Panel approves draft child intervention proposals
The all-party panel tasked with improving Alberta’s child intervention system approved its final draft of recommendations Wednesday, aiming to forge better relationships with Indigenous communities and update legislation.
The ministerial panel — mandated to identify systemic problems in child intervention services — was set up after the death of Serenity, a four-year-old Indigenous girl who died in 2014. She was covered in bruises and severely malnourished when she was taken to an Edmonton hospital with a head injury. She died a few days after being taken off life support.
Wednesday’s discussion focused on the panel’s second phase of work, guided by such themes as reconciliation, combating discriminatory mindsets, and family systems and kinship.
The 26 recommendations ranged from updating policies for family assessments to the provincial government supporting Indigenous-led research.
“I would like to take one more step and see actually measurable, time-based recommendations,” said Alberta Party interim leader and panel member Greg Clark. “We don’t want another report that just sits on a shelf.”
The panel was struck more than a year ago and completed its first phase of work in April. The first set of draft recommendations included increasing the authority of Alberta’s child and youth advocate, timely completion of reviews and better information sharing.
But Clark said the panel couldn’t reach consensus on publication bans, which prohibit disclosing the names of children in care. It did recommend a full review of the Child, Youth and Family Enhancement Act, which governs those rules.
He said there needs to be more discussion on balancing transparency with protecting the information of vulnerable families.
“That’s a piece that was just never discussed in a meaningful way,” he said. “It was the one recommendation we couldn’t come to agreement on at the end of phase one.”
The recommendations — which included the creation of a public action plan by June 30 — will be reviewed by Children’s Services Minister Danielle Larivee.
“There are things that are going to be doable in the more shortterm, (and) there are things that we’ve talked about that will take years to accomplish,” said panel member Peter Choate, a registered social worker and assistant professor at Mount Royal University.
He added one example is the goal to create a more diverse workforce in child intervention services to better serve Indigenous communities.
“That’s a recruiting issue, that’s a training issue, that’s a post-secondary education issue,” he said.
United Conservative Party MLA Leela Aheer said there needs to be better accountability in the system for perpetrators of violence.
“You can’t fix something if you don’t know who you’re dealing with and how it happened in the first place,” she said, adding the panel’s work focused on closing gaps in communication.
“We really, really have to push those recommendations ... so we can implement as much as we can right away and, God willing, save somebody.”