INDEPENDENT REVIEW INTO THE MINISTRY OF CHILDREN

This blog and numerous other ones have been advocating for years for an objective but robust review of the Ministry of Children and Family Development with regard to case management, treatment of parents, investigation of complaints and concerns, response to children's best interests. Too many cases in the past are brought to light through private online sites or public journalistic articles and becomes sound bites that lose ground to next week's news. 

This time, a Supreme Court Justice's ruling has made such a spectacle of the Ministry's malfeasance in the case of a woman whose concerns about her husband's abuse of their children, was ignored by social workers, that Stephanie Cadieux, Minister of MCFD has been unable to assure the public that an objective outside review will do the job. Premier Christy Clark has needed to step forward to cover with promises of an independent review. The Ministry and the government do not Mary-Ellen Turpel Lafond, the Representative for Children and Youth, to do this, claiming she already has a position about this case and the Ministry. So, understandably, in partnership with the Child Welfare League of Canada (CWLC), the Ministry of Children and Family Development has asked Bob Plecas, a highly respected former deputy minister, to lead an independent review into matters arising from Judge Walker’s recent B.C. Supreme Court ruling.