to the recommendations for people who have been identified as victims, the larger group is all of those people who are victims and aren’t coming to the attention of anyone. Can you make a comment on that?

B. Richard: Certainly. Someone can add some detail in terms of what the report speaks to, but certainly this is an issue where we know that the proverbial tip of the iceberg compares and applies. We know this is the type of situation that occurs in private and often with very vulnerable folks, in particular vulnerable children and youth.

There are no more vulnerable children and youth in the province than those who are in care. They’ve already lived through trauma, sometimes including sexual trauma and violence, in their own families, and then they’re placed in situations where they’re often moved from home to home.

I come from a very, very small community. I’ve lived in a community of 2,000 people all of my life. One of the great tragedies of that community was the workings of a parish priest who, over the course of a number of years, sexually abused close to 100 young boys. The truth came out decades later. I know many of the victims personally. I assisted the former Supreme Court of Canada judge Michel Bastarache in helping victims apply for compensation many years later.

It is a mystery to me how this could go on in a small community over many years without it being public knowledge. Having interviewed victims, I know some of them told me that they talked about it to their parents and more often than not received a swift hand to the ear and were forbidden to talk about it. People didn’t believe.

So this is my personal opinion. I think that with regard to children that are so vulnerable — coming from trauma as they do and being in care, dependent on strangers for their well-being — it is that much more difficult to talk about it. Who do they trust? Who will believe them as children in care?

I think you touched upon a very critical aspect of this issue — that we can do better by those who are victims
[ Page 729 ]
and who come forward, who we learn about. How can we help the many, perhaps even more, victims that will never come forward on their own? How do we better educate and train social workers — that’s one aspect that we talked about — and other professionals as well for recognizing sexualized violence that has occurred? I think you’ve touched upon a very important issue.

I can perhaps ask Bill to talk about whether we address that aspect in the report. I can’t recall. Bill?

B. Naughton: Obviously, we speak about the fact that we understand that under-reporting is chronic, not just in the child-in-care population but in the population in general.

One issue that was of specific concern to us, of course, as we move forward with this is that we as RCY have no ability…. Once children age out of care, once they’ve turned 19, we have good reason to believe that as they move into adulthood, there are frequently opportunities at that point for them to disclose historic sexual abuse. But of course, because they’ve aged out of the system, we don’t have any way of tracking that.

I suspect we do have a cohort of children that we are aware of in the sense that they have moved through care, but we are unable to capture some of that data and revelations that they may have made, having aged out. This is a problem both for the child-in-care population and for populations generally.

I’m not aware that anyone has found a magic bullet in terms of trying to increase reporting rates, but I do think that one of the most cogent parts of the report is to identify that demographic within the child-in-care population that is the most vulnerable and where social workers can pay particular attention to the potential signs of victimization. For example, we know that within a year of sexual victimization, 20 percent of these children are either attempting suicide or are significantly self-harming. So there are some significant warning signs.

Even in the absence of a disclosure, there are things that could certainly trigger further inquiry. There are things that we can document through the research that would provide good grounding for social workers to make further inquiries and possibly get disclosures as a result.

J. Rice: I have two questions. I guess one is…. I always find it so shocking that we’ve removed children from a risky or a traumatic experience and yet there’s such a high percentage that are re-introduced to risk or trauma with sexualized violence. It’s more of a comment, I guess, that I just struggle with that and how we could fail so profoundly.

This report is talking about cases…. It’s a snapshot — or tip of the iceberg, to use your words, Bernard — of cases that go back to 2004. Here we are in 2017, and we still don’t have a strategy on addressing kids that are re-introduced to trauma such as this.

I guess that’s more of a statement. But I’d be curious to know: why is this so difficult? Why are we here in 2017 and only starting to address this issue?

My second question is just in regards to looking at the breakdown of the victims — such a large percentage are aboriginal girls — and if you had any comments on strategies on better equipping aboriginal girls to protect themselves.

B. Richard: I think it’s a difficult issue for society to talk about in general. It’s still a bit taboo to talk about sex and sexualized violence and sexual abuse of children. It’s something that we’re uncomfortable, generally, talking about.

We’ve identified ways where we think more precise training in social work programs and with professionals and a clear strategy can help make a difference. Certainly, we’re willing to work with the ministry on finding ways to better prepare professionals to deal with these kinds of issues. Bill has indicated some of the indicators that invariably show up when children have been victims of sexual violence. So training social workers and other professionals to recognize that and to help children speak about the kinds of abuse they have faced I think is quite important. There are things we can do. There are things that we need to do, and we’ve identified some of them.

J. Rice: Well, just to finish up on that question. I guess one of the discussions that we’re having right now is about the actual child as the victim reporting and the reasons why they don’t report. But what I’m concerned about is the fact that kids have reported it or the RCY office has interviewed social workers that have identified this as happening — it has been reported — but yet we still don’t have a strategy to properly…. What’s really alarming for me is that there’s no strategy. It’s almost like this is acceptable. “Oh well, you’re a kid in foster care. Yeah, you’ve got a higher chance of being abused.” I’m just shocked at….

The second part of my question was in regards to just the astronomically high number of aboriginal girls that are victims and what your thoughts are around that.

B. Richard: Yeah, I’ll ask Dawn to address that. I know from my work with aboriginal leaders, including with Cindy Blackstock, and the work I’ve been asked to do to
[ Page 730 ]
identify how the province of New Brunswick might better respond to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission calls to action, that with regards to indigenous children, there is a historical trauma, intergenerational trauma, that has yet to be fully dealt with.

Though I’m encouraged by the TRC calls to action, the commitment of the federal government, the renewed commitment of all provincial governments as well, more resources that have been committed federally as well, the Human Rights Tribunal decision in the Cindy Blackstock complaint…. I think there are things that are happening that should allow us to be more optimistic, but there’s a tremendous amount of work to be done still. These are not issues that will be…. It took generations for us to get here. It will take some time to get to a much better place, but there’s no time like now to start.

D. Thomas-Wightman: Sure. You’re right: it’s disheartening, especially around aboriginal young girls.

A couple of things. We’ve asked for a strategy and some policy. When a social worker has somebody who discloses, there’s no policy they can go to and say: “This is what you should do.” We saw a wide range of responses from social workers, saying: “You should go report to the police.” Well, if I’m the parent, I’m not telling my 13-year-old: “Go down there and report.” I’m working with them. I’m taking them down there. I’m supporting them.

That’s something we’ve asked for urgently — a strategy and a policy and training so social workers know what to do. There really was a wide range of responses, and it was luck of the draw for girls.

We had one advocacy case where we worked with a young aboriginal girl who was abused in a residential resource. We went to court with her, the previous representative and myself. It was an awful, awful day — to have to sit with her and have the defence lawyer attack her on what happened. Why would any 14-year-old who had intergenerational trauma, was in care, had all those other things ever want to put themselves through that? I was disgusted by what she went through.

If it happened again, I doubt she would ever go through that four-year process again because of how she was treated. There were no supports for her. The rep and I were the only ones there with her. Her foster mom wasn’t with her. There wasn’t a social worker with her. When you look at that picture, it’s no wonder why kids don’t report.

The other thing we’ve asked for urgently is an indigenous child advocacy centre. There’s real research that shows they’ve been successful. The child comes in and reports once. There are supports. There are social workers. There’s police. There’s victim services, counselling supports — anything that they can get — in that one centre. It’s very child- and youth-focused. There’s been success.

We know there are some proposals from the north. Some agencies in the north have put proposals through, through MCFD, although they have not been accepted. That’s something we see that is urgently required. Like you said, we brought them into care because of trauma. Then the government is the parent, and they were abused and neglected again. So the priority focus on this is urgent. We feel it’s a huge priority and that something needs to be done immediately around this issue.

B. Naughton: If I could just add one thing. We talk a lot here about the children themselves and the interaction with social workers, but another really key piece of this is the fact that a large number of children in care — probably about 2,000 in B.C. at any given time — are going to be living in the care of staffed residential resources. That’s been an issue of concern for us for a significant length of time because in many of these staffed residential resources — I think we’ve said it in previous reports — many of the most complex and challenging children in the province get some of the very least skilled, minimum-wage workers, who are actually engaged with these kids day in and day out.

I think you see some very significant negative impacts as a result of that. Certainly, we’re going to have a very fulsome discussion of that in the context of the Alex Gervais report. I think it’s really important to look at, as well, in terms of the screening and the training of the private agencies that are providing services to such a large percentage of this population. That’s another very significant piece of this, in terms of looking at the quality of the care and at getting better outcomes for this population.

As I say, it’s our intention, certainly, to discuss this quite a bit more in the Gervais report, because I think it’s very central, at least to that story.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Well, thank you for making remarks on this report. This is a deeply disturbing report. For those of you that know my personal life, I have been a victim of sexual abuse, so this is a disturbing report to illuminate that these kids were in state care. I do have terse and strong remarks because of understanding, from a personal perspective, the impacts of being a victim as a child, so I thank you for illuminating it.

I guess I have a few remarks. That is, we do need to treat this with urgency, understanding the impacts of substance use and mental health on the outcomes of kids that experience sexual violence.

What this report illuminated for me was: where is the prudent parent — with respect to caring through pressing charges, working with the criminal justice system or the civil justice system — to get compensation for the victims? It’s one thing to know that these are injuries that happened in state care. I’d like to know what actions were taken to pursue the criminal pieces. On page 10 of the report, Stats Canada says that in 2012, 15 per cent of cases were actually tried, provincially and nationwide, across
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the country. So we know that convictions are really low for victims of violence.

I guess I just want to underscore, as well, that this is a significant breach of trust. Out of these children, the 121 children, the bulk of them were indigenous. Why were so many indigenous children sexually assaulted? Why are they being targeted? Is there any analysis as to what to what makes them more vulnerable? Why is their race a variable?

That’s why I disclose. I am an indigenous woman who was a victim of violence. That shouldn’t be our birthright. There needs to be action today. I’m 41 years old. My incident was three decades ago. The number in this report is appalling, and the response from the minister, with all due respect, was: “There are some interesting recommendations from this report.”

It’s not about recommendations, as the members opposite acknowledged. It’s about action. I want to know how many of these foster homes got shut down. I want to know how many people are going to be criminally convicted and spend time in jail. People spend more time in jail for harming cats and dogs than they do for harming children. So I would like to see some action.

I’m not going to apologize for my passion. Kids are relying on us to be their advocates. Kids are relying on us to act swiftly. Some kid tonight…. In this report, a three-year-old…. My kids are six and 13 years old. A three-year-old is being sexually assaulted in foster care. That is not okay. That should not be okay for any government or any society, especially in 2017.

My questions are about whether there is any information on whether this government has taken criminal or civil action on behalf of these victims that received sexual assaults in care.

Also, to illuminate, if you aren’t aware, Representative, the Public Guardian and Trustee released a report late last year. On page 18, for the record, the highest rate of incidents that they deal with for legal proceedings is related to sexual assaults. There is something systemic going on here — that for the kids that are in care, the greatest injury they receive is to be sexually assaulted in state care.

Thank you for allowing me the time to share my perspective. I hope that we can all agree that it is the state’s duty to act as a prudent parent on behalf of these children and that we can tell them that we’ve done everything we can to ensure that justice is served. For these kids, I don’t know if justice has been served. We’ll probably find them in the Downtown Eastside, in my riding — kids like Paige.

B. Richard: It’s a shame to have to respond because I think you’ve said it all. The passion is obvious and doesn’t need to be apologized for, obviously.

I think the question in itself is the statement, right? Why are we not doing more? Obviously, some result in criminal charges and convictions. Dawn has referred to the difficulty even of pursuing…. Putting a child through that process is awful. It’s oftentimes revictimization, so it requires the highest imaginable supports that we could mention. Certainly, it requires the kind of support that a caring parent would provide and assistance and then everything else that’s required — counselling and all the rest.

I think your passion speaks for itself. It tells volumes. It’s an issue that we’ll keep talking about in the months ahead and in the weeks ahead because it shows up. Yesterday, again, in our screening process, which is the most difficult thing I’ve had to do in my six weeks here…. To go through that list of cases and to imagine that happens to kids still today…. It does, and I guess it will.

We’re the adults. We have the responsibility to ensure that it doesn’t happen any more than it should. This is an issue on which I don’t mind saying that it shouldn’t happen at all. It takes resolve and commitment and leadership, and we expect that to happen.

D. McRae: I really appreciate the passion from the member opposite. It’s funny. I was drawn to page 10 as well. My comments don’t come with the same experiences, but they come with some same level of concerns.

I look at the stat from page 10. Fifteen percent of cases are tried in court, which seemed shockingly low, yet 75 percent of perpetrators are found guilty. I was shocked at the — and I mean this in a positive way — success rate. If we actually take it to court, the perpetrators are often found guilty and deservedly so. Yet only 15 percent are going to court. And these are known cases. That shocks me.

I guess the question I was looking for, as I read the report, going to the recommendation side, is…. I was looking for recommendations that would assist that.

There are many other things to talk about here. Do we need to have more supports for the RCMP to take these cases forward? Does Crown counsel need more supports to understand these tough cases? And these are tough cases. Or do social workers need more training to allow them to support the youth as they need to go down this path, which no one wants any youth to ever go down?

I think the reality is, though, when we decide to take it to court, we make a difference in terms of punishing those who are guilty. I would like to see more guilty individuals. It doesn’t make it get better or go away for those individuals who are affected, but at least those who are doing the case are well known, are given a chance to have a fair trial and, hopefully, will never have the opportunity to spend any time with children ever again.

I was a little sad that there were not those recommendations that I saw later on in the report.

The other thing that I noticed in the report…. The recommendations are fine. I have no problem with them, other than I found the recommendations to be more re-
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active than proactive. Reactive is fine. It’s still important. But I think when you see government or society decide to be more proactive, we see improvements.

If I use an example of…. Where the RCY office and the ministry work together with adoptions, we see an example where we can make a real…. I trust they will be all positive. We see the forever home and the chances for young people to have those families improve because we’ve worked together as a society. We can be proactive. It’s there. I’m looking forward to seeing more opportunities for proactive.

From this report, I was hoping I would see an opportunity to see what else we need to do proactively. Yes, it’s after the event has occurred, the horrible events, we need to do things. How do we make sure that we do our best to prevent them from happening in the first place?

One of the things I ponder is…. I have a young family as well. How do we get more, better and more skilled individuals to consider fostering in all parts of society? What can government do? What can the RCY office do? What can non-profits and society in general do? Are there pieces…?

I know from my own personal experiences…. At a stage in my life when I was younger, my wife and I considered perhaps fostering. This is anecdotal, but we were encouraged to maybe not consider it — not because of our background. It’s just that it’s really challenging.

We have two lovely children. It’s great. But I think you want your best to deal with the children who come from a really tough background. I think maybe as a society, as government, as organizations, we can actually examine what we can do to have families and communities, large and small, who perhaps never considered doing this but have such great skills and love to share and nurturing…. How do we increase those numbers?

I was a little sad as I read this report — and my heart broke as I read it — that there weren’t more proactive recommendations. Again, I applaud the recommendations that were there, but I really like proactive work that we can do. I think our society wants to do it. I know government wants to do it. I know the opposition wants to do it.

If we’re all in agreement, maybe give us a bit better of a road map to help us get there. It’s not so much a question, but by all means, you’re welcome to respond.

D. Thomas-Wightman: I’m going to respond to that one. Thank you for your questions.

The recommendations are…. We do them with the ministry. We bring the ministry staff in and say: “What’s doable? What’s achievable? What do you think of this?” We come up with the recommendations together.

They’re not binding, as you know. They’re meant to start a conversation. That’s it. So today we’re having a conversation. Those are good ideas.

When the ministry receives their recommendations, if they see a better way to get at an outcome, that’s fine. We don’t ever hold them word for word to that recommendation. It’s there to start a conversation.

Often they are the best-case scenario — you know what I mean? — to set the bar high. We often don’t get there, but it doesn’t mean that they didn’t meet the recommendation. They may have met it another way. I take your point. I think it’s worth having a conversation with the ministry. But just so you know how we come about them, it’s that it’s done in partnership with our ministry partners. They’re not binding. They’re only meant to start these types of conversations so that we can put our heads together and think of an outcome.

Also, I wanted to talk about the member from Mount Pleasant’s comments. Thank you for your comments. I appreciate your passion. I think what’s important to note is that for indigenous people, it’s not just a stat. It hits us in every aspect of our lives. It’s more emotional. You’re more passionate about it because it’s you or it’s your brother or your sister. We don’t go home and separate this work from us. It’s our lives.

It is urgent. It needs an urgent response, and there hasn’t been an urgent response. What’s it going to take for us as a group, a society, to not normalize those statistics and not be okay that these kids in care who have already had trauma are re-traumatized while under government care? I just want to echo your comments and pray that we don’t continue to normalize that those outcomes happen.

D. Thomas-Wightman: Okay. I just wanted to give you some clarity on how they were developed.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Not seeing any other nods of heads, thank you very much for the report. Thank you, Deputy Chair, for your passion, and the comments from the others. It’s very much appreciated.

I think this whole issue of sexualized violence…. Although tragic — specifically, for aboriginal kids and girls and in care — it’s a societal issue across the board that society has to come to grips with.

We’ve seen in very highly publicized cases, like the Jian Ghomeshi case, how things go about and how victims are treated. That, in itself, can explain why so many people don’t report. So we’ve got a long way to go for everybody.

I appreciate the report bringing it to our attention, in general, but also specific to our most vulnerable kids in the province. We have a lot to do. I’m sure that we’re going to be having more discussions on that soon.

Thank you, Mr. Richard. Thank you very much for your presentation of the reports. I think you did a great job. We very much appreciate it. Certainly, being bombarded
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with questions and comments and suggestions on how to do your job was probably very pleasant.

B. Richard: It’s great. Can I just say I relish the opportunity. It’s a wonderful opportunity.

I’ve spent much of the more interesting and fun years of my professional life in committee rooms such as this in this kind of building. It’s a wonderful privilege to be able to serve people. I’m not an elected representative. I had been for 13 years, so I understand the responsibilities you have. I relish the opportunity as an independent officer of the Legislature, acting, to have the chance to participate in these kinds of discussions. They’ll help us do a better job as Representative for Children and Youth, and we’ll take into consideration everything that’s been said.

Secondly, I want to thank the staff of the Office of the Representative — obviously, those people who are here, who hear me directly, but also the others, who really do a lot of the hard work for us as we spend time thinking about what we can recommend and how we can improve things, and talking to the media and talking to other people.

There are people, at this very moment, manning the phones, talking to kids and trying to help them sort through very difficult issues, so I want to express my appreciation to them.

Finally, I’m going to do everything I can to warm up the weather in British Columbia by this time next week.

Thank you very much, and specifically to our committee members for their comments and interest, obviously, in all of these topics. We’ll be looking forward to all of our future work together.

We also appreciate that we’re ahead of time. Now we notice that our lunch is here, which is perfect. But the Clerk has told me that Hon. Hughes has to leave by quarter to three, so we need to have lunch, and then we want to have a fruitful discussion with him. The good news is that we will get out of our committee meeting early.

Why don’t we, then, recess for half an hour. Then we’ll come back, and we’ll start a review of the statutory review process with Hon. Ted Hughes. Is everybody okay with that? We’ll just declare a recess, then.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Good afternoon, everybody. We would like very much to introduce the Hon. Ted Hughes.

We have been looking forward to your presentation and very, very much appreciate you coming. You were here before. Do you want us to introduce the gang again? You’ve got everybody down pat?

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Okay, perfect. We’re here to talk about your opinions, the input that we can get on the statutory review of the act. We very much appreciate listening to your comments.

T. Hughes: I’m pleased to be here. I’m sort of making the assumption that the invitation for me to come today is a follow-up to my appearance before this committee on November 3, 2011, of which I will say something in a few minutes. I hope I’m correct in that assumption. Assuming that I am, I’m going to go through a little historical background as to how we got here and what my views are of where we are today.

I want to say this sort of at the outset. While there are many pluses, in my view, that grow out of my 2006 report besides the creation of the office of the representative and the powers and duties that were given to her on my recommendation — and given to him, as of now — one of the highlights and the successes of that report for me is the creation and the functioning of this committee.

The advice I got at the time was that the political environment in this province is known to be so charged that “a committee like that won’t get the job done that you envisage and call for in your report.” The fact is that all my observations tell me that your work has been considerable and appreciated and is, in fact, getting the job done.

It has been a resource for the representatives to come and make reports. One of my recommendations that I’m pleased with was the recommendation that the representative have the authority and the power to produce special reports. There have been many of them that have brought to your attention crises in the child protection area, as a result of which you and the department have acted — and the ministry. That has been a delight for me to see that happen.

Now, I think this five-year review perhaps is the ultimate result of the fourth recommendation I made in my report, which reads: “That the Representative for Children and Youth be mandated to monitor, review, audit and investigate the performance and accountability of the child welfare system, but that this mandate be reviewed in five years and revised as appropriate at that time.”

Well, that power to monitor was one of those that was given to the representative under section 6 of the act — the very important responsibility given to perform advocacy services, to report on critical injuries and deaths, and the other one being this monitoring role. I think it’s
[ Page 734 ]
important to understand. I think the future of that monitoring role is really what I propose to speak to today, because that was the subject of the discussion when I was here in 2011.

I think it’s important to appreciate what I had to say in 2006 on that issue. I’m going to make reference to pages 30 and 34 of my report. Having spoken to the importance of the advocacy function as the first duty and responsibility, I then went on to say:

“The second part of the office’s mandate will be to monitor, review, audit and investigate the performance and accountability of the child welfare system. In this second aspect of its role, the representative will focus not on the day-to-day operations of the child welfare system — such as reviewing all plans of care, as was done by the Children’s Commission — but on broader, systemwide issues.

“This may not be a permanent aspect of its mandate. As discussed below, it is unusual to have an external body overseeing the functioning of a government ministry.”

“This is essential at this time” — this was in 2006 — “to restore public confidence in the child welfare system, but it may not always be necessary. I suggest that this area of responsibility be reviewed in five years’ time. If conditions have changed substantially by then, the mandate of the office may be revised at that time to include only its advocacy” — and child death reporting — “functions.”

“Most government ministries are not subject to formal oversight by an external body, and it may be that in the future there will be no need of an independent office for children.

“The ministry’s own performance measurement, quality assurance programs and public reporting may, in themselves, be sufficient to assure British Columbians that vulnerable children and youth are being protected as they should be.

“But at this time, to meet public concerns, an external agency remains necessary, as the ministry continues to enhance its ability to measure, monitor and report on its own performance. The public needs to know that the child welfare system is accountable for what it does and how it does it.”

That was the recommendation made at that time. Then, as an outgrowth, section 6 of the act was passed, which sets out the powers and functions, with the monitoring role being in section 6(1)(b).

The next step that took place was in 2011, when I came before this committee, the five years having been up and the time for review having arrived. In front of the committee, at that time, was a report from the ministry which, amongst other things, said this in a brief that it has filed: “MCFD is in the process of taking concrete steps to establish a set of performance measurements, quality assurance programs and public reporting system that it believes will be sufficient to assure British Columbians that vulnerable children and youth are being protected and served as they should be.”

Then the ministry recommended keeping the current monitoring, review, audit and research provisions reflected in the RCY Act, section 6(b), in place for an additional two years, through to the end of September 2013.

It was on November 3, 2011, that I was asked to come to speak to that. Amongst other things, I said this: “I have concluded that it is preferable to have the ministry meet its target prior to five years from now so that a new representative comes into a stable environment where the ministry’s performance measurements, quality assurance programs and the public reporting system are up and running, rather than waiting for an evaluation at the time of the arrival of a new representative.”

I went on to say, “I am supportive of the adoption by you” — that is, by this committee — “of the ministry’s recommendation that I read to you from pages 6 and 7 of its brief.” But my recommendation was: “that the current monitoring auditing provision be kept in place for an additional three years — that is, through to the end of November 2014.”

The result was that that recommendation was accepted by this committee, and it filed its report so stating that in May of 2012. Then, on February 6, 2015, the ministry and the representative signed a letter that they sent to this committee recommending that the monitoring function remain and be reviewed in a 2017 review. So the ministry apparently didn’t get to the place where it was ready, neither within the two-year term that it had recommended, nor the three-year term that I had recommended that was adopted by the committee.

Then, as I say, on March 26, 2015, the report from this committee was that the monitoring role remain and be part of this review, and that’s why we’re here today.

The Clerk was kind enough to furnish me with the report of the representative that was recently filed. I want to make reference to one part of it.

This is the Ten Years of Advocacy: Representative’s Report Card, some of which has been discussed here today, as I understand it, as I heard it. On page 18 of that report, which was recently before you, the representative outlines the three duties and responsibilities: the critical injury and death review investigations, the monitoring and the advocacy.

Then, at page 38, the representative spells out the ways that the work of the monitoring program is carried out and lists three different ways that the representative has met that responsibility, the first being through oversight, and she explains how that is done; research and evaluation — evidence-based research, analysis and evaluation; and thirdly, review and audit. That is conducting reviews and audits to assess the effectiveness and appropriateness of programs and services to children, youth and their families.

I also have had the opportunity of reading Hansard for October 24, 2016, which is about three months ago. The representative, who was appearing before you at that time, said this at page 40 of Hansard for October 24, 2016: “I think that there is a pretty strong agreement with the ministry that until there is a proper, regular quality assur-
[ Page 735 ]
ance reporting function, the monitor, review and audit component does need to continue.”

So here we are, 16 years later from the time of the recommendation that I made and the expectation that that function might have met its mandate within two years. Here we are, ten years later, and it’s the representative’s view that the ministry is in agreement with her that the time has not come to make that change.

With that history, it seems to me that the question is: what is to be said and recommended on this issue in your 2017 review? That’s what I really am here to speak to.

A related question is: why is the ministry not at the stage to assume this responsibility, as it said in 2011 it would be by November 2013? Nor were they ready at the time of signing the joint letter on February 6, 2015. And nor, says the outgoing representative on October 24, 2016, was the ministry ready at that time.

Now, I don’t know the details of why that is so and what discussions have taken place between the representative’s office and the ministry, but what I do know and believe is that the time has come to put in place a plan to bring about the change and to follow through with its implementation, or alternatively, accept that section 6(1)(b) is in the act to stay on a permanent basis.

If there is agreement to put in place the assurances that the ministry is ready to assume these functions with quality reporting and self-reporting, I suggest that the new representative, who you’ve heard from this morning, given his background as an advocate in New Brunswick, could be of great assistance in accomplishing that, if, indeed, it’s decided that this is going to go forward, rather than accepting that section 6(1)(b) is there to stay.

I’ve looked at the New Brunswick act under which the advocate there, now our representative, performed his duties during the years that he held the advocate’s job, and nowhere in the New Brunswick act is there a section comparable to B.C.’s section 6(1)(b).

Words like “monitor,” “audit” and “research” are not there, and I don’t think you’re going to find them in any other comparable statute in any other jurisdiction of the country.

As in other jurisdictions, insofar as New Brunswick is concerned, the three ways the representative’s office says the monitoring process is carried out — oversight, research and evaluation, review and audit…. It must be that in New Brunswick, as in other jurisdictions, those things are being satisfactorily performed by the ministry — in New Brunswick’s case, as I read the act, the department of social development, which I believe holds responsibility for children and youth — by way of the department’s own performance measurements, quality assurance programs and public reporting. That is to say, the department has shown the capability to measure, monitor and report on its own performance.

Coming to British Columbia from that jurisdiction, the resource that the new representative could be in getting this issue resolved once and for all, I think, is obvious to anyone. For reasons, as I say, to which I’m not privy, the fact is that the achievement of what I envisaged in 2006 as being possible has not been achieved.

I want to add that this has reached that stage notwithstanding what I think has been an outstanding performance by the outgoing representative, who in my view has performed her duties with distinction in this province.

I also want to add to that, having listened to the new representative speak this morning. I want to commend this committee and the House, I suppose — or the House as it will do — in making the selection of the new representative. I’m satisfied he will give distinguished service to this province — after hearing his performance this morning — as has the outgoing representative who served so well.

The challenge remains with this new resource now available that I think it’s an appropriate time to make the decision of what is going to happen with that section that I said ten years ago might only have to be in place for a limited period of time. There’s no question about the importance of the advocacy function of the representative’s office. It has been so ably handled and is now in capable hands to carry forward, as well as the review and reporting on critical injuries and deaths of children in care.

It remains this other question of the monitoring role, which is the one that I suggested might be provisional because of its unusualness. But it was necessary at that time to restore public confidence in the child protection and child welfare system of this province. It was at a low ebb, which required that to happen.

That, as I see it, is the background of, I assume, why I was asked to come here this morning to take a look at the act as it sits. As I say, I’m very proud of my recommendation that there be an office of a representative, that it have the advocacy functions and that the special reporting power is there.

The placement, at the time, of the monitoring provision was necessary then. Whether it is now, I don’t know, but I think you’ve got to figure that out. You either get a plan and follow through with the plan with the assistance of the new representative or decide that it’s going to stay as a permanent feature of the act and not spend any more time on it.

Now, Madam Chair, I’m certainly prepared to try to answer any questions. I won’t go any further than that. I don’t know whether there are any other parts of the act or the work of the committee that you want to talk to me about. I’m sort of at arm’s length. I don’t know the detail of what’s going on day to day, but I’ve tried to follow it the best, and I’m pleased with the functioning of the Office of the Representative and the work of this committee.

D. Plecas: Mr. Hughes, thank you for that. It seems to me that you’re saying you would still prefer to see it where the office doesn’t have that monitoring function. That’s not the most proper place for it.

D. Plecas: Right. But it does seem strange, if I could use that word, that it’s taken so long for something to happen, which some of us would say is, for a large part, mechanical. One could envision that these systems are set up to make it happen. So I guess it’s the will to do that.

The question I’d have for you is: since there seems to be unknown reasons for that not happening to date, how would you feel, at the end of the day, if a decision was made to leave it where it is?

T. Hughes: Well, I think you would have to consult with the ministry before you made that decision with finality, because they’re the ones who have this independent office looking over their shoulders, so to speak. I can’t see the point of letting the issue waver back and forth any longer.

But certainly, if the ministry was of the view that they haven’t been able to resolve how to get this quality assurance reporting and that kind of thing done over the last ten years and that the responsibility is best left in the hands of the representative to play that monitoring role, then unquestionably I would say everybody’s happy. Leave it where it is.

I think, in fairness, you have to consult with them. As I say, three months ago the representative reported that she was of the view the agreement continues, that the stage was not ready to have that happen.

M. Dalton: Thank you very much, Mr. Hughes, for your comments and the work you’ve played over the years in just setting this whole committee up and the representative’s office. It’s very significant.

As far as the quality assurance reporting, I just want to go back to a comment you said earlier — that as far as you’re aware, this is the only jurisdiction that actually has this role in Canada.

T. Hughes: Yes. Now let me just turn to my left and ask the representative if he agrees with that.

T. Hughes: We’ve not discussed this, but he sat at the table with all of the other advocates.

B. Richard: I’ve had the privilege of meeting with the Hon. Ted Hughes, so I appreciate the opportunity to just say that, formally, this is, as far as I know, the only province where this function exists. Informally, I don’t know of any office that doesn’t monitor how child welfare services are provided.

We did it in another fashion. We worked with the New Brunswick Health Council to measure how the situation of kids improved year over year in issues like addictions, teen pregnancy, school dropout rates, high school completion rates. There are ways to measure how kids are doing. Even if it’s not a formal mandate in the legislation, I think that work needs to be done.

What I don’t know, and I appreciate Mr. Hughes’s comments, is that at one time, there was some question as to the effectiveness of the ministry to provide high-quality services. That’s why the office was created.

Whether now that confidence was fully restored, whether there’s a need for an independent voice to measure outcomes and to determine whether we’re doing what we promised to do, we all promised to do the best we can towards children.

If there’s a need for an independent voice, I would say the representative office is the right place for that. It can assure the public that, yes, we are meeting our objectives, our aims and our goals and that children are, in fact, better protected and receiving the kinds of services we expect.

Now, how long that is necessary — it’s too early for me to comment on that. But certainly, I appreciate the comments. We’ll be thinking about it, because I assume I’ll be invited at some point to present, as well, on the review of the statutes.

M. Dalton: My sense is that it’s a bit of a criticism of how things have developed. There seems to be a lagging, as far as on this one point. You’re saying: “Let’s either do it…. Let’s make that decision.”

M. Dalton: Really, it seems to me that you’re saying that the ministry really needs to make that decision. Is that correct? Or is that something that needs to have an overall discussion?

T. Hughes: Well, I think you have to hear from the ministry, and then you have to make the decision.

T. Hughes: But I just don’t think that it would be appropriate for…. I assume you’re going to ask the ministry to make a presentation to you on your statutory review.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Yeah, the ministry has been invited, as have other ministries as well. You’re the first. We’re just starting.
[ Page 737 ]

I would hope, then, that the ministry will deal with this issue, because it’s the issue that I think has brought me here, at least as I understand it. I mean, I’m ten years stale, but this issue is one that I said should be dealt with at some time, with my first five-year recommendation. It has never been dealt with, and so I’m back speaking to that. As I understand it, that is the issue of concern to you that I can contribute to.

By all means, get the ministry in here, and see what they have to say. The representative, by then, might have his feet a little more on the ground and understand this issue. It’s not in his legislation, where he served previously. I might come back and speak to you again. But I think it’s a decision for this committee to make.

D. Plecas: I guess I just want to go back to my question again a bit. I’m reminded that it’s your wise counsel that got us here. We have a great debt to you for that.

It sounds like you’re saying: “Look, let’s do one thing or another. We can’t leave this hanging.”

D. Plecas: But I’m reminded that you initially made a recommendation with an expectation or an implied wish that it would ultimately go back to that function of monitoring being where you implied it ought to be or stated it ought to be — with government.

D. Plecas: So I guess what I would be asking…. While I appreciate your saying that it is up to government, if it were up to you, would you say that it ought to go back to government still today? Am I making myself…?

You know, this office has functioned pretty well. I wouldn’t go out…. When I see your final report, if your final report says that you think this function should stay as it is with the representative, with 6(1)(b) remaining there, that would not upset me. I think that the job has been done, and if that’s where the decision lies, get on with it.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Thank you, Hon. Hughes, for your report. I followed your works from the time that you released the initial review and appreciate the essence of the monitoring function.

I guess I just want to build off of the member opposite’s points. That is, is the ministry capable of providing factual information about its ministry to the public? Really, what I’m underscoring is the difference between independence and those that work within the ministry to report out on its own behaviour — their own decisions, their own actions or inactions. If you can just speak to independence and whether the government is capable of being able to report publicly on the state of its affairs for, in this instance….

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): If I’m not clear, just the importance of independence and whether the government is capable of reporting out on its….

T. Hughes: Well, I didn’t think that the department was capable of doing it effectively in 2005. The stature of the department in the public’s eyes was at a low ebb because of reporting events that had occurred or events that had to be reported out and that had gone on. I felt that this was an important role to put the representative in — to have that oversight, if you like, over the department. It, in effect, is looking over the shoulder of the operation of the department.

The person that was making that recommendation, “Give us two more years,” back a few years ago, was Mr. Brown, who was then the deputy minister. He said: “We’ll be in a position to take it over and give the public the assurance that it requires.”

The department felt that it would get to that point, but apparently it hasn’t, up to this point in time. I recommended that it might only be a temporary measure because I was of the view that the government could assume that role. It hasn’t done that, and here we are, ten or 11 years later. What does that tell you? Hence my answer to Mr. Plecas was that if the decision is to leave the section there and get on with the operation of the act, I’ll not be upset.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Hon. Hughes, may I ask: would you make any other amendments to the act? If you were to go back a decade, is there anything else that you would add now, in 2017, to strengthen the act?

T. Hughes: I haven’t given any direct thought to that. I think it has operated well. I will give some thought to that, and if so, I’ll communicate with the Chair. But no, I think the province has been well served by the operation of the office and by the quality not only of the people that have been appointed as representative but of the staff that has been there to back them up. I’m impressed by the operation of the office.

I know the representative today has said it’s a larger office than he’d been used to before, but this is a larger province. There are still many, many problems out there, some of which were highlighted this morning, but I think we’re just so fortunate to have the office and to have the calibre of the people that have given the leadership to it.
[ Page 738 ]

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Well, I’m looking for other comments or suggestions from other committee members.

Just to reiterate, we have put out, actually, quite a few requests to many groups to come and present, at least at this point, through electronic means, etc. And we’ve had an official request for MCFD, Health, Education and Justice to come and present, either individually or together, but to date we haven’t had a response. I would expect that we’ll probably get a response soon. We do have another meeting coming up in February.

T. Hughes: Right. And then you’ve got an election, I know. Are you going to report before or after it?

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): The act said that we have to start the process. Collectively, the committee made a decision that we weren’t going to finish it before the election and to let that finishing part occur after the election, with a new committee. We wanted to get a little bit into it, but we didn’t want to get totally into it, because we absolutely do not want to politicize this.

T. Hughes: Right. I understand. Well, if this point that I’ve spoken to today becomes more contentious and you want me back on this point or something else later on, why, I’d be happy to do so. But I am sort of damaged goods ten years ago, so I come with that negative attached to me.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): Well, we don’t think you’re damaged goods. We’re glad that you’re here. You might be shocked that we might want to get you back.

D. McRae: Thank you for your expertise and your corporate knowledge and your sort of global look. To be honest, this is a relatively new committee for me. I haven’t spent much time on it, and I won’t be here to finish the work of it either.

When we’re talking about monitoring, one of the things I was wondering as we were just talking seconds ago…. I don’t disrespect the ability of the RCY office to monitor, but then I also wonder about the other monitoring agencies that we have in government — whether it is the Ombudsperson or the Auditor General — which seem to work into space that isn’t always about bottom-line financials. I know they do visit various ministries and make recommendations about their performance as well.

Because I’ve never thought about it before, I just wonder: do they complement each other with what the RCY does and what those other two offices do or could do? Or do those independent offices just not come into this space and make comment because there is the RCY office? I don’t know the answer to that. I don’t know whether I can direct it to you, to staff or to the Chair.

T. Hughes: No, I don’t know the answer to that. The difference here, of course, is that this monitoring role given to the representative relates to one ministry. That’s the difference. But as to whether that overall monitoring that goes on through those other offices…. Whether they hold back on this office because of this role, I don’t know.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): I think that’s a good point, because you do have other ministries that are mentioned in many, many independent reviews. But I think there is, actually, another officer that has put forward recommendations.

M. Mark (Deputy Chair): Children are more vulnerable than adults, who can contact the Office of the Ombudsperson. They don’t have the capacity. A child — an infant, for example, who is in care, or any of those children that are not seen in community — isn’t going to have access to make complaints and report complaints. So I think that oversight, because of the vulnerability of age, is essential — and why there is that separate and unique function.

If I may, having spent so much time in this area…. We’re the envy of the country — to have the oversight body and also to have reporting that is a high-level reporting. It’s not drilling down and pointing fingers, but it’s actually the tools for social workers to say: “These are the things that we need to do our job to the best capacity possible.”

Again I would go back to my remarks earlier to the Hon. Ted Hughes. Can we trust the government to report out on how well they’re supporting their staff, or not, to be able to carry out the mandate and the functions of the ministry?

I just did a quick search on the ministry’s site, and some of the links on reporting are dead. If you don’t have a legislative function to protect and mandate the reporting out, we could rely on dead links on the website to show us what’s happening. Who knows if press releases go out from when those links go live?

I think it’s an important discussion, and I welcome the remarks by the Hon. Ted Hughes.

J. Thornthwaite (Chair): As a reminder to the committee members, and also for your knowledge, Hon. Hughes, our next meeting is on Wednesday, February 22 — nine to 12, here.

The House will be sitting, I think, at that time, so that’s why we’ve chosen that. But the statutory review consulta-
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tion process began in the fall, and all members had gotten an email on that. The Clerk’s office had put out an email requesting submissions. To date, that one is open until Friday, February 10.

Depending on what happens after the election, then that, obviously, would probably be rejuvenated. But for now, that is the work that this committee is devoted to — in addition, obviously, to meeting with our new representative on any reports that come up in the interim. That’s kind of what our schedule is — now, at least.

T. Hughes: Oh good. My suggestion is that this is the last review where you’re debating whether to keep that section or not, and that issue be put to rest in this review. I think you got that.

If nobody else has got any other comments or questions, we thank you very much for coming. Hopefully you’ll come back.

I guess the next point is to ask for somebody to make a motion for adjournment — Marc and Melanie.

Access to on-line versions of the report of proceedings (Hansard)
and webcasts of committee proceedings is available on the Internet.

Chair:	Jane Thornthwaite (North Vancouver–Seymour BC Liberal)
Deputy Chair:	Melanie Mark (Vancouver–Mount Pleasant NDP)
Members:	Marc Dalton (Maple Ridge–Mission BC Liberal)
	Carole James (Victoria–Beacon Hill NDP)
	Maurine Karagianis (Esquimalt–Royal Roads NDP)
	Don McRae (Comox Valley BC Liberal)
	John Martin (Chilliwack BC Liberal)
	Dr. Darryl Plecas (Abbotsford South BC Liberal)
	Linda Reimer (Port Moody–Coquitlam BC Liberal)
	Jennifer Rice (North Coast NDP)
Clerk:	Kate Ryan-Lloyd

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON CHILDREN AND YOUTH

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON
CHILDREN AND YOUTH