Child welfare review falls short [editorial]

Talk about a lead balloon. A government review of child welfare in British Columbia dropped out of the sky, landing with a thud when it attacked the one person in the province that works steadfastly to stand tall and talk truth to power about the systemic problems in the Ministry of Child and Family Development—the Representative for Children and Youth, Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond.

If there was any good to be learned from the review, penned by former MCFD deputy minister Bob Plecas, it was poisoned and corrupted publicly by lack of consultation with First Nations people and is buried now in mistrust.

Plecas review was done without input from Aboriginal leadership, despite Aboriginal children making up more than 60 per cent of kids in care. That tells us a lot about this provincial government, which keeps putting the cart before the horse on First Nations concerns, over and over and over again.

This old-world, cynical style of conservative governing is perceived in stark contrast to the open, inclusive style of the new Liberal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Add to that the misrepresentation of the job of Edward John, a top ranking First Nations official appointed as a special advisor on child welfare concerns, and Plecas review is as a stick that pokes at the hornets’ nest.

Plecas job was to review the department following a B.C. Supreme Court decision that found the province’s child protection services abused its authority in the case of a toddler who was molested by his father while the child was in ministry care.

Another report at the time shone a white hot spotlight on the department when a teenage boy living in a hotel in government care was found dead. The Representative for Children and Youth found in that case that B.C.s child protection unit is in crisis, and it’s not the first stinging rebuke of MCFD services from Turpel-Lafond.

While the public expects MCFD’s feet to be held to the fire over such tragic events, it seems it’s been getting a little too warm to bear for the ministry itself.

In the preface to Plecas Review, Part One: Decision Time the author says he focused on a number of key reports, including the Gove report, the Hughes report and the 29 reports issued by the Representative, all authored by lawyers and judges.

“My grandfather used to say, if your watch is broken you have two choices: take it to a lawyer if you want to sue the watch company, or take it to a jeweler if you want to get it back running on time.” He’s the jeweler who fixes “complicated government organizations,” he says. His style is condescending and glib, and reeks of an old man’s ‘I told you so’ arrogance.

Plecas reminds us dummies that many reports make recommendations and expect government to find the money to implement them, but he’s smarter than the average bear. “I can attest that there is no printing press for dollars hidden in the basement.”

(At least, not for children at risk. Other government priorities seem to be funded just fine.)

“So, choices must be made,” and we couldn’t agree more.

He makes it clear in the report that despite every best effort by government care workers, children will still be abused and die; a kind of collateral damage of the imperfect modern reality. And there is not a darned thing anyone can do to stop that from happening, he says.

He told us all this, of course, 18 years ago when he was brought back to MCFD under Premier Glen Clark to implement the recommendations in the Gove Report and build a new Ministry for Children, and it’s still true today, he said.

He tells us that government is the fourth level of protection of children, but it’s not the first three—parents, grandparents and extended family, and community—that bears the burden of the failure if a child is injured or dies.

“If a tragedy occurs, front line child protection decision makers are the ones whose "heads must roll… But I am convinced that we are not well served by a system where fear constantly underlies every worker’s day—a fear bred by what I would describe as a culture of relentless accusation.”

Plecas says “there seems to be a great appetite for piling on and blaming both individual workers and the system at large for perceived and real failings.” And this culture of blame cannot be seen in other areas of the public service.

Plecas seems more an apologist for a system that he’s helped create, than an arm’s length reviewer of the functionality of the service, and he finds fault with the “uncompromising” and “insistent” demands of the Representative, finding the “sheer volume” and “constant nature” of her recommendations “overwhelming.” He tells us they have become “part of the bigger management problem.”

Plecas view is that now “real change” at MCFD is underway, he says the ministry itself can take on the role of oversight, self-policing and reviewing its own efforts. Well, if his review is such a result, we say ‘no way’.

The First Nations Leadership Council has said ‘not a chance’, as well. The Plecas Review gets a failing grade, right there.

Plecas calls also for in infusion of money—$50 million, in fact—but half as much as the Representative has called for, and many times less that what has been taken from the system over the past two terms of the Liberal (read conservative) ruling government.

What a waste of time and energy. And as the FNLC notes, a wasted opportunity as well.