Children’s minister requires records: judge
Attorney general told to produce info on legal representation for vulnerable kids
A judge has ordered B.C.’S attorney general to release records to the representative for children and youth that are related to legal representation being provided to vulnerable children in the province.
In October 2018, the chief investigator for the representative’s office sent the ministry a two-page request for the records to assist in the preparation of a special report addressing concerns that the voices of vulnerable kids are not being heard in legal proceedings.
The attorney general declined to provide the records, which include cabinet documents, after questioning whether the report was within representative for children and youth Jennifer Charlesworth’s mandate.
The ministry argued that Charlesworth’s authority was grounded in the child-welfare system and does not extend to private family legal disputes.
Charlesworth’s office responded by filing a petition in B.C. Supreme Court seeking to get the records, and after the attorney general responded to the petition by continuing to oppose the release of records, another letter was sent to the attorney general.
The July letter said that the representative’s office had received numerous and ongoing reports about whether or how the voices, views and interests of critically injured or dead children were heard in family law proceedings that were near in time to the child-welfare proceedings.
The representative’s responsibilities include investigation of critically injured or dead children in the child-welfare system in B.C. In his ruling on the case, Justice
Douglas Thompson concluded that the representative needed the information sought in order to do a proper job of delivering a report to the legislative assembly.
He said there was nothing in the applicable legislation that supports a restriction on the representative addressing the extent to which children’s voices are heard in proceedings proximate to child-protection proceedings.
“What occurs in parenting cases, and in particular whether children are heard in these proximate parenting proceedings, could have a bearing on the workings of the child-welfare system and this is squarely within the representative’s mandate to address by way of a special report.”
In particular, the representative is seeking information and records relating to the Family Advocate Program, a provincial program that provided government-funded legal representation for children in contested custody and access cases. The then-liberal government ceased funding of the program in 2002.
Some of the documents related to the program are protected by cabinet privilege.
The judge said that it was “premature” to decide on whether the cabinet records might be disclosed at some point. “It is an issue that ought to be decided if and when it is necessary to do so. I will remain seized of these matters.”
The representative’s office had no comment Thursday. The attorney general’s ministry had no immediate comment.