The committee met at 7:05 p.m.

[J. Sims in the chair.]

J. Sims (Chair): Good evening, everyone. My name is Jinny Sims. I’m the MLA for Surrey-Panorama and the Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth.

I would like to acknowledge that we are meeting today on the traditional territories of the lək̓ʷəŋən people, now known as the Songhees and Esquimalt Nations.

This evening the committee will be considering a report from the representative entitled Still Left Out: Children and Youth with Disabilities in B.C. We will also receive updates from the representative and her staff on monitoring of recommendations as well as her office’s key performance indicators and investigations and reviews.

Joining us this evening are a stranger to none of us, Dr. Jennifer Charlesworth, Representative for Children and Youth; Samantha Cocker, deputy representative; and Jennifer Dreyer.

We’re going to turn it over to you, Jennifer.

Consideration of Representative
for Children and Youth Reports

Still Left Out:
Children and Youth
with Disabilities in B.C.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you very much and good evening. I’m happy to be here with you all tonight to present the latest report released from our office and to provide you, as the Chair has noted, with two updates. Also to join my colleague Jennifer Dreyer to speak with you about our Advocating for Change and the monitoring updates.

I’d like to just let you know that Deputy Representatives Samantha Cocker and Pippa Rowcliffe will be joining us online. Of course, Jennifer Dreyer is here beside me.

I’m going to begin tonight by talking about the report that we released, actually, on November 9, entitled Still Left Out: Children and Youth with Disabilities in B.C.

Just to provide some context, in 2020, my office released a report entitled Left Out: Children and Youth with Special Needs in the Pandemic. The intention there was to examine how families were coping with the impact of COVID-19. It was revealed at that time that while COVID-19 was certainly making it more difficult for these families, the kinds of issues that they were facing predated the pandemic.

In Left Out, we spoke to families who generously shared their experiences of navigating the children and youth with support needs system, or CYSN, as it is known. It’s been three years since we released that report, and because the Ministry of Children and Family Development has been looking at how best to reform children and youth with special needs services, we wanted to find out how these families are faring now and what, if anything, has changed or improved.

I look to a member of the committee who often asks us, “What kind of impact are you having?” so this is an important question for us. This led us to do the follow-up report before you.

Just to give you a sense of our methods, we reached out to the ten original families that we spoke with in Left Out, and we also reached out to four families that we had worked with in Excluded. That was the report pertaining to children and youth with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, or FASD.

We met with those 14 families. Our team members went to their communities and sat with them in their homes and in their communities, for the most part. Those conversations are rich and deep. It’s not just a quick phone call or a survey or an email; it’s sitting with them and understanding their lived reality.

We also wanted to hear from other families of children and youth with disabilities. Back in 2020, we did a survey. We had a significant response at that time. This time we put that survey out worried that because many of these families are, quite frankly, getting surveyed a lot, we might not get a strong response. But we felt it was important to do a temperature check, to see how families are doing across the whole spectrum of regions and disabilities.

We got, in very short order, over 1,000 responses. We’ve actually kept that survey open, and we’re now at 1,300 responses and literally hundreds and hundreds of comments as well as quantitative data.

What we heard overall was disappointing, to say the least.

[7:10 p.m.]

Not much has changed for those 14 families that we have been in relationship with for some time now. They’re still struggling to navigate a system of supports and services that’s under-resourced, filled with closed doors and lengthy wait-lists for assessments and treatment, cumbersome to manoeuvre and difficult for parents to understand.

As I say, the sentiments from the thousand-plus families that we surveyed were very similar. Across every region of B.C., they told us that they’re still being left to wait, not just weeks or months but sometimes years, for the supports and services that they need. They’re struggling under a continued piecemeal, uncertain and profoundly inadequate system of supports and services, and sadly, they’re losing hope.

Almost three-quarters of the parents who responded to our survey, from every region in B.C., reported feeling no confidence or minimal confidence that their child would receive the services they need, whether in or out of school, within the next one to three years. Fourteen percent of those surveyed said that they have considered placing their child in care under a voluntary care agreement in order to get the services and supports that their child requires. No parent should be faced with a choice like that.

We estimate that as many as 80,000 B.C. children and youth with disabilities are currently not receiving any support whatsoever. That’s not acceptable.

As I’ve said to this committee before, I support the direction of the provincial government and their stated vision for a needs-based CYSN framework, one that reaches all children and youth, wherever they live in B.C., and walks alongside families to help them find what they need at every stage of their children’s lives. But as members of this committee are aware, that much-delayed framework process is already nearly six years old and still at least a year and a half away from any resolution. For those caught in the middle of the process, that’s a childhood.

In November 2022, when the provincial government announced it was pausing its controversial CYSN framework rollout to undertake an engagement process co-designed by First Nations leadership and leaders from the disability community, the Premier stated: “Every child in B.C. should have the supports they need to thrive.”

We certainly understand the need to pause that framework. It was very contentious. It was important to go back and seek a better understanding, especially because the early consultations had been done in 2018. Our report shows, though, that children are not getting those supports.

The Premier and the Minister of Children and Family Development also committed, at that time, to make new investments in the interim, as the new system is being developed, to support children with disabilities and support needs that are currently underserved or unserved, including fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, Down syndrome and other neurocognitive developmental disabilities.

Now, I’ll say that there have been considerable investments. I’m going to come back to that in a few moments. However, this report shows that the underserved are not very much better since that announcement either. Children with FASD, for example, are still ineligible for services that some with other diagnoses, such as autism spectrum disorder, receive. The same goes for children with Down syndrome. In fact, more than 34 percent of survey respondents told RCY that they have children with disabilities who are currently ineligible for any support.

Since 2018, I’ve made 25 recommendations to government, across a number of reports, related to addressing supports for families of children with disabilities. It has become a bit of a cause for us. Many of these recommendations have seen little to no progress, which is something we’ll look deeper at, at the next segment of tonight’s presentation.

Speaking specifically about recommendations to help children and youth with disabilities…. This lack of action is having a tremendous impact on their lives and the lives of their families. Families are exhausted and overwhelmed and are being pushed to the brink, frankly, of their coping abilities by the systems that are supposed to help them.

In this report, we’ve related the stories of these families and our survey, and we’ve organized it into four broad age groups. We thought that might be a contribution — to take a look at the different needs and how things are happening in those early years, in the school-age years, in adolescence and then transitioning into adulthood. It’s interesting. At each stage, there are different kinds of needs.

One of the stories we shared comes from Maria, a mother of twin boys in the Lower Mainland. Both of her boys, Adam and Jason, have cerebral palsy, meaning they require considerable support, especially at daycare, where they need skilled aids.

In theory, those aids are funded by what was previously known as the supported child development program. Most people still understand it as that. In reality, those funds can be quickly oversubscribed. There’s a budget, and they quickly get oversubscribed in higher-demand regions like the Lower Mainland.

[7:15 p.m.]

Unfortunately, that was the case for Maria. She found suitable daycare spots, but she was unable to get the aids that were necessary in order to sustain that daycare be­cause there was no funding left. That meant she, once again, would have to wait. She eventually did receive funding, and it significantly improved life for their family. However, it’s just a temporary fix. The children, having waited for quite some time, are now just about to age out of that program. So they’re going to start again.

Another mother who shared her experience with RCY was Maeve. She has three children, each of whom has FASD. We got to know her and her three children very well in 2019 and 2020.

She has had to fight, again and again, against an educa­tion system that’s creating barriers rather than solutions for her and her children. She has had to pay out of pocket or seek charity funding for needed resources that her children were otherwise ineligible for as kids with FASD. Like many other parents, Maeve says that negotiating B.C.’s systems of social care and the lack of understanding for FASD are far more of a stress than dealing with her children’s disabilities.

This report urges government to move forward on im­mediate and medium-term actions to support CYSN families and to make progress on those recommendations brought forward in past RCY reports.

Before I open it up for questions, I also want to share some additional information. In the month of November, Samantha and I, along with one of our advisers and another team member, Sarah, have visited Kelowna, Prince Rupert, Terrace, Kitimat, Houston and Smithers, all areas that happen to have family connection centres in development.

We’ve met with dozens of families and service providers to hear directly how things are for them. I will say that there were times when I left the community and was just overcome.

I want to acknowledge the many people who came to share their experiences with us. After sessions with parents, caregivers and family members, I came away saying a number of times that I was in the presence of greatness.

Some of the parents that we met were remarkable in what they were navigating and, with tremendous generosity, sharing with other parents. They couldn’t find ways to get information out of our current system in order for them to get the supports that they needed. Their courage, tenacity, persistence and deep love for their children shone through. They’re trying so hard to provide their children with the supports they need to thrive, and they are exhausted. It was very, very powerful.

As I said, I want to acknowledge that the government has made significant investments in CYSN services that will flow out over the next three years. But what we heard over and over again is that these have not changed families’ experience on the ground. They just haven’t landed yet.

The workforce challenges and shortages are huge, especially in many regions of this province. It’s wonderful to have additional positions earmarked, but if you don’t have speech-language pathologists, physiotherapists, OTs, be­havioural interventionists, respite care workers, it doesn’t make a difference. If there’s no one to provide those services, then what?

I think it’s calling us in. This latest information is calling us in to take a deep, hard look. What can be done, given the complexity of what’s before us?

Moving forward, we’ve kept the survey open to the end of November. As I said, we’ve now got over 1,300 respondents, which will give us a wonderful baseline for comparisons to kind of see what has changed over time.

It’s also providing us with powerful information right now on what is working, what’s not working and what is needed, which we’ll incorporate into a report in the spring of 2024. Following that, we’ll do another one towards the middle of the year that is our perspective on a pathway forward.

I will leave it at that. I’m happy to take any questions that you have.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you, Jennifer.

Now if members have questions.

N. Letnick: Dr. Charlesworth and your team, both here and, of course, online, thank you very much. Nice to see you here again, Jennifer. Thank you for the report.

My question, as I was reading through the report this afternoon and listening to your presentation today, was: what can we do differently? Why is this happening?

[7:20 p.m.]

My question is one for yourself and then one for the committee. I’m going to be a broken record on the second question.

The one for yourself is: does the ministry have the financial capability to fund those human resources you’re saying are lacking — and therefore, we just need to work harder in getting people trained or attracting people, which is, I guess a good possible answer — or in your opinion, are we short?

The second question is to the committee. I’d rather not be asking you this question, because in Public Accounts Committee, right next to you would be the minister or the deputy minister, and I could ask them the question.

But here I can’t. I find that totally absurd, because you shouldn’t be answering this question for me, right? I’m not going to stand up in the House through question period and ask the question of the minister. The Chair might even say that I should be asking this in estimates and might rule this question to you out of order. That’s fine.

I want to get it on the record. We decided at some point a few months ago that if we wanted people, we would call them in. I’m suggesting that Dr. Charlesworth should actually say to me right now: “I can’t answer your question, because I’m not the minister or deputy minister. You need to get them in here.” Then the committee would say: “Yeah, that’s right. We need to get them in here to answer these questions.” Over and over and over again, we keep getting these reports.

I’m not the new kid on the block; I have been here for 15 years. I know the role of government members in this committee. You want to improve the lives of these children. At the same time, you have to protect the minister. I understand that. But at some point, we have to come to the point where it’s not working. And to continually read these reports and listen to the representative and just say, “Yeah, okay. Well, thank you very much. We’ll see you in a month, and we’ll do it all over again,” is not right, because we have these children to think of.

Anyway, I’ll get off my soapbox. I’m just so fed up with listening to you and…. You know what I mean?

J. Charlesworth: Yes, I know what you mean.

N. Letnick: And not being able to actually do anything about it…. It’s not in my nature as a type A person to just hear the problems and not be able to fix them. I think we have an opportunity here.

Let me ask you again. Do they have enough money? I know you might not be able to answer it because you’re not the minister or the deputy minister. But I’ll ask you anyway.

J. Sims (Chair): Member, I’m going to interrupt here a little bit. I believe that is an unfair question to ask Jennifer because she would not have access to that budget. What you are asking her to do is to speculate. I don’t think that is fair to her or her position to be speculating. She can talk about outcomes and what she’s seen. I think it would be…. If I were in her shoes, I would not be able to comment on the budget itself.

If you would like to respond to anything other than that, you are welcome to.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you for that question. I get tired of hearing myself too. We’re in the same camp there.

Yes, of course, I’m not managing the budget. However, I can say with confidence that it’s impossible for there to be enough money in there, because we’ve got 80,000 children who aren’t getting services. Additional monies have been allocated to the budget, which is good. We’ll talk about that a little bit later, if you wish.

However, when we start to compare need and allocation and do the numbers, do the analysis, it’s simply not enough. We’ve said this all along — that based on our economic analysis and the prevalence of needs, the numbers don’t add up. So it’s a huge challenge, for sure. That would be my sense — that we can take a look at the budgets, and we can do the math. That’s where we’ve determined that it’s true. There are not sufficient resources in order to be able to serve that population of young people.

To “what can we do differently,” certainly, human re­sources are a part of that. That will require the collaboration with the Ministry of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills, for sure.

[7:25 p.m.]

There haven’t been additional seats added to those kinds of programs, so we’re getting no more graduates than we have for a very long time. That’s obviously a consideration.

I have just come back from meeting with the Canadian Council of Child and Youth Advocates. Every province is dealing with the same kind of thing. It’s not like we go to Alberta and get more people because there’s a plethora of people in Alberta. It’s just not true.

It is a challenge, for sure. I would also say that there are other things, though. I think it’s important that we understand the depth of that challenge, the workforce challenge that we’re facing across the board.

Also, what we were hearing from parents were simple things, just how difficult the bureaucracy is to try and get access to basic information. They asked us to prepare some sort of a resource. Where do they go? Who do they go to? So basic information, understanding and updates about what they can expect with regard to assessment processes and where they can go.

Some flexibility of the rules that are set in place. Yes, there are some rules that are for accountability purposes, but sometimes they’re just stupid rules, and it’s important to take a look at those. So there are some things that are practical and pragmatic. I think, in fact, during COVID, we saw some improvements, but we kind of reverted back. That’s just my opinion.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you, Jennifer.

To remind people that here we are asking questions. We did establish a process we’re going to use to make a determination if we want to see ministry representatives come. Both the vice-Chair and I have had some conversations on that. We want to make sure it’s successful and that it also gets us somewhere. We were looking at trialling it out on one report, but we will talk about that at a separate time.

Just so you know, we have not forgotten the direction the committee gave us, and the vice-Chair and I have been talking about this and how to incorporate it into our committee meetings. I think every one of us here wants to do the very best for the kids that are out there.

D. Routley: I very much appreciate the report and the conversation. I do think the Chair’s judgment is correct, and I’d refrain from asking about historical funding or current funding or what’s happening in the last budget in those terms. Obviously, resources are the issue, and it seems human resources are the number one issue. We can see that in virtually every industry.

The measures that have been taken…. The representative used an interesting term: “They haven’t landed yet.” I wonder if you could expand on that and what you mean by that. If it hasn’t landed yet, it’s a plane, I assume, and since it’s coming our way, what can we do to have it land as soon as possible and in the smoothest way possible?

J. Charlesworth: Thank you for that question. It may well come up in the context of our discussions around monitoring recommendations.

What I mean by it not landing yet is that good intentions and allocation of resources have not yet translated into services that are readily available to the families, or they have arrived and there are just a few families that are receiving the services.

A good example might be that there was some additional funding provided for respite services for kids with FASD. Very important. It was allocated through Vancouver Foundation. It was then distributed through Vancouver Foundation to Asante Centre and to Carrier-Sekani Child and Family Services to distribute.

They did a lottery, so families, first of all, had to know to apply. Then they picked 400. In the grand scheme of things, 400 is a drop in the bucket for the number of kids with FASD in this province and the number of families.

[7:30 p.m.]

For those 400 families who are now going to receive respite for a short-term period of two years, if they can find a respite care provider — great. But as I say, it’s a small…. It’s good, but it’s a small investment in the grand scheme of things.

The other thing that’s, I think, important — and you said it, MLA Routley — is the reality of trying to find the practitioners to deliver the services is also very, very difficult. It’s almost like: simultaneously, as you’ve got the vision, do we have capacity? It’s like we always have to think about that. We can have great aspirations, but do we have the capacity to deliver them? I think that analysis has been lacking.

To answer your question, I think it’s really important to take a look at the investments that have been made and then be asking the question: how is that making a difference? How will we know it’s made a difference, and how are we going to evaluate and course-correct as we go? What are the barriers that are getting in the way, and how is it that we can mitigate those barriers as quickly as possible?

D. Routley: If I could have a short follow-up…? Thank you.

I remember as a school trustee that when we dealt with, particularly, children with autism, there were certain services that they had funding for. So we would receive the funding, and then the parents weren’t able, in the same way, to find the professional that they needed. Or they were going with a private professional and the school district couldn’t — either way.

But the funding ended up being returned, so it was a really a function of the way the funding…. We couldn’t extend, and we couldn’t consolidate funds from a number of parents in a coherent enough way to compete in the market to hire someone.

I just wonder if there are issues like that within the system that prevent the service from meeting the child.

J. Charlesworth: Yes. Yes, you’re absolutely right. I will give you some examples there.

First of all, I think that the individualized funding that the parents of kids with autism receive…. For a number of parents, that works well. We certainly saw that. There was the outrage or outcry after the announcement of the CYSN framework initially, because they had in place the kind of people that would make a difference in their life.

Having said that, you’re quite right. Oftentimes the funds would be returned or the funds wouldn’t be expended by the family because they couldn’t find the caregivers or the assistance, or they had so much on their plate that actually now being an employer and managing financial records and all of those kinds of things was just simply too much. We spoke about that with Charlie in Alone and Afraid.

The other thing is that in many situations, you’ve got families that are trying to navigate in environments where, actually, they don’t have anybody to assist them to do the navigation, so they’re trying to figure it out on their own.

You’re absolutely right. We’ve got shortages of challenges, capacity issues and also, frankly, if you’re in pov­erty, it’s very difficult to put the money out and wait for several months to get the money back in. It’s just simply not feasible. So those are some of the barriers.

To your point, I think one of the intentions of the family connection centres when they were announced was that there would be, in essence, that kind of forced pooling, if you will. I think there’s a lot to recommend the idea of hubs and family connection centres, but once again, we were out in the communities where they are going to be developing those family connection centres, and we learned some interesting things — that we will, out of respect, share back with the ministry — about the way in which that’s flowing.

I think we’re going to see some of the same kinds of issues for families: that it’s not transferring from what they were able to access in individualized funding and what’s available in the family connection centres. There’s actually quite a bit of difference in what’s going to be available for families, so I think we’re going to run into some diffi­culties. As I say, we’re going to be sharing that with the ministry.

I don’t know if that answers your question, but essentially, you’re absolutely right. What we’ve seen historically continues — actually, probably even greater now because of the workforce shortages.

[7:35 p.m.]

B. D’Eith: Thank you so much, Jennifer. I really appreciate the report and how deep you got into all these issues. It was very helpful.

In regards to the bureaucracy and getting into…. I think as politicians, we’re dealing with bureaucracy all the time and trying to help our constituents deal with bureaucracy. It’s a necessity of governments. However, you want to make sure that bureaucracies are as efficient and transparent and accessible as possible.

In that regard, I’m just wondering: what would that look like to you? I’d like to drill down a little bit more. What would that look like in terms of being able to get that access and that…? One of the problems you find…. You hit on it, as well, with families with kids with autism, where some families have the capacity and some families don’t. That was part of the rationale for trying to do these wraparound services and team-based services.

I’m just wondering: how do we get at that? What do you see that looks like, in terms of…? I’d really like you to elaborate a little bit more.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you very much.

Well, what we’ve heard from families…. The thing that makes it most difficult for them is that, and I think we can all appreciate this, the rules of the game aren’t clear.

You’re going in as a parent, and you’re trying to do the best you can — or a caregiver or a foster care giver or whatever. One person described it as like: “I’m in the dark, and there’s no light switch, and there’s nobody guiding me through the dark.”

The children and youth with special needs workers — some of them have caseloads of over 200 or 250 people, so they are simply doing transactional service. They are not doing the navigating work.

So that’s one thing. It’s very hard to figure out how to access a system if no one has explained that system to you and there are no pathways that are clear — if you’re in the dark. That makes it hard. Whatever services are there, you don’t even know how to access them. So that’s one thing: the clarity and the need for navigation.

The other thing is that it appears that the expression of some of the programs is different by region. It seems quite arbitrary. What’s happening in one region is not the same as what’s happening in another region. A parent might apply in one area, and then they move to another area and they’re no longer eligible for services.

The allocation of budgets is another thing. For some programs, there’s a budget cap, and regardless of whether you are deserving and eligible for those services, once that cap is hit, there’s nothing more available. You have to wait until the next year, and maybe you’ll get lucky.

So those are a couple of things that are the bureaucratic challenges.

It’s also an interesting thing because with these services, you’ve got…. Health manages a number of services — nursing support services, for example; access to assessment and diagnostic services. So those kinds of things become the gateways. Some services are gatekept. But if the Ministry of Health isn’t working closely with the Ministry of Children and Families, and now the Ministry of Education, then kids are falling through the cracks there too. I think there’s a coordination thing, and we’ll certainly talk about that.

Those are a few examples: the not knowing, the lack of communication, the lack of navigation, the inaccessibility of the support staff to the CYSNs to assist you.

The other thing I will say is that it’s interesting speaking with many parents — this is an example of a stupid rule — where they have to re-qualify for services every couple of years, but their children have lifelong disabilities. Down syndrome doesn’t go away — not that Down syndrome gets funding, but…. FASD is not going away. Autism isn’t going away.

Now, children might vary over time in what their capacities are and what they need. But essentially, to re-qualify to prove that you have a disability — that’s taking a lot of resources, right? You have to go through the whole assessment process again.

B. D’Eith: Do you mind if I follow up? Okay.

I really appreciate the answer. There’s a multiplicity of issues there. It’s not just one.

J. Charlesworth: That’s right.

B. D’Eith: It’s complex in that regard. And you’ve got cross-ministerial issues.

Zeroing in on, let’s say…. Getting at what the programs are and having that light switch turned on for people, or at least having the navigation in the dark, the analogy you had, I’m just wondering, again: what would that look like in reality?

[7:40 p.m.]

Sometimes you think: “Okay, we have a portal online.” Could there be some kind of concierge system, or is it people? Is it a missing person in the system? I’m just wondering….

One of the things, too, is if you do everything online, for example, you could also be leaving some people aside. If you focus entirely on digital tools, then you might actually leave some vulnerable people out, who don’t have access to that. It’s always good to have these wonderful electronic systems, but sometimes maybe having that person who could do it for them….

I’m wondering, again, what it looks like. You’re talking about turning those light switches on. What is that? What is the light switch? What do you feel is the way to get to that?

J. Charlesworth: Well, it’s an interesting dilemma because people often say: “Oh, we need navigators.” I’m always struggling with that because if we’ve got a system that’s so complex that we need people to walk alongside us to navigate the system, then maybe we should take a look at how to simplify the system.

The quick answer for many families is: “I need someone to tell me clearly. I need a person, not just a website, and I need consistency.” In fact, when we’ve lined up some of the announcements over the last period of time, they’re actually quite contradictory. And we struggle, so therefore, I can imagine families….

In a very practical way, I think your point about a concierge or somebody who can very clearly articulate — either at the end of the phone or available within an office in a larger urban area, perhaps — and can basically say: “Yes, given what’s going on, these are the kinds of things that are available to you, and these are not what’s available. Here are some of the charitable or the community-based services.”

It still doesn’t get at the fact that there are many kids that are underserved or unserved because there are no programs. But for those where there are some programs, certainly that would be a start. Families often ask for that.

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): It’s more of an acknowledgment, maybe, than a question, but I’m sure there’ll be something through what I say that will inspire a comment from yourselves. I mean, in a perfect world, we wouldn’t want you, need you or your office. Reading through this, it really is troublesome, as my colleague was alluding to.

I’m glad you mentioned, in a previous question and answer, some of the challenges around the silos that are created within different ministries and how we have to really figure out how to break down those silos. And then even some of the silly red-tape regulations, requirements that you have out there.

I’ll digress quickly to say I had somebody in my office last week who had his leg amputated in an injury about three years ago. Every year he has to get a doctor’s note to give to WCB to say his leg is still amputated. This is some of the crazy stuff that goes on in government. I’m not putting blame. I’m saying that in general, in government, we have some crazy stuff.

There has to be some low-hanging fruit somewhere, and we should be trying to figure out how to tackle that. When I read through this report again — I just quickly went to the end and reminded myself of some of the recommendations and the timelines and things that aren’t being completed, which gives me some angst — one of the things that I highlighted that I want to just comment on is not only the low-hanging fruit but the opportunities that I think we really have in the short term.

I go to what you said at the onset. It’s towards the end here. What are people looking for? What are some of these families looking for? I think it was very important to highlight what you did at the end, where you say, “So little, really,” where you say that a lot of these families and children are just looking for inclusion, belonging, to stop having to portray their children in the worst possible light in order to be eligible for services.

That really hit me because I think what we’ve done is we’ve created a system here where we’ve almost…. Exaggerating is not the right word, because we know there are children and families that are struggling and need help.

I find that even in my office, I have to tell them: “You really need to be out there and talking about it more in order to try to get services. If you try to say, ‘I’ll do the best I can,’ well, guess what. You’re pushed to the side, and your child is pushed to the side.” That’s not fair, but it’s also not fair that families have to be banging on the door constantly for scraps, looking for help, when in some cases, they just want to be acknowledged and recognized.

[7:45 p.m.]

To my point about the low-hanging fruit, I do notice, and I’ve been around here long enough to know, that you can’t change major policy and direction overnight. But what’s troubling is when I see things that after five years, nothing has happened. You talk about landing the plane or whatever the analogy was. At some point, we have to at least get on the runway and try to take off. Forget about the landing. We’ll deal with that later.

I just want to thank you, Jennifers. Again, there are some great points that we have to continue to highlight, but I feel like it’s very repetitive. I know you have a job to do, so it’s not a criticism of you or your office. I think it’s the system.

That’s why I’m looking forward to some process where…. I want this committee and myself to be able to at least have something I can check off as a win. I feel like I never get that, and it’s so disheartening. I can only imagine. If we’re feeling that angst and frustration and disappointment, the people we’re supposed to be serving must really be feeling it.

I think we have a huge opportunity. When I go back to the low-hanging fruit, I couldn’t find one in this report because a lot of it is, in all fairness, very big. Some of it’s a very intensive requirement or legislative or people-oriented as far as capacity. I get that.

But when there’s ever an opportunity to say, “Here are some easy wins; let’s just do them,” then the ministry can actually say: “Look what we did.” They can check the box, and I’ll pat them on the back for it. So any opportunity that you have to highlight some of those that we can all get behind, I think, will be important as well.

J. Charlesworth: If I may, just very quickly. One of the things…. When we were out in the communities meeting with families and through this report, we actually learned a tremendous amount about the small things that could make a big difference. Just so that you know, we’re in the process now of writing that up. We’ve got literally hundreds of pages of notes, but we’re writing that up and actually trying to find those small wins or those small changes that will make a big difference.

In some respects, many families said: “We’re losing hope. We need to see some glimmer of possibility.” That’s our mindset as well right now: identifying those things that the people who are making the big plans might be not attending to in the short term.

That’s our intention right now — to identify that based on the most recent work that we’ve done and those 1,300 surveys, to try and say: “Okay, what’s short term, medium term and longer term? And let’s start doing some of those short term, because these families are losing hope.”

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): Sometimes it can be as easy as a phone call back.

J. Charlesworth: As easy as a phone callback, yes, an acknowledgment.

I think you’ve hit on something very important. Many families say: “I have to describe my child on their very worst day, and I want to be able….” That feels icky, right?

They want to be able to describe their child and the wins they’ve made, but they’re terrified to talk about, “My child was able to make it through two hours at school” or “They’ve been able to participate in a community event.” They’re so terrified that if there’s any progress, then the child will be denied services. That doesn’t make sense either.

You’re absolutely right. For many families, it is that they really don’t feel seen and heard, and they’re losing hope.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you very much.

I had myself next.

I do agree with Mike on this issue. It would be good if, when the recommendations are made, they were tiered, and they were tiered in the way: these are the short-term steps that can be done, that everybody can do a checkoff.

I’ll tell you that, myself, if I have a list of 20 things to do on a Saturday…. I have yellow stickies. I always put some things on there that I do the night before because when I get up in the morning, I get to check them off.

I’m not saying…. I’m a real believer in lists. Before I used to leave my classroom, I used to make a list for the next day. The next morning as I got things done, I got to check them off.

[7:50 p.m.]

As you said, some of these recommendations are so all-encompassing and so multifaceted, it’s hard to break them down into doable pieces. I’m really, really happy to hear that you’re already starting to take a look at that.

Being a teacher, I’m wanting to do a shout-out always. We do have one recommendation that’s been completed on this list. It’s green, right? There is another one where substantive progress has been made, and I think it’s always…. There are some that say no progress, and we need to pay attention to those, but there are others where some progress has been made.

I agree. Even when people come into our office looking for simple government services, they just want to know how to get the help they need. One, two, three, four: that’s it. Then they will get help even amongst their friends, family, and they will follow those steps.

I’m really glad to hear that you’re going to start looking at the low-hanging fruit — I’ve never liked that term, but I’ll use it today — that Mike has talked about, where we can have…. Okay, these are the steps that can be done with very little, not effort, but without major legislation or bringing too many people together, and then move forward from there.

B. D’Eith: Do you want to respond, or is that more of a…?

J. Sims (Chair): Why don’t you get to ask your question, and then Jennifer can do both.

B. D’Eith: I want to pick up a little bit on that and just on something you said earlier about the cross-ministerial issues. That would be a really good lens, I think, in your work as well.

I know when we were putting in the ICY team…. We had a pilot for ICY teams in Maple Ridge, and that needed, actually, four ministries to come together and work to­gether. Any time you have multiple ministries, there are all sorts of issues across ministries — logistical and policy and all of those things — and they worked it all out. It’s going really well, and everything is starting to go.

I don’t know. It would be a thought, putting that lens so that the ministries know: “Oh, okay, these are the challenges cross-ministry.” That would be very helpful, I think, in your future work on all these issues, to see where those rubs are so that they can be addressed. You do tend to get those silos between ministries, and you have to sort of break across ministries. It’s a challenge. It’s a challenge, but it can be done.

We did that with the ICY teams, and I’m really excited about that work. I know it can be done, but you’ve got to figure out what the rubs are, you know?

J. Charlesworth: Exactly, and you foreshadowed beautifully the next conversation we’re going to have. That’s exactly one of the things we’ve been learning.

I do want to say, absolutely, the short, medium and longer term, but it’s also, I think, important that we understand that many of our systems were designed a long time ago and that they are not reflecting the needs currently. It’s like we don’t want to just focus on the low-hanging fruit. We want to take those steps that will help us better understand the bigger system changes that we need to make. We’re never going to get it perfect. No one is going to get it perfect, but you have to start.

I think that’s why we like to see — even some progress would be good, because it means that people are trying to deal with some of those bigger systemic issues in a good way. So we have to start somewhere.

D. Routley: I’m chairing a council that’s examining programs to support workers and communities displaced by, particularly, old growth logging activity provisions but forestry changes in general, and this is relevant. Sorry.

There I see all these programs and resources going towards retraining and moving people to new occupations or new sector occupations, even within the same sector. At the same time, my daughter [inaudible recording] who is a chef. She’s moving to become a heavy equipment operator. So she’s looking at apprenticeship programs and different training, and here I am chairing this council that looks at those programs.

[7:55 p.m.]

Yet her navigation of that system has been an eye-opener for me, as chair of a council. I keep referencing it in that council. The program is there. The money is there. The people are an issue, for sure, but also navigation — simple navigation of the system.

I wonder. Can you give any kind of recommendation on how we could help people in terms of…? Are there people who could help navigate and then translate the problems that are encountered into government-ese — into the language of government and into the flow? I also run into situations where a certain person in government can’t go around another person just because of the protocols and structures. If that happens, you don’t hear about the problem further out.

I think some of the problems we encounter are related to that: human beings trying to navigate a system that’s blunt and not necessarily very flexible. Are there ways we can improve that?

J. Charlesworth: Well, I think your analysis, for sure, makes perfect sense to me. These are complex issues, and we have blunt instruments trying to be utilized in these situations. Again, I always say: what can we do in the short term that will help people understand how better to navigate that system? But then let’s not stop there and say, “Oh, well, everybody is going to need to have a navigator,” because we also have to figure out what it is about the system that is so complex that people can’t navigate it.

One of the things, and I think this came up very clearly for us when we were in the northwest, is consistent, clear information in the hands of the family members so that they know what is available and what is not available. That would make a difference. It’s very simple in that regard. Then being able to take a look at the array of services or supports and also figure out, well, where are some of the gaps?

I know that’s very basic, and that’s the intention of some of the work that’s been done thus far. But as one of the people spoke to us, the work that was done to do that analysis was actually done in 2019.

The world has changed fundamentally since 2019. So we actually have to, I think, continue to query and invite the families in so that they can let us know what the things are that are causing some grief. Then you systematically start to say: does it need to be that way? What’s the intention behind it being that way? How could it be different? Then continue to keep perfecting a system.

But I think some of our analysis is actually quite dated. In 2019, we didn’t have the workforce shortage that we’re having right now, for example. The world is a very different place. We went through a pandemic, which means that many of our kids are hurting a lot harder, and they haven’t been able to get back into school, for example. That creates a tremendous amount of stress and pressure on families.

Maybe just one final thing.

I think that your point, Bob, about the different systems is something that came home so clearly for us. The rate of school exclusion for children — maybe getting an hour or two hours a week, something like that — has had a significant ripple effect on the well-being of families. There isn’t anything that fills that gap.

That’s when that cross-ministry is really important, because decisions over here around whether a child gets to go to school or not have all sorts of impacts down the line. Those are the kinds of rubs that I think you’re talking about that are important.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you. We’ve gone a little bit over time because of the number of questions. But I think these are important questions to be discussed.

We did agree that as we received each report, we would have a discussion about if we wanted to proceed at that stage with bringing somebody, like, getting other people in. Or did we want to wait until the representative has had a chance to meet with the ministries about this report and then make a determination as to where we want to proceed?

I think we agreed on the latter, but I’m going to turn to my vice-Chair.

[8:00 p.m.]

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): Thanks, Chair. I don’t mind being put on the spot at all.

Well, if I can digress a little bit but continue on with what your thought was, one of the things that the Chair and I talked about is that we have to make sure a process that we undertake is meaningful. We thought it would be a good idea that…. I don’t want to necessarily say baby steps, but not necessarily start with a whole bunch of reports all at the same time.

We didn’t think that would be fair, not only to the committee, but not to the ministry either. We thought it would be a lot more appropriate for the committee to choose one and try to start there, and we can get our feet wet.

The suggestion was possibly to look at an older report rather than a newer report. A newer report might not be necessarily fair to either the representative or the ministry, because it’s hard for us to say: “What are your future intentions?” Or: “What’s the plan based on these recommendations?”

It’s a lot easier, we thought, for this committee if we found a report such as…. We’ve seen some where they are three, four or five years old that maybe have a few recommendations that have not even been touched on at all. It would be easy for us to just start there and say: “Why? Do these recommendations…? Are they not applicable anymore? Let’s take them off then.” Maybe they are, and: “Explain to us why they haven’t been touched yet or what the plan is of the ministry going forward.”

Things change. Times change. Directions change. I think it would be more appropriate, not only for the committee but also for the representative, to be able to have a little bit more of a concrete idea of what the direction and thought process of the ministry is. It’s easier to do that if I…. I’ll end with that. Looking at some of the older ones that are outstanding rather than newer ones that haven’t really given….

Some of us who have been in cabinet before know what it’s like when you get these reports, and then you give them to your staff, and you work together and try to come up with a plan. That can take time. The intentions might be valid, but it’s not fair to put them on the spot until they’ve really digested, even though I know they’ve had ample time, through the conversation, with the building of the report. But you still need time to build and formulate a plan.

Does that cover what we talked about?

J. Sims (Chair): It covers it very, very clearly and succinctly. Thank you very much for that.

The whole idea is how we can improve things. We don’t want our committee to become an impediment to the work getting done. So for us to choose one report….

What I’m going to suggest we do today is…. We can look at the appendix that was attached here. There are a number of reports on this. And rather than making the decision right now, I’m going to suggest people spend some time taking a look at those.

Then, before the end of the day today, we can decide which one of these reports we would like to begin with. Or we may want to wait till the next meeting.

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): Or if I can just add as another…. I hate to put the representative, Dr. Charlesworth, on the spot. A recommendation from her would be very appreciated as well.

J. Sims (Chair): Yes.

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): You do know these, I hate to say, better than us, but you wrote them, or your office did. You have a lot of the historical knowledge that some of us don’t have. I mean, I’ve been off and on this committee for almost ten years, but I don’t remember them all.

J. Sims (Chair): I think that would be a good idea.

One thing my son said to me, and I want to share this here…. He goes: “How many reports does the representative write?” He goes: “Because it’s like a writing machine.” Not saying…. You’re doing great work, and we read them, but my son reads them too…

J. Charlesworth: I’m delighted.

J. Sims (Chair): …because he’s interested in this area. But what he said to me is: “How can anybody do the work if all you get is report after report after report?”

I just wanted to share that with you, that there are people other than those who sit at this committee who are interested in the reports that are written and the follow-up we do.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you.

J. Sims (Chair): Did you want to make a recommendation to us today, or did you want to have time to think about it?

J. Charlesworth: We’re ready. We’ve been passing notes back and forth actually.

What I would suggest is that we move into the next conversation. I think Jennifer knows these reports so well, and I think you’ll get some wise counsel as we move into this next part, if that’s agreeable to you.

[8:05 p.m.]

J. Sims (Chair): It is.

Over to you, Jennifer Dreyer.

J. Charlesworth: Well, we’re going to do a Jennifer C. and a Jennifer D. I’m just going to quickly set up the….

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): You’re going to start alphabetically?

J. Charlesworth: Yeah, that’s right.

J. Sims (Chair): Jennifer C. first.

Update from
Representative for Children and Youth

RECOMMENDATIONS MONITORING

J. Charlesworth: We used to have five of us Jennifers in the office, so we’ve gone to the last initial.

Update on Advocating for Change. As you’re aware, in April of this year, we released Advocating for Change: Five Years in Review. That took a look at the status of recommendations made since I became the representative in 2018 and what progress has been made on those recommendations by government ministries and agencies.

It was really an opportunity for us to do a deep dive in what has happened as a result of their efforts. It included an analysis of what sorts of recommendations government have been able to move quickly on and also the types of recommendations where little or no progress has been made.

We will provide the committee today with an update on that report as was requested. I’ll turn it over to Jennifer D, the executive director of systemic advocacy, First Nations, Métis and Inuit research in a few moments. But just to provide a little bit of context, as you know, our act enables us to “monitor, review, audit and conduct research on the provision of a designated service by a public body or director for the purpose of making recommendations to improve the effectiveness and responsiveness of that service and comment publicly on any of these functions.”

That’s the language from our act that provides us with the authority to make those recommendations. Yes, there have been many, but we’ve tried to be very judicious and also spread it across the public bodies, because it’s not one ministry’s responsibility. That’s why we felt it was important to do the deep dive on recommendations made during the first term.

Also to update you, when I started, we actually shifted the ways in which we do our recommendations to have more transformational change, for sure, to protect the rights, interests and quality of care for children, youth, young adults and families, but also calling for the essential and urgent. So similar to what we were just talking about, those things that we felt were immediate as well as those things that are addressing some of the more transformational, which government has acknowledged is necessary.

We’ve also attached to that recommendations process and the ways in which we’ve done that often in collaboration with the ministries…. We’ve honed our monitoring process — and continuing to hone that. We initially developed them with the public bodies that we were making the most recommendations to and have since expanded it, because now there are nine public bodies to whom we will send recommendations.

These new guidelines support ministries’ engagement in the recommendations process, the development of action plans, which I think is really important, and then annual self-reported progress which we take in, and then we review.

As we said, just to remind you…. In April, we said only 14 percent of the recommendations since the fall of 2018 have been completed by government, but we wanted to provide you an update now. So over to Jennifer D.

J. Dreyer: Thank you, Jennifer.

We provided a few slides ahead of time just to offer a wee bit of a refresh for the process, which Jennifer has just walked through. I’m going to jump in at slide No. 3 just to offer a refresh of the findings of Advocating for Change so that we know where we’re all starting from and what our update is on.

Jennifer has just walked through…. This is the recommendation monitoring process whereby we develop, and we meet with ministries. We get their input, and then we monitor annually, going forward.

As Jennifer noted, when we brought the Advocating for Change report forward after our deep dive, we had found only 14 percent of recommendations at that time had a rating of complete. When we looked at the eight reports between 2017 and 2021, we were really looking to understand what the enablers and barriers to that change were.

[8:10 p.m.]

Mike, as you noted, the time…. Year over year, we would expect to see increased improvement in implementing the recommendations, but that wasn’t something that we found, so we wanted to better understand that. Older recommendations weren’t necessarily doing better than new recommendations.

We have got some examples of our most recent recommendations that are actually doing better than those that are five years old that we’re hoping to learn from and help ministries to think about how they can create conditions for good change.

We go to the next slide.

Since April, we’ve taken a look at those same 63 recommendations across eight reports, and we’ve done another review of annual progress on those 63. A year later, what we can tell you is there’s still limited progress in terms of those recommendations that are complete, so now 17 percent of the recommendations are complete. However, for nearly 20 percent of the recommendations, we are seeing significant progress.

So there is movement, but within our metrics of no progress, some progress, substantial or complete, that early-stage response to recommendations, that pre-planning or that busywork that can happen in government — none of that’s captured, because our interest is more on the impact for children. The implementation of the change that we’re calling for, not just for that planning or pre-planning work that we often see.

When we reviewed these recommendations for today for this year’s progress, what we saw was 60 percent of them are still stuck. They’ve seen little to no progress, and there’s actually three that, since we came in the spring, have been downgraded further because of either inaction or ministries completely abandoning the plans they themselves have made and the commitments they’ve made.

Despite the lack of implementation progress, I do have to say that since we came forward with this report, we are seeing more engagement from government in their action planning, as well as in their efforts to identify and address the barriers, as well as start to adopt some of the enablers that we identified in our report.

If we go to slide 5, these were the monitor enablers and barriers that we identified in our Advocating for Change report. On the enabler side, the two key enablers that we identified in the report were, first, looking at contracting and robust planning. We’ve definitely seen an increase in the quality of action plans that we’re receiving.

We’ve actually received an updated action plan for Skye’s Legacy that’s robust. It’s well resourced, and it’s an action plan we can actually approve now, because it’s going to fulfil the intentions of the recommendations set out by the representative. We didn’t have that before.

Prior to that, the ministry’s focus was very much on their long-term reform, their work towards the amendments. The CFCSA amendments — all important work but, unfortunately, at the cost of addressing this immediate need for change, for children to be connected to culture, community and their sense of belonging.

We’ve also seen new ways of working together. Since we released this report, the first-ever collaboration agreement has been reported, which was a recommendation out of A Parent’s Responsibility. In A Parent’s Responsibility, we called for MCFD to work collaboratively with Indigenous child and family service agencies. We’ve called for that collaboration in many ways over the years, but this time we said co-lead, do the work and please work together. From that has come a collaboration agreement.

The preliminary assessment on their annual progress is going to read no progress, because there’s still no change for children. However, for the first time ever, we have a collaboration agreement which is going to ensure meaningful collaboration, proper information-sharing to ensure the quality of the work that comes out of that collaboration and that shared vision for working together for kids.

We’ve also seen our colleagues over at MMHA bring on contractors to support the creation of the long-overdue child and youth substance use and wellness framework. This was a recommendation that we made five years ago in Time to Listen. We’ve got folks in seat now working on the development of that framework.

While we have some good work happening and some successes, political, structural and systemic challenges continue to limit government’s ability to respond to the representative’s recommendations.

[8:15 p.m.]

As you have asked, we continue to dig deep into those challenges to be able to illuminate, again, that question of how we create conditions for successful change.

The first area that we looked at was the alignment with government priorities. You may remember that when we came in the spring, we said 32 of the recommendations that we had were…. The ministry’s response had been to align with a strategy or a framework. Anytime those words crossed our desk, we cringed because it basically meant that we weren’t going to see change.

What we can say, unfortunately, is those recommendations are still, for the most part, stuck either in no progress or some progress, because government continues to face challenges. We’ve already spoken to the workforce shortages and other types of implementation delays, whether that be inadequate engagement or inadequate resourcing.

As Jennifer mentioned earlier, she really shifted the ap­proach to recommendations to call for more systemic change and transformation. But it’s important to note that in her recommendation, she’s done so with also calling for those immediate changes that are necessary. You all mentioned earlier the importance of having that tiered approach to change. I would argue that that’s within our recommendations.

Within CYSN, for example, we asked for a needs assessment to be done so that we could answer that question: do we have the resources necessary to address this issue? The needs assessment hasn’t been done. That’s why we can’t answer that question yet. The ministry attempted to do the needs assessment back in 2019, but their own findings were inconclusive because we don’t have the data necessary to make informed decisions.

Similarly, the Ministries of Mental Health and Addictions and Health have made commitments to review involuntary admissions made under the Mental Health Act, which was part of our recommendations from the De­tained report. They’ve made the commitments. They’ve made the action plan, but the progress that they’re reporting is on their Pathway to Hope.

Meanwhile, more than 2,000 children have been involuntarily detained under the Mental Health Act last year, and since our report, there’s been a 14 percent increase in the number of children that are being involuntarily detained here in B.C., despite all the reported progress on Pathway to Hope.

We need to have a both-and approach. We need to both look for that transformation, as Jennifer and all of us are calling for, but we also need to address the immediate and urgent needs of children.

For me, when I look at progress in this way, I see government’s commitment to the long-term change. I see action planning that is only focused long term, not on the short-term changes that we need. I think probably the most glaring example of this can be seen in the response to our Crossroads report, which I would describe as, basically, a non-response.

The Crossroads report identified fiscal discrimination of First Nations, Métis, Inuit and urban Indigenous children who are living off reserve and called for government to adopt the principles of the CHRT ruling to provide adequate financial resources to these children and to improve the transparency and accountability of public funds for these children. MCFD has reported to us that, instead, they’re going to stay the course on their current planning.

Their current planning, again, is important work. They are working with the Tripartite First Nations Children and Families Working Group to collaborate on a new fiscal framework for on-reserve services. But this work has been underway since 2016.

Again, they’re facing multiple delays since 2016, and there’s been no information provided for how this table may, if at all, address the off-reserve issue that’s actually identified in our report. When asked about that information, the response is: “The work of this table is confidential.” So we’re not even able to see if the work will address the needs of off-reserve children.

The other area that we looked at in the Advocating for Change report that was identified as a clear barrier to making any progress was data stewardship. The information isn’t there to make good decisions, and unfortunately, we see that continuing. I want to bring in a quote from The Grandmother Perspective. I think we need to keep repeating this because we have ten recommendations now about data stewardship, and we’re just not seeing the progress that we need, that’s necessary for committees like this to inform and make good decisions as well.

The Grandmother Perspective from the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner says: “There is a responsibility to act when missing data can result in a loss of human life. Numbers matter. Ongoing silences in data have harmed the most systematically oppressed communities.”

[8:20 p.m.]

RCY has been advocating for improved data stewardship, and we’re still not seeing action here. A real-time ex­ample, as we prepare to review the progress on Time to Listen…. I said moments ago that it was five years ago that we issued that report. We learned this summer that the basic service delivery data on availability of services, service utilization, wait times, wait-lists of substance use services for youth is not monitored by government.

Well, how can we create a youth substance use framework if we’re not monitoring the existing services that are out there? What was gathered and shared almost two months later is largely incomplete, or the information was simply not available. It’s not possible to draw any meaningful conclusions to inform the proper way forward.

The second-to-last area that we looked at as a barrier identified in advocating for change was engagement, meaningful engagement, with Indigenous partners, youth, rights holders. We continue to see a lack of infrastructure or coordination to support this type of meaningful engagement, despite public commitments to DRIPA and representation in the work. There is creative work happening with the working groups, where they’re recruiting people in to try to help inform the work, but it’s quite inconsistent, and it’s quite siloed, as well.

I mentioned earlier that there’s this brand-new collaboration agreement, which was signed in May of this year by MCFD and the Indigenous child and family service agencies. That was for the A Parent’s Responsibility report. Yet when we called for their collaboration to respond to the Missing report, those same principles of collaboration weren’t brought over. So there’s work to be done to ensure that the structures that are being put in place are actually utilized and are shared.

We are, though, seeing some good investment to support engagement. There is a grant. Again, this came out of our recommendations for A Parent’s Responsibility. A grant has been made to the Indigenous Child and Family Services Directors table. That, taken with the collaboration agreement, represents significant progress in terms of opportunity for collaboration to come. We just need to be accountable to it.

Finally, you have all already spoken to the importance of the whole-government approach, which we saw in Advocating for Change was a significant barrier. It continues to be a significant barrier. We’ve mentioned the workforce challenges, for example.

All of the monitoring reports I have in front of me speak about the challenges in recruitment and retention for the child and family services sector. Yet we have no government plan to address this. We know that when government comes together to identify key priority areas, change is possible. We see this with the health force recruitment plan that happened last year. So how do we get child and family services, and our child and family service sector, to be a priority so that a cross-government workforce strat­egy can happen for them?

If we look at our highlights over the last few months, I want to make sure that we are honouring the good work that is being done, and also, hopefully, drawing your attention to some of the areas that remain stuck for your consideration in terms of who you might want to bring in to learn more about the work that’s happening or not happening.

As I said, the Parent’s Responsibility collaboration agreement, one of the first of its kind…. We don’t yet have an action plan a year later, but we have commitment to work together in a new way, so that’s really promising.

Skye’s Legacy. As I said, we have a new, robust action plan, which, if well-resourced, is going to address the intention of the recommendations that the representative made.

In Missing…. I think this is probably our greatest highlight that I can bring forward. Six months ago, we released the Missing report, and that called for the immediate action on six of the eight recommendations within a six-month timeline. You might recall that this is the first time the representative has ever done this.

The urgency was identified in that report. Over the course of our research, we looked at a nine-month span, and four children that were missing had died. Jennifer issued an urgent response of six months to complete these six recommendations, and the ministry did it.

[8:25 p.m.]

Minister Dean stood up and said that we were committed to fulfilling those within six months, and with that political will behind government, we saw action. No, they are not fully complete. Yes, there’s still work to be done. There are some misses in terms of collaboration and the quality of the work. There are improvements that need to be made.

But the work happened, and the importance of the swift response cannot be highlighted enough. Since January of this year, nine more children who were missing died. When we see the political will to address these things…. They are moving. I think that’s where the role of this committee, to be able to highlight the importance of these recommendations, really comes in.

In that spirit, I’m hoping to direct you to where we see ongoing challenges, where we’re not getting that same commitment from government or action moving forward. The first, as I’ve already said, is At A Crossroads. I think that that would be one of our most concerning responses to recommendations to date. More than a year and a half after the release of the report, we’re still no closer to addressing the fiscal discrimination experienced by off-reserve children.

The ministry’s work and action plan are not meeting the intention. We do not know, at this stage, if MCFD plans to address the fiscal discrimination at all. In fact, their action plan to us says that they are considering whether or not the principles of the CHRT ruling apply to off-reserve children.

The next report that continues to remain stuck is De­tained. As I said earlier, with the numbers of children who are involuntarily detained under the Mental Health Act, increasing the relevance and urgency of protecting their rights and ensuring that they have access to the services and support that they need is of utmost priority.

At this stage, it’s unclear if or when the Ministries of Mental Health and Addictions and Health will proceed with the review that was called for in Detained. The evidence that they’ve submitted, as I said, focuses on Pathway to Hope as well as their own research when they were looking at the secure care for youth, which speaks to the detrimental impact of involuntary admission. Yet we don’t yet see the progress for them to address the current involuntary admissions.

Then, finally, I have Excluded up there. But Excluded, as we say, is one of many reports. As you’ve already heard from Jennifer this evening, children and youth with disabilities in B.C. remain alone and afraid, left out, excluded and still waiting. These are not just titles of our reports. They’re the day-to-day lived experiences of these children and youth and their families.

Despite multiple recommendations, the focus of government has been on that long-term change. As it continues to be delayed, more and more families are left behind. More and more children are aging out of their own childhood without any support. One-time-only respite lotteries do not address the gross inadequacies of our special needs services.

At this stage, it’s unclear to the RCY whether or not government will accept the representative’s recommendations to immediately expand the criteria of existing CYSN services to be needs-based so that children with other neurodiversities can access support while we wait for this transformation to unfold. Jennifer has made, as I said, both long-term recommendations and short-term. But those short-term recommendations are not being heeded.

Looking forward into the work that we’re doing, and recognizing that my time is over, I think the main thing that we’re working on is really thinking about ways that we can align our monitoring effort with true impact for children and families. As Jennifer said, we have the survey. We’re doing more convening. We’re really trying to expand monitoring to include family and service provider perspectives to ensure that the progress, as it’s reported, is actually felt at the ground level.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you very much. You took us through a whirlwind, but it was great to have the pictures in front of us.

[8:30 p.m.]

When I looked at the graphs you had, the progress be­tween April and November, obviously there was a little bit of a push there or a spark there.

In those few months, we do see movement having taken place. We need to celebrate those steps as well as the ones that we’re still going to push for.

I’m going to turn to members to see if they have questions. Then we will take a look to see on which one of these reports we want to do a further dive into the recommendations.

I’m going to go to MLA Letnick.

N. Letnick: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to both Jennifers and the team for the report. Thank you for highlighting the success. I think you made the point that with the political will, it’s possible to achieve success. If you look at it the other way around, failure is because there’s no political will. Anyway, I want to focus on the success. So thank you for identifying that.

Today the minister of the Métis Nation responsible for MCFD met with the minister and then met with me afterwards. We had a good discussion about children in care — Métis, non-Métis — and the differences. In that, she made a comment, or the deputy minister made a comment. I can’t remember which one. It has troubled me ever since.

By the way, I don’t know how you can sleep at night with all of this going on. I would be, with a box of Kleenex, crying all night long. More power to you.

She made a comment that the current system of detaining children is the same as we had with residential school or the scoop. Nothing has changed. We just call it something different now.

I’m not educated enough in this to be able to come to a conclusion as to what she is talking about. Everything I’ve heard about residential schools, the reason why it wasn’t good…. I’m saying: “Is that still happening now?” That kind of thing.

With all the reports that you’ve done, Crossroads and everything else…. Could you comment on that comment I got from these two very passionate people and explain that to us? Is there anything we can do about it?

J. Charlesworth: I’m looking to Sam and Pippa, if you wish to speak as well.

What we hear from many of our Indigenous colleagues and partners is…. The child welfare system is the new residential school in the sense that Indigenous children — Métis, First Nations, Inuit — are significantly…. The state is significantly overly involved in their lives.

What we see through our work is that many times those removals…. You know, 68 percent of kids in care are Indigenous. Many times those removals are not resulting in better outcomes for the kids. There’s significant harm, there’s poor quality of care, and children become disconnected or unbelonged from community, from their culture, from their families, etc., which is what happened in the residential schools. That is what happened in the Sixties Scoop.

We often think: what is it that is happening now that 15 years from now we’re going to be saying, “What were we thinking?” That’s one of the things we’re hearing from many of our Indigenous colleagues and partners in the organization, because we have many amazing leaders like Jennifer and Samantha, and from those outside — the Indigenous child and family services agency, the First Nations Leadership Council, Métis Nation B.C., etc.

That’s one of the big reasons for the self-determination and the push to resume jurisdiction over the well-being of their children. What they’re seeing is…. The current system is resulting in very negative outcomes for kids, as did the Sixties Scoop, which we never really stopped, and the residential school.

I’m going to turn to….

Sam, would you like to comment?

[8:35 p.m.]

J. Sims (Chair): I’m just going to request, looking at the time — it’s 8:35 — that we get a little bit tighter with our answers and with the questions, as well, so we can get through the rest of it. I think we do want to land on where we want to go. Okay. Thank you.

B. D’Eith: I take a little bit of exception to the idea that there’s no political will. There is a huge amount of political will to make change right now.

I do take exception to that, Norm. I really do.

This idea that there is a political…. When you’re trying to make systemic change, which I believe is the intent here…. It can take time to get to systemic change.

I will give an example of that. An example would be the youth emergency shelter which we’re going to be piloting in Maple Ridge. Now, to get to the policy, to get through the consultations…. It takes time, especially when you’re dealing with Indigenous children, who are overrepresented in the system.

My point being…. I appreciate that we can get to some of the smaller things, but to get to some of the bigger things needs that policy work. That takes time.

I wanted that youth emergency shelter faster than now. I did. I also recognize that to get to where we needed, to have a safe space for children that is also respectful of Indigenous ways and decolonization, that work had to be done.

When the ministry is saying they’re working through these things…. That’s the work, and the work is not, unfortunately, on a timetable. You have to give space and time. It can take time.

I’m not trying to make any excuses. I’m just saying…. There’s an example there. It did take time. It was necessary work. Now the result we have with…. This pilot, I believe, will be, hopefully, a template for a much better system than the old youth shelters, which were not appropriate for many children in need.

I’m just trying to balance it off a bit in terms of saying: “Okay. You’re not hearing from the ministry, but there’s also that work that’s being done.” How do we find that balance? You’re satisfied that you’re getting that information but also allowing the ministry to do that key policy work to get to where we need to get to make that systemic change, which is what we’re talking about here.

I appreciate the frustrations from the representative on some of these things, but some of them are just the work that is being done. I kind of wanted to balance the discussion a little bit.

J. Dreyer: Thank you very much for that. We absolutely acknowledge that.

One of our best performing reports, I guess I’ll call it, would be A Parent’s Duty, which looks at the post-majority supports. When that report came out, it joined a chorus of calls, for more than ten years, in terms of changes that needed to be made.

Absolutely, it has taken a long time to make those changes and to do them in a good way. There’s some good work happening. I think knowing that…. That’s why it’s so important that we have a both-and approach to addressing these issues.

We absolutely need to make sure that we are doing the appropriate engagement and consultation, meaningful en­gagement and consultation, to make changes in a good way. We also have a responsibility to the immediate and urgent needs of these children.

We need to set up structures so we aren’t starting from scratch to build trust again. We aren’t starting from scratch to find the appropriate engagement pathways. That’s just part of the way we do the work, for all of the work.

J. Charlesworth: Can I just add one thing, actually?

Just so we’re clear, when we put the timelines for our recommendations…. That’s done in consultation with the ministry and the public bodies. They’ll often say to us…. Almost inevitably they’ll say: “We can’t do it in that period of time.” So we will adjust. It is a recognition that some of these things do take time.

It has been a tough few years, for sure. I just wanted to make sure…. We’re not just doing that arbitrarily and trying to set them up for failure. We’re actually trying to set them up for success by saying: “What do you think is going to be necessary in order to achieve this?” I think that’s an important piece too.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you very much.

[8:40 p.m.]

I also want to reiterate. I see a lot of will, even, from the people who are in the ministry, the people who do the actual work, rather than the politicians who give the policy and guidance.

It’s like building a house. If you’re going to bring about systemic change, the time you spend at the front end doing planning and making sure you get everything right…. But — I absolutely agree with you — while we’re doing that, we’ve got to make sure that those who are falling off at this end have got some kind of support system. It may not be perfect, but some kind. So I really want to thank you.

Now, I want to draw the committee’s attention to three reports that you put in front of us that you said were ongoing challenges. I know, from my perspective, I’m really interested in digging deeper into the Detained report, because I heard the concerns. Especially in light of the mental health issues going on right now, I think it is one that is current to note, but one also where we need to see what has been done that we may not be aware of.

I’m looking for some guidance from my colleagues as to whether they are okay with that or whether they’ve got a different preference, and then we will arm-wrestle.

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): Yes.

J. Sims (Chair): We agree. Any feedback? Are we okay with Detained?

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): I was just trying to pull it up to remind myself how many recommendations, be­cause I know under…. Fourteen. Okay. I know that under At a Crossroads, that was a massive report of, like, 300 or 400 pages. It was huge, and Detained is not quite as large in the scheme of things from a report, but it still has a lot of recommendations.

J. Dreyer: There are 14 recommendations, but what we might be able to offer, as well, is where those things are stuck and where there’s actually really promising practice.

The Mental Health Review Board is doing some incredible work in terms of responding to our recommendations in that, so we don’t necessarily need to haul them in here. But the Ministry of Mental Health and Addictions and the Ministry of Health — they are tiny teams trying to address these issues, and I think they could use some wind in their sails.

J. Sims (Chair): I think we are at consensus. Are we at consensus on Detained?

M. Bernier (Deputy Chair): Yeah, if I can, totally, it’s fine. To me, it’s one that’s been around for a couple of years, so it’s definitely a good start.

My thought was it’s also a learning and training experience for us as a committee of getting groups in front of us so we can learn to ask questions and get our own feet wet on trying to work through this. I think it’ll be a learning experience for us as well, and we will get better as we go along, but we have to start somewhere.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you, Mike.

As we said at the beginning, this is not supposed to be a make-work project either for this committee or for the ministries and people who have lots more on their plate. It is one where we do want to develop a process that works. So really, how we do this first report is going to be important, because it’s going to be a prototype for how we proceed. We’re going to be developing a framework.

I believe, Michelle, you have a motion.

M. Babchuk: I do. I’d like to move that the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth request the appropriate government bodies appear before the committee to provide an update on the status of implementing recommendations in the report of the Representative of Children and Youth titled Detained: Rights of Children and Youth Under the Mental Health Act at the earliest opportunity.

Motion approved.

J. Sims (Chair): I’m looking at the time, and we have two more reports here.

Now, we’re going to go back to the representative, be­cause you have two more reports to do and 15 minutes.

J. Charlesworth: I will do it. Not a problem. Okay.

As I’m getting myself organized, I do want to pick up the Mental Health Review Board did a fantastic job in implementing…. If you want a poster child for really good work, they’re it. I want to celebrate those successes as well.

[8:45 p.m.]

KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

J. Charlesworth: I’m going to quickly speak to the key performance indicators. We’ve been reviewing and revising our KPIs, as you are aware, over the past year. We’ve brought it to you, and we’ve incorporated the feedback that you’ve provided to us. Thank you very much for that.

What we were looking at was…. We wanted to track both output measures that reflect our activities and responsiveness and measures that get at the impact and the outcomes. “What’s the good of you?” is the kind of piece there.

We’ve historically done the former quite well. Things like how responsive we are to emerging issues, how quickly we get back to people who contact us for advocacy services, how many people seek information through our website, what percentage of our critical injury and death reports have an initial review completed within two months — 100 percent, just so you know — how often we report to this select standing committee and the Finance Committee.

These speak to the activity, responsiveness, relevance and accountability — so good — but these don’t answer the question: what impact are you having, RCY, and what is changing as a result of your efforts? An important piece for sure. What we wanted to figure out is: how can we best reflect the influence we believe we are having to be able to report to you on progress in our annual report and service plan and, most importantly, to demonstrate accountability to those we serve?

You know that it’s easier to count outputs — number of calls, number of reports, those kinds of things — but outcomes are tricky and, of course, we’re only one contributor to outcomes and change amongst many. Some of this is out of our control. Nonetheless, it’s an important task, so we keep trying. We keep asking the ministry to do the same, so we figure we’d better do it as well.

We have circulated where we’re at right now. In essence, I’ll just very quickly walk you through. Maybe we start at the bottom. There are our outputs. You will see on page 3, where it says “Outputs: What RCY Does,” we’ve got…. We’ve identified some areas….

Now, this is still a work in progress, working with our teams to figure out the best metrics, but you will see, in the black, those are the things that we have been doing already. In the green, are those things that we think we should be measuring as well, because we think they’re important things that help us understand how we are doing, whether we’re talking views and investigations, engagement, etc. So that’s one thing. We’re going to do that. We’re going to try and get better at that.

The next page speaks to the short-term outcomes. What are those levers of influence that we think will make a difference? So if these things happen…. It’s like the collaboration agreement that you talked about. If that happens, then there’s a greater likelihood of better outcomes for kids. We’ve identified a few areas. Some of them are still…. They’re kind of right on the verge of outputs.

We think it’s really important, for example, to have trusting relationships, with our Indigenous colleagues, particularly, and that they are willing to engage in us and they trust us. So we will be asking them: “What do you think? How are we doing? What are some of the ways in which we’ve worked well together completing some of the memorandums of agreement or protocol agreements?” Those kinds of things are measures of our ability to be in relationship, because that’s an important lever of influence.

The recommendations monitoring is obviously a key lever of influence. Seeing the progress between April…. What you get, what is being monitored and measured, people are paying attention to. We’ve got increased uptake.

Then, of course, we need to make sure that we’re strong as an organization, so making sure that we’ve identified a number of things about our organizational culture and how we’re doing. Those are the short-term outcomes that we think will be important levers of change.

[8:50 p.m.]

The next page, the last page, really speaks to those things that we think we can measure that will be proxies for or indicative of the broader change that we’re talking about here.

New investments, obviously, policies — we’ve talked about that — that adaptation, policy changes, new ways forward, new kinds of collaborations.

Innovation is so important because the kinds of status quo that we’re dealing with is not working for many kids. We need to be taking a look at innovation in these very difficult times.

Then, things like measuring the way in which belonging is becoming the foundation. We were happy to report on the progress for Skye’s Legacy because we’re hearing be­longing being used over and over again now as an important foundation for programs and services. There’s a metric that we can track that really speaks to the values that we know support the thriving of kids. These are medium-term outcomes.

We’ve talked about interministerial and how important that is. We’ve seen that in our monitoring work, really starting to measure those structures that now exist, which didn’t used to exist, that are cutting across the issues and bringing people together in a good way.

I’m so old that I’ve been around since…. Well, I haven’t been around since the ‘50s, but anyway. In terms of my practice in the ‘70s and when I was doing work with cabinet, both under the Socreds and the New Democrats in the early ‘80s, we had some very powerful structures that were put in place in order to bring that cross-government approach.

I know there are structures now but, really, how are they working? How is it that our recommendations and our work can encourage that kind of cross-ministry collaboration to deal with the most intractable social issues that we’re dealing with?

As I say, we’re working on it, but I’m hoping that you can take a look at this and say, “Are you comfortable that we’re going in the right direction?” in order to be able to report back to you on those key performance indicators.

J. Sims (Chair): Any questions?

N. Letnick: It’s not a question. Just to say thank you. Thank you for making this progress.

B. D’Eith: I’d just like to echo that. I really appreciate the response. We talked about these things, and you’ve responded in a really positive way. You know, even we can understand this. This is awesome.

M. Babchuk: At nine o’clock at night.

B. D’Eith: Exactly, so thank you.

J. Sims (Chair): Thank you, everyone.

Yes, thank you for this, and now on to the next item.

INVESTIGATIVE AND REVIEW WORK

J. Charlesworth: All right. Good. This will be quick.

I’ll conclude my presentation tonight by just giving you an update on progress on our investigation into the circumstances leading to the death of the little boy in foster care in the Fraser region. As you know, such a tragic, tragic story.

We’ve committed, as you know, to complete an investigation, reporting out by the end of June 2024, and also — on the basis of feedback that we’ve received from First Nations leadership, from Indigenous agencies, from many of our community partners and, indeed, from government — to simultaneously conduct an extensive systemic review to accompany the report. So that, too, will be completed by June of 2024.

It’s really important to us that we keep you apprised as we’re going forward and that we keep others apprised — the transparency in our process, the transparency in our findings. Then, obviously, we will share those findings with you in June and then, hopefully, carry on with the strong knowledge mobilization. We’re going to give you some brief updates when we do meet in person, and you can also…. We’ll ensure that you get monthly bulletins — tight, very quick — just to let you know these are the steps going forward.

I just want to give you a very brief synopsis. We have actually requested additional funding for this fiscal year, of $248,000, and next fiscal one-time funding for $214,000 because we don’t have sufficient internal capacity.

As you’ve heard…. Some of you on the Finance Committee have heard that our volume is very, very high. We have made that ask to bring in some external subject-matter expertise on a number of key issues, and we are hoping to hear from the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government in December. Nonetheless, we are moving forward because we’ve got a job to do, and we’ve got a very short space of time to do it.

[8:55 p.m.]

Where we’re at right now. We have recruited Indigenous matriarchs and elders to guide us in this work. We’ve actually spent our whole day with them today, and we’re meeting with them tomorrow as well.

We’ve got a leadership and management structure that has been scoped out. We’ve identified the aims, the desired outcomes of the project. We’ve got a project charter, detailed work plan that’s in the works. The project charter is done. The detailed work plans are arising for both facets of this project. We’ve identified the key topics we’re moving forward with on the systemic review. We’ve also initiated the investigation.

In terms of the first part of our systemic review, because we don’t know if we’re going to get the additional resources we need, we’re taking a look at jurisdiction and self-determination and that transitional decision-making for Indigenous communities, out-of-care and extended-family placement options and particularly decision-making, due diligence, supports and quality of care that’s showing up not only with this story, but a number of other stories that we’re working with.

You’ll love this: the workforce capacity issues. We’re going to do a deep dive on workforce capacity.

The fourth area is our child welfare policies, procedures and the responsiveness. A number of things changed during COVID. We’re trying to understand that better and whether the policies are the most effective, given what’s being called for, for our children.

Another one you’ll appreciate is the interministerial, inter-agency and nation-to-nation communications and planning. We’re starting. The investigation is launched, and these five areas we think are the biggest levers of change from a systemic point of view. We’re moving forward with those as we wait to see whether we’re going to have the resources we need.

We’re also going to undertake several rounds of engagement, different stages, and we’ll do it using online, in-person and surveys. Basically, that will bring the circle much broader than our organization and our key partners, but to understand the current state and the issues so that we’ve got a really good understanding of the issues, we’ll make sense of the findings, and then we’ll identify a path forward.

Our intention is not to just find fault, but it is to basically say, here’s what we’ve learned from thousands of peo­ple that we have engaged with, and here are the things that we think will make the most significant difference going forward.

From now until the end of February, we’re developing the two-eyed seeing methodology. We have a wonderful expert in Indigenous research methodologies just to my right here. We’re undertaking the interview phases of the investigation, which will…. This is very, very broadly scoped. There are dozens of interviews that are necessary, and we’ll complete the background research on those systemic issues, while we meet with those who are most directly impacted, the families, the communities and then the service providers.

We’ve got a lot of work to do. But I remain hopeful and confident. We have an amazing team of people that are very dedicated. That is an update so that you have that.

I think I did that in seven minutes.

J. Sims (Chair): You did an amazing job.

On behalf of all the members here, I want to thank Jennifer C. and Jennifer D. and Pippa and Samantha for coming here and presenting to us, and for the very important work you do. Thank you.

Right now, Members, is there any other business — at your peril? Is there any other business? None.

Seeing no further business, I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

Moved by MLA Letnick that we now adjourn.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 9 p.m.