Here is today's Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond's 60 page report.GRAND SLAM, SLAM DUNK, call it what you will, the head honchos of the Ministry of Children and Family Development had it done to them. The Directors, team leaders and social workers in the various regions have earned this failing grade but the top bureaucrats own the responsibility for it. Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond delivered it on Monday in Victoria. She is the Representative for Children and Youth. While she has given scathing reports in the past today was the most recent and perhaps the most stinging assessment of the province's child welfare system.
I have written blog posts for the next couple of days but these must be shelved for the moment to focus on Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond's report. I cannot even wait until tomorrow. You need to engage with this now. If you didn't hear her speak during news hours today, then you will want to read this. If you are one of those who feel she is just a headline grabber, then I disagree with you. I see her as our best ally. She is seeing what we have been seeing and expressing. She has the weight of office to say it in a manner that will be heard. If she gets increasing news coverage we had better be thankful because it means that the public is going to be informed and concerned and demanding of answers. She was hired to be a watchdog and she has been growling in the past and today we heard that she has a big bark as well.
Listen to her as CBC recounts her report. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2010/11/29/bc-childrens-watchdog-report.html?ref=rssShe says that the Liberal “government has only fully implemented less than half the recommendations in the 2006 landmark report on the child welfare system by retired judge Ted Hughes.” She is “deeply disappointed with the government's progress and is particularly critical of what she sees as a lack of accountability and oversight in the child welfare system.” She said that “the changes made in public reporting have met neither the letter nor intent of the Hughes report and the information posted publicly now is less useful than in the past.” She described the government's action “as vague promises that make high-level references to the Hughes review yet offer no detailed information, and at other times outright government dismissal." She feels that the “Ministry of Children and Family Development has failed to meet the targets in its service plans, and that means troubles ahead. Difficult economics times can mean harsher realities for many of B.C.'s families.... Poverty will deepen for some, unemployment rates will climb, and previously successful families may struggle. Social services may be required more often, and community supports may disappear. Stagnant or decreasing budgets will not be able to address the need of additional children and families," she said.”
American Family Rights is the Voice of America's Families and its slogan is 'Until Every Child Comes Home.' It published this CBC story in a hurry today. Believe me, this is news around the world where similar issues exist. http://afrafrontpagenews.blogspot.com/2010/11/bc-childrens-watchdog-slams-government.html
Below are some passages from Turpel-Lafond's report that readers might find especially interesting:
ReplyDelete"In the Representative’s April 2008 report, From Loss to Learning, it was once again determined that comprehensive measures were not yet formulated. Robust and regular reporting on the safety, education status and well-being of children in care remained a serious concern. The
type of regular public reporting that the Representative views as essential includes:
• data on the number of children in care
• continuing custody orders and Youth Agreements per region
• the percentage of plans of care that are up to date
• visits with guardianship workers, and
• educational outcomes for all children in care, not only those with continuing
custody orders."
Turpel-Lafond thanks the CPS and other "front line" workers:
"[They] must be thanked, repeatedly and genuinely, for their continued commitment to
protecting and nurturing our province’s most at-risk children, youth and families. These skilled
individuals address the devastating results of poverty, addictions and violence and make
difficult, life-changing decisions every day. The Representative’s Office hears frequently from members of the public, service providers and MCFD staff that today’s hard economic times
are making this difficult work even more challenging and that much more must be done with
much less."
Given Turpel-Lafond's high praise (just quoted) I don't think she's slamming MCFD enough, seems how she seems to universally praise the "front line" workers and the "child protection" workers, and seems how, time and time and time again, we hear from parents - who I trust more than Turpel-Lafond, these "front line" workers and child protection workers do not deserve such praise, and in fact are the ones who really deserve to be slammed, just as much as whoever it is Turpel-Lafond is slamming.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to change my mind about Turpel-Lafond, but I keep finding reasons not to. She is kind of like the CBC - she appears to most to be a free thinking critic, protecting our rights, and really out there, etc., but she's actually, like CBC, part of the problem. And I say CBC is part of the problem because if you watch the kind of articles and pro-child protection contect they have on their website, you'll see that they aren't really helping parents as much as some would like to believe.
I know that Kathy Tomlinson has done her stories and what not, but for every story she has done, but CBC is essentially a socialist type organization, and believes in government intervention (after all, they are funded by gov't). I noticed that when the Bayne stories appeared on the website, at the same time the CBC had stories that were very pro-shaken baby syndrome.
If readers Google "shaken baby sydrome" and CBC, they'll see what sort of stories come up. CBC is not the free thinking anti-establishment gang it wants us to believe it is. They, just like MCFD, depend upon us, the taxpayers, for their cushy jobs.
ReplyDeleteAs a news organization, or as a news editor, it is incumbent upon you to appreciate the issues of the day. There is no way that the CBC does not know about the problems with MCFD, and there is not way that if they put the time and resources into it, they couldn't figure out - like so many have - what exactly the problem is. It isn't funding, it isn't lack of resources. So why do they keep up their non-reporting of the truth? You really have to wonder. I believe it is because the CBC is composed of people who have no interest in supporting causes unless they are politically correct. And supporting the fight against child protection corruption is about as unpolitically correct as it comes (that's why you have people like Doug Christie - who really is a free thinker - supporting it - and that's why the press just LOVES to make Doug Christie into some nazi supporter just because he supports freedom of speech).
ReplyDeleteAnon 9:13 PM
ReplyDeleteI suggest you read the Turpel-Lafond full report and then come back with a review on her. If you still think she hasn't hit hard enough and that she is part of the system you can say so. I believe that she is acting and speaking independent of the MCFD system as she is supposed to be doing. Show me that I am wrong.
I got to the part where she gives her wonderful praise of "front line" workers and child protection workers and I must admit I gave up. For someone to so universally and deeply praise these people who, time and again, have been the cause of so much misery, tells me she isn't being truthful.
ReplyDeleteAnon 6:40 Nov 30
ReplyDeleteOkay, I respect your opinion. Can you give me the page number in the report at which you gave up please?
While I was thrilled to see the arrival of Turpel-Lafond on the BC MCFD landscape, I am now very apprehensive after listening to some interviews on radio. The phrase, "early intervention" takes on real meaning after seeing a BBC interview with Tony Blair. You can find it on youtube under "Police State by Tony Blair." New language and new points of view are really only the same old ideas revisited from the days of Stalin, Hitler, Mao Tse Tung, Castro, etc etc The individual matters only in the context of the rulers idea of utopia.
ReplyDeleteIs it too late to wake up, Canada???
Bernice, I was about to question you about the advisability of throwing out all those names of tyrants because that is precisely the rhetorical device that turns me off and many other readers, but I did watch the Tony Blair youtube interview and I am shocked beyond words. I am glad he is gone, but he doesn't stand alone on these opinions does he?
ReplyDeleteThe UK is an absolute nightmare as far as child protection goes. But they are also on the leading edge in terms of fighting back against child protection tyranny.
ReplyDeleteOne politician, an MP, by the name of John Hemming, has been particularly vigilant in his fight against social services in the UK.
If anyone is interested in learning more about this, just google John Hemming and forced adoption.
Ron, I hear you!! we agree on the advisability of not using these kind of tyrants names as a way to gauge present social practise. However, I am shocked when I hear leaders of western nations speaking in terms such that my mind flashes to the book, I Cannot Forgive by Rudolph Vrbra.
ReplyDeleteLet me say that I am not a libertarian thinker but believe in accountability and dialogue. We always show our eventual need to be answerable to greater authority than each person doing what is right in his own eyes. There is One greater than all of us. Law is necessary.
I find it appauling that it took all this time, for the MCFD to be slammed, and that the government needs to take accountablity; for the corruption that exsists in the child welfare system! I belive that the MCFD has to be slameed harder than Turpel-Lafond has! I agree with that make the MCFD accountable! Lisa Arlin
ReplyDelete