GPS

THIS IS THE 227th DAY SINCE AYN WAS TAKEN

2012-01-28T10:09:00.001-08:00

That's long enough for any kind of assessment don't you think?
So, she wandered from home one day in June 2011. Has keeping her this long solved that problem?
Well, NO. She wandered off twice since she has been with the Ministry care. And furthermore, the last trip was naked down the street.
Finally it's enough. Yea, yea, yea, the social workers are merely trying to be responsible. Now it's time to actually do the right thing. She should be returned to her father. But you see, you can't do that easily because you placed this child into this bureaucratic isolation booth with selfish vested interests from which there is no immediate escape. And if you are going to say that a director made you do that, isn't also time for one or more of you to blow the whistle on something that is inherently wrong.

DEREK HOARE TALKING ABOUT HIS CASE CONFERENCE – Part 2 of 2

2012-01-28T00:00:00.000-08:00

In responding to Derek Hoare's synopsis of his Monday Case Conference, entitled ‘Derek’s Report about Case Conference,’ which is worth reading and was sent to his Facebook friends, I wrote a number of questions. Among them were the following. Derek's response follows each lead question.

I wrote, "The trial dates are indeed distant. Annoyance at MCFD over this is misdirected. Neither the Ministry nor its lawyers control the calendar. The court clerk’s calendar is full of prior scheduled cases. Our B.C. Court system is jam-packed with family related cases. The scheduling of a Hoare/Van Dyk case is dependent upon the availability of a judge, of the Ministry lawyer, of Derek’s lawyer, and of court room facilities. All of these individual schedules must find a harmonized meeting place."

Derek said, “Yes that is correct Ron it was not the ministry who sets the trial date, it is based on the availability of all parties (courts, MCFD, Lawyers, Amie and myself). In this case I believe those are the next available court dates.”

I wondered whether as upset as Derek and all of us were at the distant scheduling for the court case, it was still not sinking in that the outside date may not even be realistic. It could be longer. I wrote, "It is sensible for me to point out that the outside date of February 15th 2013 is not the conclusion of this ordeal. The judge will then take time to deliberate and research case law and render a decision in writing and that could be another three to six months (May or Aug 2013)."

Derek then said, “Ouch I had no idea that was true, I sorta hoped that it would be resolved that day or shortly thereafter. Also the process does continue after that point, because that hearing will be a CCO (continuing custody) hearing, I will still possess my parental rights which must be stripped in a later hearing called Termination I believe.”

I am well aware of the rationale that compels Derek to take the position of not visiting his little girl. He knows better than anyone what seeing her and leaving her would do to a child who doesn't process data well. But I wondered whether Derek might be changing his mind when he learned how long it would be that he would be without her. So I said to Derek, "Ayn will be eleven by the time of the trial and if you hold fast to your conviction about not seeing her, it will have been 1 ½ years since she has seen you. We have all learned your rationale. Many on this page have been sympathetic to that position. I wonder whether any readers now question the merit of not seeing one’s own daughter, of running the risk of creating for MCFD this commanding evidence of non compliance or if not that disinterest. MCFD lawyers could label non visitation anything they choose."

He listened and told us the following. “Hmmmm, well certainly when I made that decision I could never have dreamed it would be 1 1/2 years, I imagined like a week or two. However I believe my rationale withstands the time argument. As a side note I have provided MCFD with alternatives I would consider acceptable but have yet to get a response to them. Even now I cannot imagine that this will actually run all the way to Feb, possible but dubious.”

I said to Derek, "You sound resigned when you say that finally, with the trial dates set, you can see the end of the judicial process, the finish. Win or lose it will be the end, is the way you put it. Is that truly the way you are going forward with this Derek? Did you really want a trial so much that you are prepared for a verdict whether win or lose? Winning is getting her back. Losing is losing her. Is principle that important that you would forego mediation and rather go to trial? Is this what has happened? I am trying to understand."

Here was the way Derek spoke to that. “A good question Ron, actually when I wrote that I first put it as a near certainty that I will win, and then changed it, I do believe that if the justice systems works at all then I win hands down. I am nowhere even close to resignation (not really part of my vocab). And yes principle is that important, the reality is that if I now live in a country, if we now live in a country where this sort of thing can happen lawfully we are in a lot of trouble and ought to know it. I do believe I will win, and if I lose then I believe it becomes readily apparent at how distorted our legislation has become. As per the foregoing of "mediation", I think that requires further comment, I was willing to forego, formal mediation as I believe it is unlikely to garner any significant changes or dialog between the parties, which has not or could not be done in informal mediation. I have already spent dozens of hours in mediation with MCFD, and I think that formalizing it and trying to get a mediator caught up to speed on the cases intricacies will be very hard and render the venture likely pointless. I am more than happy to continue my informal dialog with MCFD though. And we must remember that there are 2 processes at work, the case conference and trial are simply portions of the judicial process; the ministerial process and dialog does not have to cease simply due to how far along in the judicial process we are. But I want the judicial process to complete ASAP as I believe I am right.”

I concluded with, "Then in your last paragraph you mention meeting the new social worker and learning where you go from here, that is between now and 2013. Can you explain for us what you mean by considerations of where you go and what you do next, as well as the host of possibilities to which you refer?”

Here was Derek’s response. “Well hmm, that would be a very long write-up so I’ll jot out a Cole's notes version. First off, because I have yet to meet with the new SW I still have no idea whether we will be picking up where I left off with the other worker. If we are simply continuing from where we left off this will transpire far differently then if we have to "restart", which by the way I would be very reluctant to do. There are many possibilities open to me at this time as per how to proceed: I can begin to push this far more in terms of the judiciary, oversight bodies, and complaint processes; this is something which we have avoided thus far in order to give the informal mediation a chance to work. If MCFD is going to scrap the dozens of hours put in so far, then I have little reason to believe that our meeting would ever be productive. There are the humans rights issues and tribunals, the ombudsman, emergency hearings and even a writ of Habeas Corpus. I am going to presumably focus even more on the media and getting the word out that this sort of thing can and is happening (including the waits and the baselessness of reason). Fundraising has likely jumped into the forefront as well, as I will be requiring experts and perhaps some really experienced legal advice ($$$). I also have to continue to advocate for Ayn and her treatment while in care, as well as their seeming inability to keep me in the loop with updates despite their assurances that they would do so. The list goes on; suffice to say there are a litany of things to work on and decisions to make.”

DEREK HOARE TALKING ABOUT HIS CASE CONFERENCE – Part 1 of 2

2012-01-27T00:00:00.002-08:00

Late Monday night following the difficult experience of the Case Conference, a meeting with representatives from the Ministry of Children, Derek took time to communicate to the over 4,000 online supporters who frequent the Facebook page known as Help Bring little Autistic girl back to her daddy. All day long people had sent best wishes and hopes for a good outcome.

Derek wrote, “Well I'm gonna put on a pot of coffee and get to reading here. But first I'll write up a brief synopsis. It was very emotional to say the least - did have to take a recess but at least now we know how long this can possibly go on for.”

Soon Derek sent us his report which I posted the next morning, Tuesday January 24th, entitled ‘Derek’s Report about Case Conference,’ which you can read here. If you have not read that report, it provides the backdrop to today's and tomorrow's pieces. Many page members responded to him on Facebook.

His report prompted numerous questions from me which I consolidated into one comment. The following day Derek graciously took time to answer these questions, one at a time which became very informative for us all but also offered opportunity for us to continue those conversational strings. I have provided the series of my lead questions and Derek’s responses.

I said to him, “Derek, I have read your comment and I have responses by your supporters. I am sure that none of us feel differently than we did with regard to our ardent desire to see Ayn come home to you. However, I believe a number of us may experience some confusion. I think many of us have questions arising from your report of the Case Conference proceedings and your principled position. I will place some of this before you and also make some comments. They are reasonable questions I think."

I believe we now understand that it was not the Ministry that abandoned mediation and moved toward a trial, but you Derek. You wanted the trial so that you can insure that the Ministry’s feeble reasons can be exposed and your positions on all features of this removal, disruption and confinement entered before a judge. Is that correct?

Derek responded this way. “Well that is sort of correct yes, the Ministry did not abandon the mediation, but neither did I. What happened was that there was a push to delay the setting of a trial date in order to first go through the mediation set for the 2nd of March. I did not want to leave that room without getting a trial date, in no way does mediation have to be cancelled in order for the trial date to be set and as far as I know it is still set. I did however say that if mediation was going to be an impediment to getting that date then I would simply cancel it as I am not optimistic about its success anyway. I think the most likely resolution will be found through our ongoing informal mediation, and not the formal mediation set for the 2nd.”

I put to Derek, "I suspect that you Derek, in wanting the trial did not foresee that the waiting time could be so far away - is that correct? If you had known, would that have changed what you said and did yesterday?"

Derek answered with this. “No I knew that I was looking at about a year away, and did make my choices with that knowledge in mind. It is my belief that once the ministry examines its case with an eye for an actual standard of evidence to meet, they will simply not show up. What they did is wrong and how they present my daughter and my family is skewed at best.”

More tomorrow.........

CASE CONFERENCING (What a Parent Needs to Know)

2012-01-26T00:00:00.000-08:00

CASE CONFERENCING (What a Parent Needs to Know) PART TWO
By Ray Ferris

Ray Ferris is a retired employee and administrator with the Ministry and is now a diligent critic of substandard case work and oversight and a proponent of change to Child Welfare and in particular Child Protection. He has written this two-part comment that speaks to Case Conferences and the article written on the same subject by PAPA INBC. On January 20, 2011 the contributor known as PAPA INBC or People Assisting Parents Association, wrote advice for parents who find themselves in Case Conference with Ministry of Children representatives. His piece was called A CASE CONFERENCE (What a Parent Needs to Know). Papa has also written two lengthy additional pieces of advice as comments on yesterday's GPS blog post by Ray Ferris.

Here is the final installment of this two-part post.

"Now I will try to give you one or two useful hints. You do not need to understand the whole act, but you should know certain sections that can be helpful to you and above all make sure that your lawyer reads those sections. You should read and memorize as much as possible of the following sections. Section 2, subsections 2,3 and 4. Guiding principles, service delivery principles and the best interests of the child. You can see right away that the ministry and the court are paying no attention to these sections and your lawyer should constantly be reminding the court of these sections.

"Read sections 66 and 68 and here is why. Section 66 (b) says that the hearing may be as informal as the judge may allow. This means that the judge can let you speak if she or he wishes. It does not have to be under oath, but can be a simple discussion. It is up to the judge. We used to do it years ago and it saved a lot of time and money. Section 68 deals with allowing hearsay evidence. It permits any hearsay evidence "that the court considers reliable." It is this loophole that allows the ministry to totally disregard the rules of evidence and bring in any opinion, rumour or scuttlebutt the it wishes. Not only that the courts admit it all . They now re-label it "anecdotal evidence." Unfortunately defence lawyers seem to accept it. However, it cuts both ways and a parent and defence witnesses can do the same thing. Section 68 (b) allows the court to accept any written reports it considers to be relevant. You cannot cross-examine a written report and the only way you can do it is to haul the author into court and grill them. This does not usually happen. By the same token you can file written reports under the same section. If you want to file dozens of letters of reference you can do so. Commendations from the autistic society, the school or your doctor this section allows it. They may not get read, but they can be filed. Of course the ministry will try to block it if they can."

"Finally a word about statements of fact. The term statement of fact is treated with great elasticity by the courts. When I was assisting Paul and Zabeth in their quest for more access, I tried hard to stick to the facts. I am pretty good at identifying facts and stating them in a clear fashion. One makes up a statement of facts and attaches it to a sworn affidavit to file with the court. I looked at one or two of the statements of fact filed by the ministry and I did this to make sure that I had the correct legal format to use as a template. Then I noticed a startling fact. There was not one single relevant fact in the whole two page document. It was all allegation, opinion and hearsay. Just like the rest of their evidence. Apparently the courts were oblivious to all this and allowed anything. So guess what? I quit worrying about the facts and did the same thing. Of course I did have a lot of facts to put in, including reminding the court of the guidelines in the act, which are a fact. But I did not mind if something was opinion etc. The court never questioned a thing. So my friends do not worry if your statements are not strictly factual. The court and the lawyers don't seem to care, so why should you?"

CASE CONFERENCING (What a Parent Needs to Know) PART ONE

2012-01-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

On January 20, 2011 the contributor known as PAPA INBC or People Assisting Parents Association, wrote some advice for parents who occasionally find themselves called to a meeting with Ministry of Children representatives - a meeting known as a Case Conference. His piece was called A CASE CONFERENCE (What a Parent Needs to Know). Papa prepared parents for an adversarial attitude by Ministry reps. Ray Ferris, a retired employee and administrator with the Ministry has in latter years become a critic of substandard case work and oversight and a proponent of change to Child Welfare and in particular Child Protection. He has written a two-part comment that speaks to Case Conferences and the article written on the same subject by PAPA INBC.

CASE CONFERENCING (What a Parent Needs to Know)
By Ray Ferris

When one reads the preparation advice for case conferencing that is recommended by PAPA INBC, it is hard to imagine that this is preparation for some negotiating meeting with a benevolent and helpful agency, which is supposed to find every means of keeping children at home wherever possible. It is hard to imagine it will be a dialogue with an agency that is charged with looking after the best interests of children and with giving parents every help possible. No indeed, it is more like a preparation for a war, or some other violent contest.

Instead it is like two people preparing to fight a duel. One is not there to discuss a peaceful solution. One is there to discuss the choice of weapons, the venue, the seconds and the furnishing of a surgeon. If it is preparation for a war, often it is not like discussing an armistice, or an avoidance of conflict. With the Ministry of Children it is more like discussing the terms of surrender rather than truce.

The advice of PAPA INBC seems to be very confrontational and mistrusting. Come in full armor and never let your guard down. This begs the question as to whether parents are justified in taking such an extreme position. I think that the answer to this has to be that in many cases it is justifiable. It does not matter whether it is true in most cases, or in just a few. An organization like MCFD which tolerates even a few cases like that of Ayn Van Dyk and other recent cases simply cannot be trusted. One can never let ones guard down, because you don't know until you get there how aggressive the Ministry is going to be. One should of course hope for the best, but always prepare for the worst. Many people might think that Youth and Child Representative, Mary-Ellen Turpel-Lafond has been too confrontational in dealing with MCFD. But what choice has she had?

Having said that, I have to say that much of the advice of PAPA INBC is not going to do you any good. He said that you should take a copy of the CFCSAct with you to the meeting. If so, have you read it and do you truly understand it? Even if you have, there is no guarantee that any of the social workers, or even the lawyers present have read the Act. Even the judge may not have refreshed himself/herself on it for years. It certainly seemed that Chief provincial Judge Thomas Crabtree did not know very important sections of the Act when he made an illegal order in the Bayne case. Even if the lawyer and the judge know the Act well, you have to remember that most judges will go with the establishment if they possibly can. It saves them a lot of bother. So they are quite capable of cherry-picking the Act to use only the bits and pieces that suit them. They are also quite capable of cherry-picking the evidence to find ways and means of supporting the Ministry (MCFD) if they can. And of course ministry lawyers can cherry pick everything and ignore the rules of evidence, secure in the knowledge that the bench will be supportive of anything feasible.

So take the Act to the meeting if you wish but don't think for a moment that anyone is going to let you quote from it. Everything is stacked against you and your only hope is to have the kind of top drawer lawyer that you cannot afford anyway. PAPA INBC made a comment something like. "if you are allowed to speak to the court." Now why on earth should you not be allowed to speak to the court. Your lawyer speaks for you and if you have no lawyer, you have no choice but to speak for yourself. Actually it is sometimes an advantage to have no lawyer, because judges are sometimes more sympathetic to an unrepresented person and will allow them more informality. More informality? Oh how terribly formal and stifled in process the family courts have become. The legal profession will tell you that it is the only way to preserve the purity of the process, the pursuit of truth and a just outcome. This may well be the truth --- if you manage to live long enough to benefit from any result. No, the real truth is that for at least 200 years the long drawn out processes generate the most revenue for those in the profession.( Read Bleak House by Charles Dickens.)

Tomorrow – Part Two Case Conference

DEREK'S REPORT ABOUT CASE CONFERENCE

2012-01-24T08:02:00.000-08:00

This morning Derek Hoare wrote his initial account of the Case Conference held yesterday to determine the future of his daughter Ayn, a ten year old girl who has a condition known as Autism. She has been in the custody of the Ministry of Children and Family Development since June 16, 2011. Derek and Ayn's mother Amie long to have her returned to them. She was removed following an incident in which she wandered from home for three hours until she was located by police.

"We arrived early for the case conference which was set to begin at 10:45. It started a bit late, likely closer to 11.

The meeting is in an informal setting at a round table where all parties are to discuss the situation as it stands, what the hang ups are and how we can move forward from here. Time is very short so all points are made in extreme brevity. I tried my best to outline some of my frustrations and concerns.

I did not walk away with any greater understanding of MCFD's position, though they were questioned about it many times. My understanding of the "conference" before entering was that it was my chance to finally get the judicial process to the point where I can argue my position before an unbiased judge. In that, it was successful.

There was a lot of pressure to put off the trial and wait until after mediation. However, I was adamant that I wanted that (trial) opportunity. It was very emotional for me, I cried several times, and tried to get them to see the harm they were doing to a beautiful girl and her loving family. My lawyer requested a brief recess towards the end to try to reduce my emotions.

Upon my return I did get them to agree to a trial. With that we set off to the court clerk to find some available dates.... well my lawyer did. I went outside where my emotions again poured out rather embarrassingly. A group member did happen to pop in and was right there to let me cry on their shoulder. I then went in to sign off that I had received my dates (yet another pink slip); but this one was different it was the finish line, win or lose it will be the end.

So here they are: Oct 23rd- pretrial, Dec 7th- Trial begins, Jan 30th 2013 second trial date, Jan 31st third, Feb 1st fourth, Feb 14th fifth, and finally Feb 15th completion (this could elongate mind you).

So now finally we can see the end of the judicial process, a year away but we can see it. This does not mean that the ministerial process is over but that the oversight of the courts has reached its point where a trial is set to determine the justifiability of this. I am meeting with the new SW on Wed, where I do hope to discern where this process is headed from here in terms of the ministry, I hope to continue where it had left off but as of yet I am still in limbo. I do know that the Ministry is going to begin drafting a counter proposal to offer me, but I have to wait weeks longer for that to be completed. It is "hoped" that it could be done by Feb 24th, a week prior to my Formal mediation which is scheduled for Mar 2 I believe. So Tonight I ponder what to do and where to go from here. Lots of possibilities lie before me and I am sorting through it all. Will be posting more and am hopeful that I'll get lots of input and advice from everyone."

THIS IS A VERY SAD DAY

2012-01-23T23:18:00.001-08:00

Today Ayn’s parents, Derek and Amie attended the long anticipated Case Conference.
They and all of their family’s supporters, now numbering in the thousands, were hoping that MCFD would come to this Conference with the intention of at the very least, a graduated return of Ayn to her family and home.

That is not what happened.
When the day began, Derek spread this early morning word. “Well I have been waiting what seems like an eternity for this day. The case conference is set to begin at 10:45, I don't feel nervous or worried, rather eerily calm and an odd optimism. I think this will likely be as anticlimactic as the rest of the judicial process has thus far been. I am hopeful that a trial date will finally be set and that we will learn how much sand is really in this hourglass. As I understand it is not a long meeting, generally around an hour, though in my case it may run a little long.”

Derek will soon tell us his own thoughts about the day. I will share Renée Allard’s comments which were posted for the Facebook audience with Derek’s permission. She attended the location of the Case Conference and learned what transpired. We don’t have all of the details but enough to sadden a family and their supporting army. “I went to the court today, I had no thought of going but something in me persisted to tell me that I was needed for support. I got there and Derek saw me pretty much right away. He knew I was out there pulling for him, for Amie and for their little girl! At one point during the hearing Derek came storming out of the room, and looked devastated and to be in tears. I rushed to his side immediately. He was very emotional, and sure of his steadfast case, and his feelings. Today I have witnessed one of the hardest days for Derek’s emotion. Needless to say he went back in, determined that his daughter needs to be returned. In my presence his lawyer openly told Derek that this would not go to trial and yet within 5 or so minutes the decision was set in motion. This case will be taken to trial sometime in December 2012 for 6 days of trial, and not on consecutive dates either...running until February 2013. Give them lots of room to respond as today was very emotional. Tears everywhere. I am so appalled at MCFD. It is gut wrenching!”

IMAGINE WHAT IT'S LIKE TO BE ME

2012-01-23T00:00:00.000-08:00

American Idol is back. I am amazed at how many tens of thousands of people believe they have singing voices that others want to hear. I will watch 'Idol' again, but I must say that Christine and I enjoyed another import from Simon Cowell's creative British successes. X Factor went on for months and finished just a few weeks ago. Permit me to introduce you to one contestant whose voice is worth hearing, made even more compelling because of his personal message.

Scott James is Autistic and after reaching the final 50 of X-Factor he has recorded this Autism single. It was released on April 2nd 2011, coincident with Autism Awareness Day. All funds from its sale are donated to Autism Awareness UK. Have you ever wondered what it is like to have Autism? If you wish to have a brief musical treat as well as peak into an autistic spirit, please listen.

Then, for a moment consider Ayn Van Dyk who is ten years of age, not nearly as proficient at language or music as Scott and yet she too wishes that people, particularly the social workers directly involved with her case, would be able to understand what she experiences each day because that would most certainly inform them that she needs to be with her family in order to survive.

On Monday, January 23rd, her father is attending a Case Conference at which he will learn how prepared the Ministry of Children is to returning Ayn to her daddy. She didn't mean to do anything wrong. She just walked away from home. Her daddy didn't think he was doing anything wrong when he called the police to ask for assistance in helping to find her.

When you see Scott now, on stage and singing in front of a crowd, you may question his so-called autism. Scott's disorder is known as Asperger. Asperger syndrome is often considered a high functioning form of autism. People with this syndrome have difficulty interacting socially, repeat behaviors, and often are clumsy. Motor milestones may be delayed. People with Asperger do not withdraw from the world in the way that people with autism withdraw. They will often approach other people. However, their problems with speech and language in a social setting often lead to isolation. With treatment, many children and their families can learn to cope with the problems of Asperger syndrome. Social interaction and personal relationships may still be problems. However, many adults work successfully in mainstream jobs and are able to have an independent life, if they have the right kind of support available. Scott had the disorder earlier but was diagnosed when he was 13 years old and could not leave his home for seven years. He was 21 when he sang on X-Factor. A vocal coach assisted him to develop his natural singing ability into the instrument that you hear.

The online site at which to access this and other autism resource videos
Scott's audition in Manchester UK which pushed him to the next round. "You Raise Me Up."
Scott's Website

PARENTAL LIBERTY (Part Two)

2012-01-22T00:00:00.000-08:00

Preserving Family Autonomy

Is it important to you to protect family autonomy?

We live within a society that if not politically polarized is ideologically uninformed and confused. Some opinions express satisfaction at increased government control. Others, equally adamant, are horrified at the infringement upon family autonomy. Only two political parties are represented in the current Legislative Assembly of B.C., the British Columbia Liberal Party and the British Columbia New Democratic Party. There are several other parties that will nominate candidates, one of which, the British Columbia Conservative Party may be able to win seats in the next election. If your affiliation is with one these directions, do you understand to what degree your party of choice values family, family autonomy and parental rights with regard to children’s education and other aspects of child rearing? Do you know how important is parental choice with regard to tax-funded educational curriculum in your party of choice?

The party in power will make a difference. It is certain that family autonomy cannot be taken for granted.

The compromise of the value of family autonomy becomes apparent with the sweep of the Child, Family and Community Services Act which endows the Ministry of Children and Family Development with legislated muscle that cannot be challenged. Rescuing children from instantly recognizable abuse, neglect, abandonment, hunger or poverty without the impediment of time consuming court orders I understand. It is with cases which are not unmistakable or evidence-based that increasingly we take issue.

This blog focused two years of daily entries on one family whose ‘family life’ was dissected for FOUR years when a Ministry of Children and Family Development office based in Hope BC, removed the three children from the Bayne family. Yes there was suspicion of abuse, of physical injury to the youngest child which required investigation. Over the course of time, that office of MCFD social workers and supervisors and the regional director made it palpably clear that it was incapable of bringing this to a reasonable conclusion. Allegation, accusation, suspicion, intimidation were tools used during the four years but never mediation, conciliation, or negotiation. Instead, if Zabeth and Paul Bayne were ever to have their children returned to them, the condition was unambiguous. They must admit responsibility for harming the child. This couple maintained their innocence for four long years while displaying unimpeachable character and unwavering resolve to regain custody of their children. MCFD personnel paid no attention to the thousands of character reference sent on the parents’ behalf. MCFD resolutely relied on one doctor’s diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome and made no effort to inquire whether other medical explanations might account for the child’s injuries. It was left to the parents themselves to make this province aware that SBS was at best still a theory and was being contested universally as the definitive explanation for a triad of signs. They brought to their hearing the opinions of a dozen medical professionals whose testimonies took issue with the original diagnosis. It took a court case and a judge to finally declare that the MCFD had taken too long and the course of action sought, a Continuing Care Order leading in all probability to adoption, was unsuitable.

Now we have Derek Hoare, whose daughter Ayn has been for over seven months in foster care. His case appears to me to be an even more blatant violation of parental rights and an assault on one family’s autonomy. This case is simple enough. There is no abuse or neglect, negligence or anger issues to investigate or to discuss. This is the case of an autistic ten year old, who at age nine wandered from her home and required the Royal Mounted Police to locate her – not too far away at a neighbour’s home. Was it upsetting? Of course, Derek called the police for help when his frantic initial attempts proved futile. But we don’t remove everyone’s child when the child takes a leave of absence. Of course in this case there is the additional challenge of her erratic behaviour in school. She has been difficult there. Still no reason to remove her. Oh, but perhaps if Derek looked into appropriate drugs to subdue her, that could make it easier for teaching staff. Autonomy anyone? He handled Ayn with words, grace-filled words. Which do you think is in her best interests?

PARENTAL LIBERTY (Part One)

2012-01-21T07:23:00.000-08:00

Dispute About Government and Parental Roles

simply an image of a dispaasionate agency leading a child away from family

History tells the story. Historically there has been a vigorous dispute about the relationship between government and the family and certainly with the function and responsibilities assigned to each. Contingent upon the political philosophy, either the family has been seen as servant to the state or the state has been expected to provide for families the required security to accomplish their work as primary caregivers to these citizens of the future.

Tension always exists between the state and its parts. Government institutions should be obliged to be careful to facilitate the function of the family without usurping its proper role. Of course federal and provincial governments have a role to play to ensure children are not threatened by poverty, neglect or abuse but the state must be careful not to trample on the independence of the family. Theoretically the government exists to aid and assist the smaller units rather than to take over their places in a society.

In British Columbia, and by all reports, in other provinces and territories of Canada as well, it is time to restart this discussion about the proper role of the family in a free and democratic society. The case of Ayn Van Dyk, a ten-year old autistic girl underscores this dramatically. Now for seven months she has been in provincial care, accommodated in a foster home with decisions about her welfare made entirely without consultation with her parents and solely by social workers. Ayn has two brothers, one of whom is also autistic and both of these children are in the secure and responsible care of their father. Her father, Derek Hoare, is a stay-at-home dad, intelligent, articulate, and informed about autism and deeply in love with his children. Their mother is also a caring parent, and she although divorced from Derek, has an amicable and trusting relationship with her ex-husband. Ayn was removed seven months ago on June 16, 2011 four days after she wandered from her back yard by scaling a fence. Social workers showed up at Derek’s home requesting that he sign a voluntary release document to which he understandably vehemently objected. That I presume represents an uncooperative attitude. At no time has there been any suggestion that Ayn was neglected or abused by Derek. There is every indication and evidence to believe that Derek’s home and custody is the very best place for Ayn and it is in her best interests to be at home.

We have sanctioned through legislation that an institution of the government, the Ministry of Children and Family Development, may have the authority to remove any child at any time and only after the fact acquire a court order to legalize that action. Because we laudably want to protect innocent children from real abuse and neglect we have vested in an institution a value that is increasingly undeserved because the institution itself is guilty of abuse and disregard for parents whose families MCFD has misguidedly divided.

You may surmise, there must be more to Ayn's and Derek's story. There must be more presenting reasons for her removal than merely that daytime wander. But you cannot know that because Derek himself, the father of the child, has not received that disclosure from the MCFD. He has requested to know. We would all maintain that he has a right to know. Yet within the system that we have created, the institution's employees do not need to see this as a priority. Rather, they can remain non communicative until meetings and case conferences months apart.

Derek is scheduled to have a Case Conference on Monday January 23rd, 2012. He has waited for a couple of months for this. He prepared a detailed Plan of Care for Ayn to which the MCFD will positively respond. We hope for the best for the family.

I suggest some interesting reading at Parental Rights (American website)

A CASE CONFERENCE (What a Parent Needs to Know)

2012-01-20T03:16:00.000-08:00

A CASE CONFERENCE (What a Parent Needs to Know)

Written by PAPA INBC (People Assisting Parents Association) http://www.pa-pa.ca/

Items To Bring

Case Conference brief for judge to read, include 1-page timeline, nor more that 2 pages of facts, emphasize poor timeline and CFCSA guidelines) one page of your statement of defence, finally what you are asking for (include the obvious, return of Ayn, but failing that, ask for # of court days, the court date to be established TODAY, witness list count, etc.)
The Case Conference brief is an important document, it sets the stage for the conference and provides MCFD a record of your position. Make sure it is retained on your MCFD file so a Freedom of Information Request supplies it.
Copy of the Order of Interim custody (get from court clerk if needed)
Copy of CFCSA (Lawyers should bring current edition of CLE's Family Law including CFCSA)
All clerk notes from first appearance, two presentation hearing dates and any other - you can get these from the counter if you don't already have a copy. Free.
Timeline document for your reference, medical, legal, MCFD meeting record
List of questions to be asked
List of statements to make that you don't expect answers to
Bring portfolio case that contains key documents with lined paper, sticky pads, 2 pens / pencils, audio recorder / iPod
Be prepared to write private messages of instructions to your lawyer during proceedings in case you cannot speak and have to instruct him.
Copy of affidavit and response, Form 1, Form A, any MCFD disclosures

Pre-Meeting
Derek/Amie lawyers strike up conversation with MCFD lawyer, try to get position on return, and mention the no-supervision return offer, and get a reaction from her.

Inside Case Conference Room

First 15 minutes is when you find out if MCFD is there merely to pass time or whether they intend to participate in good faith.
Judge describes function of the 1-hour Case Conference, his powers and limitations in this setting.
Take notes (preferably audio record) of MCFD lawyer summarizing the case for judge. Ask for copy of their case brief. Note times you asked these questions.
Note their facial expressions, impressions (bored, attentive, staring off into space, nervous, aggressive etc.)
Note your response including feelings, impressions, apprehensions and the fact / event that goes along with it.
Dad/mom's lawyers give their version of the overview of the case to judge (otherwise he reads just Form1/A); try to get a read on his opinion of the matter. If lawyer sticks to the presentation form
Get judges' name and research after return home (in case you run across him again)
Write down time at each key point of discussion.
When this quarter ends you should know if MCFD intends to bargain and mediate or they won't budge.

This write-up assumes MCFD won’t budge, so it is time to get information and prepare for the next stage, the protection hearing.

For the next 20-30 minutes the parents know MCFD will not deal, so lay out information to force MCFD to defend their actions, but because they believe these proceedings are not transcribed, the answers are likely off-the cuff and may be different than what is given in open court later. Answers from MCFD that differ over time and location can later be used during the protection hearing to gain an advantage.

For The Last Bit Of Time, Make Sure You Have The Following Information

Witness count and names (MCFD may force a high number to maximize trial length time, so get the names to pull their bluff)
Days required for trial (try to get 3 days, limit to 5 days)
Court date (likely not obtainable during Case Conference)
Pretrial date (or date to acquire this time)
Date that the seized judge will be appointed

The key thing to remember is that things rarely go to plan, and there will be something unexpected that will happen.

JANUARY 23 IS AN IMPORTANT DAY FOR AYN & DEREK

2012-01-19T08:23:00.000-08:00

Ayn has such a great smile!

Ayn Van Dyk has a wonderful smile. She smiles for her daddy. She should be at home with him but she is not.

You may be shocked to learn that she has not been in that family home since June 16, 2011.

She is a girl with a condition known as Autism.

Autism is a disorder of neural development characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior. These signs all begin before a child is three years old. Autism affects information processing in the brain by altering how nerve cells and their synapses connect and organize. It is one of three recognized disorders in the autism spectrum (ASDs), the other two being Asperger Syndrome, which lacks delays in cognitive development and language, and Pervasive Development Disorder - Not Otherwise Specified (commonly abbreviated as PDD-NOS), which is diagnosed when the full set of criteria for autism or Asperger syndrome are not met.

It is unfortunate that she has it because it causes her to behave in ways that are deemed abnormal but not in ways that should ever be considered criminal. While the social workers associated with her present case have not classified her as criminal, their treatment of her over the past seven months is criminal. Perhaps not in the technical or legal sense because they are fully justified by law and ACT for what they have done, yet in terms of the human spirit and plain common sense, her removal and continued incarceration is wrong.

She was not a risk to anyone or to herself. Her father is certainly not a risk to her or her siblings brothers, one of whom is also autistic. It is a functional and good family with challenges. She is difficult to manage at times at her school. Sometimes her father has to be called so he can calm her with his words. She has a typical autistic tendency to wander from the place that she should be. That's what she did on June 12th, 2011. Four days later in spite of her father's angry protests, she was gone from him. Only those of you who have experienced this, can appreciate our grievous is this pain and associated emotions and thoughts. Derek, her dad, somehow missed seeing her climb over the family yard fence on that day. Common sense would tell a person, that is not uncommon. He was not ignoring her, neglecting her. He was not absent from her. She was playing in a playhouse on stilts. She was occupied and he was happy about that. It would have been easy to miss seeing her move from the playhouse to the fence top. Derek did.

The Ministry of Children removed her and began to medicate her. If she is more manageable at school now, is it because she is medicated? Perhaps. Is that a good thing? Derek didn't want her plied with anti-psychotics. He did not want to experiment with her when his fatherly kindness and soft words could accomplish the same ends.

On Monday January 23, Derek has an important Case Conference with social workers when it will become clearer how soon and with what kind of plan for Ayn's care, she will be returned to him. That is certainly what Derek and Ayn's mother Amie hope for. That's what over 4000 fellow advocates for her return are hoping for as well. It is an Important Day.

REMEMBERING AYN'S BIRTHDAY

2012-01-18T00:00:00.000-08:00

On the 14th of December Derek Hoare headed for the location where his daughter was being held. It was her birthday and he had not seen her since June 16, 2011 when she was removed from him by the Ministry of Children and Family Development. He was here to deliver a large bouquet of balloons with her name on them. He didn't see her that day although he desperately wanted to see her, but he had made the decision that he could not break her heart by turning around and leaving her there. She doesn't understand you see. He has always been her saviour, her champion, her ever present help. Now she has been taken from him and if he didn't rescue her now, how would she perceive that? Would she be overwhelmed? Quite possibly. She is autistic. MCFD knew that. Quite possibly MCFD social workers don't understand autism. Furthermore, just as they did not understand the Baynes' determination and strength of character they will have misjudged Derek Hoare.

Derek texted, "Off I go"

"Waiting for the supervisor to come down and meet me"

Well a month has passed since then. That's right. Christmas was celebrated without her in Derek's home with his other two children. That was very hard for Derek. The Ministry chose not to give her back. You see, she is after all, merely a case file. Social workers cannot allow themselves to become so emotionally involved. Is that the theory? There is process and protocol and the girl and the family must wait for that. Of course, all of this could be dispensed with in an instant if a social worker wanted to do what was actually right in this case. This girl should not still be in the care of the ministry.

On this occasion Derek took joy in leaving these balloons for Ayn so she would know that he loves her.

"no subtle way to drop off 3 dozen balloons... especially when the pot lights keep popping them!" Derek wrote

Near the end of January Derek will have a Case Conference with social workers that will hopefully provide a plan to return Ayn to him. He waits for that. We all wait with him.

DIAGNOSIS MURDER

2012-01-15T06:39:00.000-08:00

DIAGNOSIS MURDER
The entire 45 minute CBC broadcast is available online at this CBC link.

If you missed the Friday telecast be sure to see it now. The subject is controversial and the feedback to the program is similarly debatable. The CBC website provides numerous helpful sidelinks for selected related subjects.
USA Viewers - Unfortunately, a CBC note on the screen tells me, "Note: This video is only available to view online by Canadian audiences due to rights issues."

Watch Full Episode (45:14)
CBC News: Gillian Findlay discusses shaken baby syndrome (5:12)
Extended Interview: Keith Findley (18:44)
Interview: Waney Squier (7:40)
Interview: Dr. John Plunkett (7:43)
A History of Shaken Baby Syndrome
Related Link: "Shaken-Baby Syndrome Faces New Questions in Court"
(The New York Times)
For people living outside of Canada, Diagnosis Murder is posted online at http://vimeo.com/35041114

You will be asked for a password -------- use this, shakenbabydiagnosis

CONGRATS FIFTH ESTATE - WELL DONE SBS DOCUMENTARY

2012-01-14T06:17:00.000-08:00

I waited, I watched, I am Pleased

You should check this link to see when the show is repeated. It will also be archived at the CBC TV site. (Repeat airtimes)

DIAGNOSIS MURDER

This long awaited documentary was better than I had hoped! This has been the most significant public awareness vehicle to date, to alert Canada to the possibilities of unjust allegations and convictions with regard to Shaken Baby Syndrome.

The Fifth Estate investigative team, the production crew, and Gillian Findlay are a class act. They researched both sides of this controversial issue and they allowed both sides to speak. Yet it was clear enough on which side of the diagnostic/judicial conundrum Fifth Estate stood.

Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS) is a medical diagnosis based on the presence of a diagnostic triad: (1) retinal bleeding, (2) bleeding in the protective layer of the brain, and (3) brain swelling. During the past twenty years this has been the preferred diagnosis. It was formulaic. These injuries in a child were considered conclusive evidence of a shaken baby. Every shaken baby has a shaker. A shaker has committed a criminal offence punishable upon conviction. But WAIT!

In Toronto, one of Jeffrey Smith’s twin daughters, born very prematurely and struggling to live in their early months, died while in his sole care one day eighteen years ago. He went to prison after being tried for murder but sentenced for manslaughter. This was one of two heart-wrenching stories featured last night. Recently he was exonerated.That little girl died of natural causes. Jeff's life has changed forever. His other daughter is eighteen years of age now and he has never seen her. She was raised by her mom who although she was not present when the little girl died, was convinced by the police that the father was responsible. She did not appear on air.

Zabeth and Paul Bayne of Surrey, BC, had charges dropped in 2007 but their three children were removed from them because of suspicion that one of them had injured their youngest child. She did not die. She was gravely ill for a long while. She too had been born with some prematurity but in a household accident at seven weeks of age she had also been struck by a sibling as he fell on her while running. That explanation did not wash with authorities, both law enforcement and medical. A pediatrician diagnosed her as a ‘Shaken Baby.’ RCMP dropped initial charges due to insufficient evidence but the Ministry of Children understandably continued to consider the parents a risk. Not understandable was the Ministry’s unwillingness to ask for a second opinion - a disinclination to entertain the possibility there may be another explanation for her injuries. It took four (4) years and everything that this determined couple could give in order to win a verdict that they were not responsible for the child’s injuries and to have their children returned to them this past year, four years after the saga began.

Fifth Estate considerately, wisely held off the broadcast of this show until the Bayne family was no longer under the review period assigned for the first three months that the children were back with their parents. The Baynes were not vindictive in the interview. They plainly expressed how the ordeal had affected them personally and how helpless they had been within a child protection system that assumes guilt until proven innocent. Last night’s show may become a resource to prevent other innocent and grieving parents from being presumed guilty.

THE FIFTH ESTATE SHAKEN BABY FEATURE TONIGHT

2012-01-13T09:40:00.000-08:00

When to Watch

Tonight,Friday at 9 p.m. JAN 13

9:30 p.m. in Newfoundland & Labrador (Repeatairtimes)

DIAGNOSIS MURDER

For decades, the diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome virtuallyguaranteed convictions, shattering the lives of thousands of parents, babysittersand families. Now new evidence questions whether the syndrome even exists, andwhether some have been wrongfully convicted.

In a promotional video of aninterview this subject is discussed for five minutes – good introduction. Pauland Zabeth Bayne are interviewed.

CBC News: 'Shaken BabySyndrome?'

ReporterGillian Findlay sits down with CBC News Network's Heather Hiscox. In theinterview, they discuss research that suggests that the widely accepted shakenbaby syndrome may actually be a physical impossibility. http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/2011-2012/diagnosismurder/news.html

If you are not in Canada and cannot tune in tonight, the video will be archived online for viewing around the world. And the link will be placed at this blog site.

Gillian Findlay hosts and reports for CBC Television's investigative program, the fifth estate, and she is the principal reporter tonight with video and interviews that have been researched and assembled for many months for tonight awaited feature. Here is her bio. Her colleagues are

Bob McKeownand LindenMacIntyre

I AM CERTAIN THAT IT IS MERELY COINCIDENCE THAT THIS BROADCAST AIRS ON FRIDAY THE 13TH, ON ONE OF THE DARKEST STORIES OF OUR SOCIETY, WRONGLY ACCCUSED PARENTS AND CAREGIVERS.

Diagnosis Murder

SCRIPT TAKEN DIRECTLY FROM THE CBC FIFTH ESTATE SITE.

"It's a scenario as horrifying as it is heartbreaking: a frustrated parent ... a baby that just won't stop crying ... and suddenly, what were tender, cradling arms become instruments of death. At least this is how Shaken Baby Syndrome has been characterized in countless court cases in recent years. But what are the scientific foundations of this diagnosis?

Gillian Findlay examines the conventional wisdom around Shaken Baby Syndrome, discovering that those who question it often feel targeted by those who believe passionately in it. And yet new science suggests the so-called syndrome may be a physical impossibility.

"Diagnosis Murder" tells the story of several Canadian parents who say they were wrongfully accused--and the leading-edge medical researchers who believe they're telling the truth. The stakes are high: Some have gone to jail. All have had their other children taken away from them.

One couple recently had their children returned after a four-year battle. Even though the courts in B.C. cleared Zabeth and Paul Baynes of charges they had shaken their baby, the couple feel they will carry the stigma for life. Another man in Ontario has now had his case put up for judicial review, giving him hope that his name may too be cleared.

Is Shaken Baby Syndrome conclusive evidence of murder? Or is it a scientific hypothesis that has convicted an untold number of parents as killers -- when their children actually died from other causes?"

THE PRICE OF CHILDREN

2012-01-12T00:00:00.000-08:00

Derek Hoare knows the value of his children. You should hear him speak about them. Two of his three children, because they are autistic, require a great deal more attention and understanding than do many children . In fact, they are severely autistic, but they are each differently affected or they demonstrate differently. His son Lyric, who is still in Derek’s custody, is non verbal, happy and easy to live with. Ayn is vocal and articulate, can understand you and can speak but cannot carry on a conversation per se. She is easily upset and highly emotional and has a history of wild and erratic conduct, tearing her clothes, breaking objects, attacking people. She requires calming which Derek has administered through conversation. Ayn's school regularly calls Derek for this purpose. Well, Ayn is no longer with him. That’s because the Ministry of Children in British Columbia made the presumptuous judgement that his parenting load was too burdensome for him, so when she walked from her home last July, the ministry took her away. Of course such action would also have been predicated on one or more people telling MCFD to take a look at this child. The story is disgusting. We are telling it frequently because while the child was taken to place her in another environment for observation and testing and chemical subduction, no effort was given to examining Derek and his home and the provisions for Ayn's care and the effectiveness of that care.

However, today I will share someone else’s effort to communicate the incredible cost of raising any child and what you get for the price. It's a 5 min visual. Press the 'Read More 'and you get the transcript.

The Price of Children Uploaded by tommyswindowshows on Mar 30, 2011
Adapted from an article by Regina Brett – columnist for the Plain Dealer. “$160, 140 per child a great bargain” May 07, 2000
Updates from ‘The cost of raising a child: $221,000 through age 17’ by Betsy Taylor, Associated Press, August 5, 2009

Here is the transcript to the video. The Price of Children
The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a middle-income family.
Talk about sticker shock. That doesn't even touch college tuition.
For those with kids, that figure leads to wild fantasies about all the things we could have bought, all the places we could have traveled, all the money we could have banked if not for (insert child's name here).
For others, that number might confirm the decision to remain childless.
But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down. It translates into $8,896.66 a year, $741.38 a month or $171.08 a week.
That's a mere $24.44 a day. Just over a dollar an hour.
Still, you might think the best financial advice says don't have children if you want to be rich. It's just the opposite.

There's no way to put a price tag on:
Feeling a new life move for the first time and seeing the bump of a knee rippling across your skin.
Having someone cry, "It's a boy!" or shout, "It's a girl!" then hearing the baby wail and knowing all that matters is it's healthy.
Counting all 10 fingers and toes for the first time.
Feeling the warmth of fat cheeks against your breast.
Cupping an entire head in the palm of your hand.
Making out da da or ma ma from all the cooing and gurgling.

What do you get for your $160,140?
Naming rights. First, middle and last.
Glimpses of God every day.
Giggles under the covers every night.
More love than your heart can hold.
Butterfly kisses and Velcro hugs.
Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds and warm cookies.
A hand to hold, usually covered with jam.
A partner for blowing bubbles, flying kites, building sand castles and skipping down the sidewalk in the pouring rain. Someone to laugh yourself silly with no matter what the boss said or how your stocks performed that day.

For $160,140, you never have to grow up.
You get to finger-paint, carve pumpkins, play hide-and-seek, catch lightning bugs and never stop believing in Santa Claus.
You have an excuse to keep reading the adventures of Piglet and Pooh, watching Saturday morning cartoons, going to Disney movies and wishing on stars.
You get to frame rainbows, hearts and flowers under refrigerator magnets and collect spray-painted noodle wreaths for Christmas, handprints set in clay for Mother's Day and cards with backward letters for Father's Day.

For $160,140, there's no greater bang for your buck.
You get to be a hero just for retrieving a Frisbee off the garage roof, taking the training wheels off the bike, removing a sliver, filling the wading pool, coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs and coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated to ice cream regardless.
You get a front-row seat to history to witness the first step, first word, first bra, first date, first time behind the wheel.
You get to be immortal. You get another branch added to your family tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called grandchildren.
You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications and human sexuality no college can match.
In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there with God. You have the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever and love them without limits, so one day they will, like you, love without counting the cost.

That’s quite a deal for the price!!!
Love and enjoy your children, grandchildren and great grandchildren!
It’s the best investment you’ll ever make.

AUTISM FUNDING FOR BRITISH COLUMBIA

2012-01-10T00:00:00.000-08:00

AUTISM FUNDING (A Resource for Parents)
By Dr. Ron Unruh

This synopsis of government funding for families of an autistic child is specific to British Columbia with some occasional links to other Canadian provinces for follow-up by readers.

1. There is Autism Funding in British Columbia. The Ministry of Children and Family Development provides two funding programs, one for children under 6 years of age and another for children 6-18. These programs provide the means by which children may benefit from intervention to facilitate communication, social and emotional development as well as functional and academic skill development. The Funding is available in all regions of B.C. and is intended to assist parents to purchase the intervention services most suitable to their child, providing families maximum choice and flexibility.

2. If your child has received an ASD diagnosis, a parent may apply and enroll in the Autism Funding Program by contacting a local office of the Ministry of Children and Family Development to complete the funding agreement. Here is the MCFD page for regional office contact numbers.

3. For a child under the age of 6 (six), the funding must be used for those autism intervention services deemed to be eligible, such as behaviour consultants, speech-language pathologists, occupational therapists and physiotherapists who are listed on the Registry of Autism Service Providers (RASP). Also the funding is used for behavoural interventionists, administrative costs (as much as $100 per month) and other applicable employer expenses like Canada Pension Plan, Employment Insurance, Employee Income Tax and Workers Compensation Board Premiums and 4% vacation pay.

4. For a child over the age of 6 (six) and up to age 18 (eighteen) the funding must be used for the following: Behaviour consultants, Speech-language pathologists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, Behaviour interventionists, Life skills and social skills programs, Out-of-school support/tutoring (not part of regular school program), Specialized therapeutic activities and camps designed to address your child’s ASD, Dietary or nutritional counselling from a registered dietician/nutritionist, Family counselling/therapy, Other interventions recommended by a professional/specialist* (pre-approval suggested), Administrative costs (up to $50 monthly), applicable employer costs (e.g. employee income tax, Canada Pension Plan, Employment Insurance and Workers Compensation Board premiums, 4% vacation pay).

5. ‘A Parent’s Handbook: Your Guide to Autism Programs’ is available upon request at 1 877 777-3530. Here is the online version.

6. The handbook clarifies that not all interventions and equipment are eligible funding expenses and among these are such things as Home repairs/renovations/swimming pools/ hot tubs/trampolines/playground equipment; Household items, including appliances; General recreation and sports enrolment fees; Sports/fitness equipment, including bicycles; Electronics, including televisions, CD players, stereos, MP3 players, game systems, video games, tracking devices, and cellular phones/palm pilots; Non-ASD specific CDs, DVDs, and videos; Musical instruments; Vitamins/medical supplies/incontinence supplies/orthotics; Clothing/helmets; Food (small reinforcers for Applied Behaviour Analysis therapy may be eligible).

7. Autism Handbook is available in other languages than English:

8. The Autism Funding Unit contact Information:
Autism Funding Unit, PO Box 9776 STN PROV GOVT
Victoria, BC V8W 9S5
Telephone in Greater Victoria: 250 387-3530
Elsewhere in BC call toll free: 1 877 777-3530
Fax: 250 356-8578
Email: MCF.AutismFundingUnit@gov.bc.ca

9. ASD or Autism Spectrum Disorder must be Properly Assessed and Diagnosed in order to quality for Funding.
In British Columbia assessment and diagnosis is conducted at no cost by British Columbia Autism Assessment Network (BCAAN) to which you are referred by your family doctor. For more information on ASD diagnosis and testing, visit the BCAAN website or contact BCAAN at 604 453-8343. If they so chose, parents may purchase a private diagnostic assessment but this must meet the same standards and guidelines as the BCAAN.

10. Children previously Diagnosed out of Province or out of Country or before April 1, 2004, must have a qualified BC specialist complete a Confirmation of Diagnosis form in order to apply for Autism Funding Programs.

11. The amount of the funding is substantial.

Autism Funding for a Child Under Age 6
The Under Age 6 program provides families up to $22,000 per year per child to assist in purchasing eligible autism intervention services and therapies. An intervention program for a young child with ASD must be based on a plan that takes into consideration the child’s unique strengths and needs and best practices. This behavioural plan of intervention is written by a Behaviour Consultant. Parents must select Behaviour Consultants, Physiotherapists, Speech Language Pathologists and Occupational Therapists from the Registry of Autism Service Providers.
The Autism Funding for a Child Between Ages 6-18
The 6-18 program provides families up to $6,000 per year per child to assist them with the cost of purchasing eligible autism intervention services and therapies outside of school. This funding is in addition to the educational program and special education services provided through school boards.

12. The List of Forms and the PDF files that a Parent May Require are posted at Forms You May Need.

Forms for Funding for Under 6
Forms for Funding Between 6-18
Specialist Assessment Forms
Service Providers

13. Parents have Certain Responsibilities when Receiving Autism Funding and it begins with the Autism Agreement, then submitting a Behavioural Plan of Intervention.

14. Again I refer you to the Ministry’s webpage entitled Autism Spectrum Disorder where I encourage you to scroll down the left hand index.

15. To make Yourself aware of the Tax Implications see this Canada Revenue page, T2201 Disability Tax Credit Certificate For additonal reading on this topic see J.C. Boyd’s BC Family Law Resource called Child Support Guidelines.

16. News Articles of Particular Interest

B.C. Government axes intensive therapy program for autistic children, Sept 17, 2009 Kelowna report also CBC story
A very dated 1997 Brief to Members of Parliament called ‘Solution to the Human Suffering and Social Cost of Autism’ by Families for Early Autism Treatment in BC (FEAT)
Autism Funding in B.C. (or, Autism Funding for Dummies) not my subtitle but the website’s. This is a site about money and administration. A well-run therapy program will cost $50,000 per year. Where will the money come from?
Milburn Drysdale, formerly a banker by trade, moved to BC a few years ago. He has one child with autism who has not yet reached school age. He has established a website that has fully developed a user-friendly informational approach to topics a parent of an autistic child will ask. Autism Funding in B.C. or, Autism for Dummies.

17. Some Approximate Cost Factuals

A Behavioural Consultant will cost $110-$150 per our.
A Behavioural Consultant’s observation of your child at school and a subsequent report will cost $500-$00.
A Behavioural Interventionist can charge $16-$25 dependent upon experience.
Speech Therapy is $110 per hour.
Occupational Therapists cost $110 per hour.
Consultation by a Naturopathic Doctor and all relevant testing is out of pocket.

(Image is taken from the cover of a book entitled 'Children of Autism - a Parent's Guide' authored by Michael D. Powers, with a foreword by Temple Grandin)

'DIAGNOSIS MURDER' ON FIFTH ESTATE FRI JAN 13

2012-01-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

FIFTH ESTATE is an award winning CBC television program known for its quality investigative journalism. This coming week, on Friday January 13th at 9 PM Pacific Time, it will air a show to which many of us have looked forward. The show is entitled tile ‘DIAGNOSIS MURDER’ and it is a documentary on the questionable science of Shaken Baby Syndrome. Paul and Zabeth Bayne will be involved in this expose. You will recall that this couple lost custody of their three children with an event that began in September 2007. For two years this blog chronicled their story – the medical diagnosis of their youngest child’s injuries as SBS and the subsequent establishment of a Ministry of Children’s case that one or both of the parents were responsible for those injuries. That unchanging conviction directed the Ministry’s actions for the next four years. RCMP had dropped charges due to insufficient evidence. That did not stop MCFD. We can understand the need to be cautious, even suspicious, and therefore exercise due diligence to ascertain whether these parents are a risk or not, and further whether they deserve and can manage three children if they are returned to them.

Will this be a good documentary? Will it affect any benefits for the Baynes, or for other parents who have been suspected of shaking a child? I have great expectations for this approaching show. My confidence comes from the record of archived Fifth Estate shows and most recently the success of this past week’s show entitled ESCAPE FROM JUSTICE.

Jassi Sidhu

Maple Ridge resident Jassi Sidhu was murdered in a roadside attack in Punjab, India, and in the same attack her husband Mithu Sidhu was left for dead in 2000. The murder was described as an honour killing. No Sidhu family member went to India to claim the body for burial. In India seven people were convicted of Jassi’s murder and were imprisoned in India. Evidence gathered by Indian authorities pointed to members of Jassi’s own family, resident in Maple Ridge, Canada, as having arranged Jassi's murder. Indian authorities laid charges of complicity in the murder against Jassi's mother Malkit Kaur Sidhu and Jassi's uncle Surjit Singh Badesha, the patriarch of the family. However, no extradition agreement existed between Canada and India. So convincingly did Fifth Estate reveal the records of phone calls from the family compound in Maple Ridge to the contract killer in India that an objective viewer would concur that there was complicity. The RCMP and the Canadian Federal government however gave no indication for ten years that they would proceed with charges or prosecution here in Canada or extradition of the accused family members to India. In India Jassi’s husband recovered from his injuries and devoted himself to uncovering the truth about her murder.

The far reaching power of Sidhu family money from Maple Ridge allegedly resulted in a woman in India charging Mithu Sidhu with rape and he was tried and sentenced. He spent four years in jail until under the pressure of studious investigation like that of Fifth Estate journalists, a case was made that Jassi’s family manipulated this false accusation. The accusing woman withdrew her complaint and confessed that she had lied. Mithu was released but he is still in constant danger of retaliation.

Jassi Sidhu and Mithu Sidhu

Jassi Sidhu met Mithu during a visit to a Punjabi village where her parents were born. Mithu was a rickshaw (taxi) driver without property or money. We are told that it was unthinkable to the Sidhu family that she could be allowed to marry someone like him. It would dishonour her family, the cultural theory goes. Fifth Estate revealed that when she returned to Maple Ridge she was held in her room for some time but eventually made her way back to India. People close to Jassi affirmed that.

Malkit Kauer Sidhu (Jassi's mother)

The weight of the Fifth Estate evidence was so convincing that television viewers must all have questioned what is wrong with the RCMP that charges are not laid or with our federal government that they do not make an extradition agreement with India to bring the family members to justice. We did not wait long. The next morning, Saturday January 7th the public announcement was posted on news sources that Jassi’s uncle and her own mother had been arrested that day. Malkit Kaur Sidhu, 63, the mother of victim Jassi Sidhu, and uncle Surjit Singh Badesha, 67 were arrested Friday in the Vancouver suburb of Maple Ridge. Now in custody they await an extradition hearing. This is the culmination of an exhaustive 11-year international investigation that involved RCMP and Indian police.

I am convinced that the next Fifth Estate will become the catalyst for reviewing a lot of SBS cases across our country, for releasing individuals who have been incarcerated on convictions of SBS, for restoring children to parents when the cases are closed. I can hardly wait to watch this.

Wouldn't it be astounding if Fifth Estate had reason to do an entire show on Autism and the trouble that arises when authorities in social work and the judiciary do not understand the condition?

THE ATTORNEY GENERAL AND CP MEDIATION

2012-01-08T00:00:00.000-08:00

Jenelle Schneider, Postmedia News

Ministry of Attorney General: The government website page for the Ministry of the Attorney General contains this page entitled Child Protection Mediation Program. In the post below I am quoting that page in its entirety and without comment from me. This is the mediation option of which the Attorney General’s Office wants you to be aware. I would like to hear what some of you who have been affected by MCFD's child protection practice think about this mediation theory and its delivery.
Attorney General

Child Protection Mediation Program

Sometimes parents or other people who are responsible for the care of a child disagree with child welfare workers in the Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) or delegated Aboriginal child and family service agency (DAA) about a child’s safety and well-being. Child protection mediation is a collaborative way to reach agreement on the best plan for a child’s safety with the help of a specially trained, impartial person called a mediator.

Mediators do not take sides, nor do they make decisions or recommendations. Instead, they encourage people to focus on common interests and work towards a mutually acceptable solution that is focused on the child’s needs.

Mediation is a process which brings together the parents, child welfare workers and others in a respectful way to talk about everyone’s interests and seek to understand each other through sharing feelings, ideas, concerns and potential solutions for the child.

The Ministry of Attorney General (MAG) and the Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) established the Child Protection Mediation Program in October 1997. MAG and MCFD administer the program. MAG’s Child Protection Mediation Program (CPMP) contracts for mediation services with specially qualified private sector mediators.

Background
In British Columbia, the Child, Family and Community Service Act (CFCSA) is the law that describes what steps must be taken if a child is not living in a safe environment or there are concerns about a child's safety or health. The law gives child welfare workers with the MCFD or a DAA responsibilities and powers to take action and make decisions to keep a child safe. This can sometimes include removing children, for their own protection, from their families. A child welfare worker is often called a “delegated social worker.” In most cases, once a child is removed, the Provincial Court of British Columbia becomes involved in the child protection case. The child welfare worker has a responsibility to appear in court within seven days of a
child's removal. A judge will decide if the removal was appropriate. The CFCSA describes other steps in the court process that may be necessary if the parents and the ministry cannot agree on ways to make sure a child lives in a safe and healthy environment.

Court Proceedings and Mediation
Mediation is an option that may be tried any time when MCFD or DAA is involved with a family under the CFCSA, even before a child is removed or after a hearing. If the case is already court involved, a judge may suggest mediation or any of the parties can request an adjournment to the court proceedings so mediation can occur.

Child Protection: What Happens When You Go to Court and Parents’ Rights, Kids’ Rights: A Parents’ Guide to Child Protection Law in BC are information booklets on child protection law in B.C., written for parents, advocates and other people, about what happens in the child protection process.

Mediation
With mediation, disagreements can often be resolved more quickly and without the formal processes and confrontational approaches used in the court system. In mediation, the mediator helps people to negotiate a settlement to their dispute. In B.C., mediation is used to resolve many kinds of legal disputes, including small claims disputes in the Provincial Court and motor vehicle personal injury cases in the Supreme Court, as well as family disputes that occur when parents separate.

Mediation has been available since 1997 to resolve disagreements about the care of a child. Every year, more parents and child welfare workers choose to use mediation. Most of the time, disagreements are completely or partly settled. Once a referral is made to mediation, the mediator meets separately with the parents and the child welfare worker for an orientation session to: talk about their side of the
dispute; help them list the things they would like to discuss at the mediation andexplain how the mediation
works and give other information about the process. The mediator will then arrange for the mediation meeting(s). At the end of the mediation meeting, an agreement is written and then signed on all the issues that are agreed to by the parties.

How Child Protection Mediation Can Be Used
Parents and the child welfare worker can choose to use mediation when there is a disagreement regarding the care of a child. It can be used to resolve a number of issues, including: what services the family will
receive and participate in as part of the plan of care; the length of time the child will be in care;
the amount and form of access the parent or others have with the child; the specific terms of a
supervision or access order; or other matters relating to the care or welfare of a child.

Who Can Ask for Mediation
Any of the parties can ask the other parties to participate in mediation. The suggestion can come from a lawyer, from a child welfare worker, from the child’s parents or members of the child’s extended family. The child can also request the appointment of a mediator. However, in order for the mediation to proceed, all parties must agree to participate.

How to Set Up a Mediation Session
Once the parties agree to try mediation, they must select a mediator from the Child Protection Mediation Roster. If there is more than one mediator listed in a community location, then the parties must agree on whom to select. They can decide among themselves how they will do it and can review the list and suggest a mediator to the other party. Once they have agreed on a mediator, they simply contact that person to get started. If there is no mediator on the list in the location where the people are, the parties should agree on another mediator, nearby if possible, and contact that person by phone. The parties can contact any mediator to ask questions about their background or qualifications if this would help in the selection process.

Once selected, the mediator will provide advice and information to all parties about the process and will schedule and arrange the locations for pre-mediation orientations and mediation session(s).

Some areas in B.C. have a mediation co-ordinator who can help choose a mediator and sometimes can
make scheduling arrangements with everyone.

How to Find a Child Protection Mediator
If the parents and child welfare workers decide to try mediation, they select a mediator from the Child Protection Mediator Roster and then work with the mediator to settle the dispute.

Click here for the list of approved child protection mediators.
For Mediators
If you are a mediator would like to know what qualifications are required in order to be on the Child Protection Mediation Roster and what is involved in the selection process, see the information sheet Mediator Qualifications and Selection.

More Information
To learn more about the Child Protection Mediation Program, read What is Child Protection Mediation? The brochure is especially written for parents. Here are some translated versions of the brochure.

More details about child protection mediation are available in a question and answer style.

For more information on a range of options for collaborative planning and decision making, including child protection mediation, please see Options for parents and families: Collaborative Planning and Decision-Making in Child Welfare.

THE WAY IT WORKS

2012-01-07T00:00:00.000-08:00

Natural parents have full rights over their child unless mitigated by an agreement or court order to the contrary. These rights, known as parental rights are also referred to as custody or guardianship.

Occasionally a parent is unable to cope with parental responsibility and voluntarily turns a child over to the government. By law, in all jurisdictions of Canada there are child protection services, sometimes called child welfare services. The term 'apprehension' is applied to the government intervention by which a child is removed from the natural parent(s) care, and this is affected by the extraction of all or most of the parental rights from the natural parents, through a quick confirmation by the Court. On this blog we tend to highlight the cases in which the government has taken initiative for a child protection order by which parental rights are set aside temporarily. I cannot underscore boldly enough my objection to the too frequent occurrence of temporary care that ignores court orders and time parameters.

British Columbia's legislation is entitled Child, Family and Community Service Act. In Ontario, the related legislation is the Child and Family Services Act, and, in Alberta, the Child, Youth and Family Enhancement Act. The BC CFCSA is unique in that it personifies the role of the government in child protection cases by a reference to the Director who is a senior public servant in one of the five provincial regions who interestingly seldom becomes involved in individual cases and never appears in court. So in fact, 'Director' means the child protection office or social worker responsible for the file.

In theory and by law this is how it should work.

In BC a child apprehension is followed promptly by a presentation hearing where in court the social worker discloses the facts for the apprehension and also provides a plan and the court makes an interim ruling. Much angst and criticism from parents and lawyers results from the brusque and summary process of this presentation hearing. The threshold for custody rationale by the Director is startlingly but predictably very low because the system is designed for the parent's challenge to be deferred until a later date, the later protection hearing. It is profoundly crushing for parents to know that their child will remain with a stranger while false suspicion or anonymous allegations of abuse are investigated.

In some cases the Director and the court may consider a supervision order which returns the child to the parents subject to the Director’s terms and conditions. Sometimes, the Director will come to agreement with the parents as to what should happen next. Other times mediation or judge-presided conferencing is scheduled. Nevertheless, for parents who have mistakenly or unjustifiably lost the care of their child, compromise or negotiating becomes an extremely difficult proposition, specially if admission to abuse is pressured upon or required from a parent who is innocent. (MCFD will object to the descriptors, 'mistakenly' and 'unjustifiably' as inaccurate.)

The protection hearing is a more substantial hearing that may result when the Court endorsement of the Director's opinion that the child needs protection. This can then proceed to the Continuing Care Order and once a child is engaged in the cycle of protection hearings, the child may remain in the custody of the Director until the age of majority. Well intentioned parents may not survive and some will acquiesce to litigation fatigue or impoverishment due to legal costs. That attrition is predictable for all but the extremely hardy or well supported because the government has limitless resources and a bottomless bank account.Paul and Zabeth Bayne were two of the strong and determined parents recently features on CBC's Go Public and on January 13th, 2012 at 9 PM on CBC TV to be part of the Fifth Estate's Documentary called 'Diagnosis Murder' on the questionable science of Shaken Baby Syndrome.

It is apparent by now in the posts I have written and in the unsolicited comments subsumed under them, that the office of social worker in child protection proceedings is a very challenging and thankless job. Given the demand to respond to every report concerning a child, opportunities abound for error and misjudgment. We are told by the government that in the vast majority of cases, apprehension decisions are not made lightly and are submitted to thorough and careful analysis and ruling of an interested and unbiased judge. There are many who read this blog who do not agree and refuse to see anything inherently good within the present Ministry of Children and CFCSA. Personal pain and loss when wed to helplessness against what appears to be authorized brutality does not readily result in forgiveness.

Advocating for the return of Ayn Van Dyk, ten year old Autistic daughter of Derek Hoarne. In care since June 16, 2011. She should not still be there. Nothing is being gained. Incredible emotional harm is being imposed upon her and her mom and dad and brothers.

MCFD IS IN UNRESOLVED CRISIS MODE

2012-01-06T06:55:00.000-08:00

'Broken Dreams', Murray Unruh, glass & acrylic

UNRESOLVED CRISIS

MCFD IS IN UNRESOLVED CRISIS MODE

In spite of inquiries and recommendations, changing governments, legislative reforms and in-house restructuring that the MCFD calls transformation, this child welfare system in B.C. has failed generations of both children and parents. British Columbia’s child welfare system has been in crisis for decades and it still is. Hon. Mary McNeil can only address the predicament if she consults and understands the history of this Ministry in B.C., acknowledges the existing problems, and agrees that changes are required and can be affected.

The foundation of B.C.’s child protection system is articulated in The Child Family and Community Services Act . It was approved in 1996 and it contains the values for child welfare as the Legislature expects it to be practiced. In 1996 this Act held enormous promise that the service provided would support families to care for their children within the family home. Physical apprehension of a child would be used only as a last resort and in the event that temporary placement was deemed necessary. Even in such a case the stated goal was always to reunify children with natural parents as quickly as possible. The CFCSA tacitly stated that removing a child from the parental home is a severe intervention. I join the crowd of serious reviewers who have concluded that the current child protection practices are violating the law established within the principles of the CFCSA. I'm not writing simply to rag on a Ministry or upon people but rather to represent the rationale for necessary changes and improvements to B.C.’s Child Protection programming and delivery.

When evaluating this Ministry, assessors are obliged to hear service providers, social workers, and lawyers representing parents in child protection cases. Wisdom dictates that another group needs to be heard and that is the parents whose children have been or are involved in the protection system. They have too often been ignored or silenced yet they have experiences, opinions and insights that can inform conscientious appraisers in ways that will make a difference. MCFD cannot in good faith say that it acts in the best interest of children until its management pays unbiased attention to parents.

The 'Child, Family and Community Services Act' Link

It concerns me that I have said nothing here that has not been said before by authorized probes and legal society reports. Ms. McNeil must restore MCFD practice of the fundamental principles of the ACT.

Art: 'Broken Dreams' by Murray Unruh, acrylic and glass, 36X49 inches

SHOULD GOVERNMENTS ENFORCE LIMITS ON HOW LONG CHILDREN CAN BE KEPT IN TEMPORARY CARE?

2012-01-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

Should governments enforce limits on how long children can be kept in temporary care?

That’s the premier question following the Bayne story which was aired by Kathy Tomlinson last night on CBC’s Go Public broadcast. It was an article written by the CBC Community Team at 4:36 PM January 3, 2012 and it received 10 comments. Of course the question generates reader response. It begs for response. But what an undiscerning question. Why ask the question at all? It is precisely because enforcement is a given, a natural expectation, that we have laws and codified prescriptions. They are legislated for the purpose of compliance by the citizens of a society regardless of whether one is an employee of the government in power or one of its agencies or is a civilian dwelling in the region governed by that government. There are penalties for contravening laws and regulations. From what kind of understanding of citizenry and governance does such a question arise? What could possibly suggest an immunity for child protection social workers and their supervisors from absolute compliance with the legislated limitations dictated by the Child, Family and Community Services Act? If there are mitigating circumstances peculiar to a specific case then there is latitude afforded to MCFD to seek a court order that extends limitations for holding on to a child. I am prepared to say that even at the risk of overlooking severely unusual circumstances, there should categorically be no allowance for keeping a child in protective care for a time longer than that allowed by law or legislated act.

So, YES, governments should enforce limits on how long children can be kept in temporary care.

One commenter with a screen name of Jon rod, in answering this question left this remark on the CBC page. “The issue is not the length of time children are in temporary care but ensuring that it is safe to return them home. In this case, the head injury to the infant included internal bleeding, which is consistent with shaken baby syndrome. The ministry took action to protect the child, which is what it is supposed to do. The parents obviously chose to pursue a very adversarial course of action which was a major reason why the case took so long to resolve.”

I responded to that in this fashion.

“For Jon rod: Child protection (MCFD) did respond to a medical professional’s report of suspected abuse. The gravity and complexities of the girl’s injuries necessitated significant care. For some years the triad of symptoms has defaulted to a diagnosis of shaken baby which can only lead to one conclusion. A caregiver is at fault. Progress in mediating a solution with the parents was impeded by MCFD’s recurring insistence that the parents acknowledge harming their child. What you have deemed as adversarial action by the parents is an inaccurate label since they could not admit to something they maintained was untrue and therefore no course of action was possible to them other than appealing as widely as possible for someone to listen to their agony. Internal bleeding is consistent with shaken baby syndrome but not exclusively so, since other causations can account for this but MCFD was unwilling to pursue these possibilities. Sticking to one professional’s opinion, MCFD contravened timelines of their own provincially legislated ACT and yes the length of time that these children were in care became the issue because it was not temporary, and the Director had made application for permanent care still based on SBS. These parents were required to find their own experts to dispute the allegations resulting in Judge Thomas Crabtree, now Chief Justice of BC ruling that the child had not been shaken.”

I continue.

painting by Esther Palmer

"Any assessment of the Baynes’ reactions such as yours, offered four years after the presenting concern itself, can be misguided without a serious look back. It must not be forgotten that profound personal tragedy, horror and disbelief became the Baynes’ 24/7 companions in the early weeks of the drama back in 2007. In October 2007 when Paul and Zabeth Bayne’s three children were removed from their home and from their custody, their domestic world had crashed. Because of the nature of the medical diagnosis, ‘Shaken Baby,’ the RCMP were initially involved. Both Paul and Zabeth were arrested and held overnight. This was so unbearably traumatic for Zabeth that she required medical attention. They were released. The charges were dropped due to what RCMP called insufficient grounds. Gradually the Baynes grew their resolve to seek the return of their children, to assert their innocence, to provide reason for the Ministry to change its mind which would include accumulating evidence that the medical diagnosis was wrong. The Director Bruce McNeill, whose name appeared on the application for permanent custody of the children which propelled the case to court, never surrendered the commitment to a SBS diagnosis. That was a position that refused to engage with other medical opinions that disputed the triad of symptoms being explained exclusively by an SBS diagnosis. The Baynes proved themselves to be honourable in all of their dealings with the public, with the media, with the Ministry of Children’s personnel. I am pretty sure that the Baynes’ forthrightness, composure, stalwart conduct, commitment to preserve their reputation made bureaucrats livid. Ultimately goodness rises to the surface and it did in this case. I am convinced that it will for Derek Hoare and his wife Amie who want their daughter Ayn to be given back to them. This autistic child does not need to be away from her dad, does not benefit from this separation, and does not deserve the psychological and emotional anguish of being apart from her family. The MCFD is wrong, wrong, wrong. I have lived long enough to understand the circle the wagon defence is instinctive even for good people who have made a glaring mistake. There is denial, blame-casting and blind delays. That's an appalling reputation for one of our government departments to carry. It doesn't need to be this way if goodness rises.”

THE GROWING PUBLIC REACTION TO CHILD PROTECTION DONE BADLY

2012-01-03T22:32:00.000-08:00

As of Tuesday evening at 11:00 pm, there have been 424 comments to Kathy Tomlinson's Go Public documentary on Paul and Zabeth Bayne's four year battle to recover their family, four children (438 by 6AM Wed). Those comments convey the growing distrust of the Ministry of Children and Family Development, and a public demand for changes and reform to our child protection in B.C. Tomlinson's news story was aired several times on Tuesday, Jan 3, 2012 and printed online under the title,

B.C. children spent years in limbo after shaken baby accusation

Court proceedings dragged on for 4 years

By Kathy Tomlinson CBC News

Posted: Jan 3, 2012 3:59 AM PT / Last Updated: Jan 3, 2012 7:09 AM PT

I was pleased with Kathy's effective journalism yesterday aired at regular news hours including 6PM and 11PM. She encapsulated the Baynes' story for first time viewers of their ordeal. It was a staggering reminder to me of what my friends endured for 4 long years. Viewers will have found it incredible. Even Minister Mary McNeil expresses on air the need to speed up the process for what I and others believe to be a broken child protection system. The eldest three were removed in 2007 and their youngest baby was seized hours after his birth. Well not precisely. Social Workers arrived to remove him but his prematurity required that he stay for almost two weeks before he was taken from the hospital. He was so small he didn't fit into a car seat without stuffing it with blankets. Then there was a battle over whether this baby would be allowed to drink Zabeth's milk. At times it became an expose on the primitive quality of training of Ministry personnel. Despite Judge Crabtree's March 2011 decision that the Baynes' daughter had not been shaken by one or both parents in 2007, these parents had to endure many more months of MCFD protocol before the children were all returned in August. Even then, a three month probationary period was imposed during which time MCFD could inspect how the family was getting on. Finally, the file has been closed. At least that is the word received, but is anyone ready to believe anything that the Fraser Region of the MCFD says?

The Fifth Estate & Shaken Baby & the Baynes

2012-01-03T22:17:00.001-08:00

The Fifth Estate explores the suspect science behind shaken baby accusations, in Diagnosis Murder, Jan. 13, on CBC-TV.

HOT OFF THE PRESS - CBC STORY ABOUT THE BAYNES

2012-01-03T10:59:00.000-08:00

By CBC News, cbc.ca, Updated: January 3, 2012 10:09 AM

B.C. children spent years in limbo after shaken baby accusation

A couple whose children were removed from their home and eventually returned say the B.C. government caused needless suffering by keeping the family apart for almost four years.
“It’s going to take a lot of healing,” said Zabeth Bayne, mother of the four children. "There’s a lot of pain that gradually we have to deal with, and as a family."
“Children grow up very quickly, and they can’t wait,” said Paul Bayne, the father. “For four years, I couldn’t be a proper dad or provider or a protector. Now I can.”
The Baynes were accused in 2007 of shaking their six-week-old daughter. They’d brought her to hospital with inexplicable injuries, so the B.C. Ministry of Children and Family Development took her away.

No criminal charges were laid. The couple always insisted their daughter's injuries, which included internal bleeding, were not caused by shaking, and several medical experts agreed.
In 2008, after the parents protested publicly about the baby’s removal, the government seized their two boys, then about four and three years old, for involving them in the publicity. The couple later had a fourth child, a son, who was taken away at birth.
Supervised visits only
Over the years, the children were shuffled among foster homes and had strictly supervised visits with their parents.
“Our oldest boy kept saying, ‘I feel like I am the only one who visits his mommy and daddy,’” Zabeth said. “He didn’t understand what was going on, why he had to be separated from us for so long, and why he couldn’t see us. And we couldn't tell him anything.”
After a lengthy court hearing — with repeated delays and adjournments — Chief Judge Thomas Crabtree of the B.C. provincial court ruled the baby was not shaken, calling her injuries “unexplained.” Crabtree's ruling came four months after he finished hearing the evidence.
A psychological assessment was then done on the Baynes, which was favourable, and in August 2011, the government returned the children, with no explanation or justification for why it took so long.
During their first weeks back home, the children clung to the parents.
“They were sleeping in our room,” Zabeth said. “They could not be apart from us or there were tears."
Although the shaken baby diagnosis was wrong, it took an unnecessarily long time to get it overturned and to bring the children home, she said.
"It’s not acceptable, and you see the damage that’s done, waiting for process," Zabeth said.
Paul compares the slow pace of the court case to driving slow motion during an emergency.
“It feels like your children are at home and someone’s trying to break into the house and you get a phone call — to get home as quick as you can. And your car is stuck in first gear. You’re driving five miles an hour trying to get home. It’s like, ‘Come on. Let’s go. Let’s go!’ It’s frustrating sitting in court saying ‘Let’s get going.’”
Zabeth says she and her husband were reluctant to complain in court, because the judge held so much power over their family.
“Any frustration [over delays] can be twisted, and viewed that ‘Oh, there’s a temper there.’"
One-year limit exceeded
B.C. law specifies young children should not be kept in temporary care for more than a year. Although the Baynes say their lawyer raised this restriction several times, it was never addressed.
“There’s no one held accountable for the timing,” Zabeth said. “There’s no questions asked.”
Ministry statistics show, on average, children are being kept in temporary care three months longer than they were five years ago. In 2006-07, the average temporary care order was 13 months. In 2010-11, that increased to 16 months.
A parents advocacy group called People Assisting Parents Association, or PAPA, says too many cases drag on beyond the one-year limit, for no good reason.
The group cites another case, that of an accountant and father of four from Victoria, whose one-year-old son was removed from the home in 2007. PAPA said the child has been in temporary foster care ever since, while the court case is repeatedly delayed. A custody hearing date is now set for June 2012.
“The modus operandi of the ministry is to set a court date for a custody order and seek a long trial length (usually from five to 10 days), citing calling many witnesses and evidence,” said spokesperson Stephen Luk. “In most courthouses, the date for a 10-day trial is generally 10 months to 15 months later.”
Carol Ross of the B.C. Association of Social Workers confirms that temporary care orders often extend beyond one year, partly because the court system is notoriously slow.
Limits 'not enforced'
"Time limits are not enforced,” Ross said. “As long as the (court) case is initiated within 45 days, it can drag on and on. It’s frustratingly slow for parents.
“What I see over and over is they don’t get the support they need … there is very little access to legal advocacy.”
She says social workers who are bound by process also feel the frustration.
“It ultimately hurts the child … and it is heartbreaking," she added. "Within three months, I would think you can figure out what is going on."
Mary McNeil, the minister for Child and Family Development, refused to comment on the Bayne case, but she agreed court delays are a problem.
“I totally understand the frustration — I understand the frustrations for me — to make sure that families are returned together,” McNeil said.
“Each case is so different, and we’re not alone in making these decisions. And the decision to apprehend a child is taken very, very seriously.”
Minister wants mediation
She says she wants to see more cases settled through mediation.
“I’m really pushing the ministry … to make sure that we have the system in place and alternatives in place so families don’t have to go the court route. So that families can try to resolve what they need to through mediation, through family dispute mechanisms and through family group counselling.”
Paul and Zabeth Bayne say they couldn't have agreed to mediation, however. In that scenario, they would have had to admit they harmed their baby.
“We fought back,” Paul said. “When someone [in the ministry] makes a mistake, it’s pretty hard to go back, especially with what happened to our family and all the money being spent.
“They’re not used to resistance,” Zabeth said. “It went south and people dug their heels.”
The couple say they get emails every day from parents asking for help. They said they do not plan to sue the ministry for what happened. They'd rather try to help others in similar situations.
“Your heart breaks over some of the stories that you hear,” Zabeth said. “Something needs to change.”
----------------------------------------------
Now here is an update. It is 5:38 PM Pacific time and at 6PM the Go Public broadcast will air.

You ofcourse know Kathy Tomlinson of CBC’s Go Public. She is the one who wrote thispiece today. We understood that she would consider doing a broadcast and anarticle about the Baynes once their perilous three month supervision hadexpired. The supervision was a proviso when the children were returned inAugust. As PAPA implied, both Go Public and Fifth Estate considerately held offuntil this period was over because the MCFD has been known to retaliate withchild removals. It’s an insidious abuse of power.

The Baynesare okay now but I want you to hear now how you can help parents like them, andpossibly even Derek and Amie. It comes as a result of an email exchange betweenRay Ferris, Doug Christie, Paul and Zabeth, Kathy Tomlinson and myself today.Ray is an occasional writer and commenter on my blog, a serious advocate forjustice, has been working to advise MLAs about MCFD. Doug Christie is thelawyer who was invaluable to the Baynes. Kathy responded to notes from Ray and:Doug with this statement. “Obviously we focused on the time frame in this casefor today's story - however - I strongly encourage anyone who has more to sayabout this case to write a comment on the web story which is currently gettinga lot of attention and comments: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/01/02/bc-childrenreturned.html

Cheers,

KathyTomlinson
Reporter, CBC Vancouver
604-662-6813
cell 778-847-4459
775 Cambie Street
Vancouver, B.C.
V6B 2R5

You mightlike to say thank you to Kathy Kathy.Tomlinson@cbc.ca

Then go tothe link she provided and write like mad.

FifthEstate is going to air a show on Shaken Baby Syndrome and it will feature theBaynes on January 9^th.

A LOOK BACK AT AN INTERVIEW

2012-01-02T16:50:00.000-08:00

On the day that his daughter was celebrating her tenth birthday, the ABBOTSFORD NEWS 1130 interviewed Derek Hoare and this is whatnews journalist Jess Johnston wrote on that day, December 14th, 2011. It is a good review of Derek’s present situation. Many of you know the details. Here is the account.

SINGLE FATHER FIGHTING TO GET AUTISTIC DAUGHTER BACK WANTS QUICK APPEAL PROCESS.

“Ten-year-old Ayn has autism and when she wandered away from home back in June, the Ministry of Children and Family Development stepped in. (Courtesy Facebook)

Derek Hoare is bringing a cake to his daughter's school this afternoon so she can celebrate her 10th birthday, but he won't give it to her in person.

Hoare hasn't seen his girl since she was taken by the province six months ago.

Ayn has autism and when she wandered away from home back in June, the Ministry of Children and Family Development stepped in.

Hoare was told he had too much on his plate as a single dad with three kids, two with special needs.

He hasn't visited Ayn since that happened.

"She should not be left in a position where she has to see me walk away from her and leave her in a situation that she doesn't want to be in," Hoare said. "For her to see me, and then have me walk away and leave her would be permanently damaging for her."

In an effort to raise awareness for his case, Hoare is putting up balloons outside Seven Oaks Mall in Abbotsford and the Ministry of Children and Family Development office. He has started a petition and a Twitter account.

Also, dozens of people around the world are taking pictures of themselves releasing balloons and posting them on a Facebook page that's been set up for Ayn.

Hoare has a case conference scheduled for Jan. 23, but he's not expecting to get a decision.

He's hoping to work out a solution with a case worker first.

"What we had done and where we left off was I was to draw up a proposal for [how I would care for] both of my [other] kids and they would review and sign off on that," Hoare said.

"What's happened in the interim is the worker I was doing all of these negotiations with has left. A new worker has taken over the file. I don't know if we're back at the beginning or if we can keep going forward with the negotiations. I could be looking at 2013 before I ever get to sit in front of the judiciary and argue why she never should have been taken."

Hoare wants to see a process in place so parents can appeal cases like this quickly.”

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2011-12-31T06:59:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year

“Happy New Year” slips off the lips spontaneously and wishfully and with varying degrees of sincerity. It is exchanged between family members, close friends, neighbours, customers and shopkeepers, and strangers. It can be simply a seasonal courtesy as much as a genuine desire for the other person. Perhaps the level of authenticity in this greeting is determined by how well you know the recipient, how much you care for the person, how earnestly you yearn for the next year to be a year full of happiness for the receiver. But that’s too much to consider when simply saying the equivalent of an ‘hello.’

“Happy New Year Derek.”

I wonder how that sounds to Derek. Like the rest of us, he may not reflect upon it, because his almost involuntary response may be to return, “and Happy New Year to you.” There is no reflective time within the exchange itself, and then the conversation veers off to something else or life’s duties demand attention. “Happy New Year,” is mere rhetoric, a gesture of good manners, of friendliness and of good business.

For the expression to actually be more than this, perhaps the speaker must know the recipient’s story, the history of the past year, the challenges to be faced in the new year. Perhaps the speaker must empathize with the recipient’s losses, broken heart, feeling of helplessness, bottomless agony. Perhaps the speaker must informatively speculate what will be required in the new year to turn life around so convincingly that happiness is the lasting and unmistakable result.

And that is what this blog has been seeking to do, to lay a groundwork of understanding of what Derek and his daughter Ayn have experienced in 2011, and what they face in 2012, and what it will take as the clock strikes one second past midnight to turn their world around, so that the darkness dissolves as the dawn of a new day shines. That is what the groundswell of over 4000 empathizers understand as they regularly update themselves on Ayn’s Facebook pages (1 Help Bring Little Autistic Girl back to Daddy) and (2 Justice for Ayn), and plan various events and campaign efforts and even pray to God to gain her release from the Ministry of Children and Family Development foster care and her return to her father and her family.

We know of what a happy new year consists for Derek.

With utmost sincerity, I join the crowd of kindhearted advocates for Ayn’s return to Derek’s arms, in saying,

"HAPPY NEW YEAR DEREK!"

THE WANDERING SPIRIT OF AN AUTISTIC CHILD

2011-12-30T08:38:00.000-08:00

Ayn with some stuffed toys

An autistic child knows where he or she wants to go but lacks the words to tell you, so often simply takes off. A child like Ayn with this developmental disorder, a severe form of autism, has difficulty communicating and socializing. A dangerous aspect of autism is the tendency to run away from home or adult supervision. It causes endless stress for parents. And in Derek Hoare’s case, it has caused the removal of his daughter Ayn from his home and custody.

The MCFD employees that have taken her believe they have done something in the child’s best interest, but the action has simply created the most unnecessary and vicious wounds to a fragile mind and psyche.

Derek conscientiously had an eye on the door all of the time. His house is equipped with window and door locks beyond what is customary in our homes. Guarding against the wandering tendency may be the hardest part of raising an autistic child and Derek has two of them. The yard around the home is protected by a high fence but a ten year old autistic child can and will find a way to scale the barrier and Ayn did that. Autism groups refer to this tendency as ‘wandering’ or ‘elopement’ behaviour. It is the habit of fleeing a place at any moment. And of course the danger is real since wandering is the leading cause of death among children with autism. And drowning is most common among those related fatalities. And sure, Ayn was found in a neighbour’s yard with a pool, albeit a kiddy’s pool.

Yet notwithstanding the grave concern over such wandering behaviour, autism groups and parents of autistic children find it deplorable that authorities consider it a viable and beneficial response to a reported missing child, to take that child away from the parents when the parent is known in his community and peer group as a dedicated and conscientious father. That is the case for Derek. Coming on the pretense of inquiring the father's explanation for the 'wandering' incident but having a prepared custody release form in pocket having intended to remove the child regardless of the interaction may be official but it is more accurately appalling.

A WORD TO MCFD: There must be a promotion of understanding about the wandering tendency of autism and do you know who should be spear-heading that – the Ministry of Children and Family Development. If MCFD wants to serve families and our communities and this province put your money and energy in services like that. Without that promotion, police, teachers and neighbours will continue to blame parents when the child is missing again. Doctors too have to upgrade their understanding rather than feed parents false hopes that the autism symptoms will markedly improve. It would be more helpful for doctors to know of support to which they can refer grieving parents who struggle to deal with the reality that their child is severely autistic.Yet in order for MCFD to comprehend the value of promoting this understanding about the 'wandering' bent of autistic children, the entire ministry must become educated. That is not difficult to do. The Internet itself provides social workers with a self-educational opportunity and soon the entire ministry could be persuaded and could be a great deal more gracious to parents whose lives are already sorely tested by their daily demands. What you have presently done, pretending to help by taking away Derek's responsibilities for Ayn, is to treat her like a machine or even an animal. And to have begun drugging this child three days after you took her is beyond descriptive words.

A PETITION - HELP BRING AYN VAN DYK HOME

2011-12-29T06:58:00.000-08:00

A petition by advocates for a 10 year old girl's return to her family cannot affect that transfer of custody. It can however demonstrate the strength of public conviction that the apprehension and foster care of this child was ill advised and inappropriate. Within hours now the goal of 5000 signatures will have been reached. Almost 5000 people believe that Ayn, the ten-year old autistic daughter of Derek Hoare and Amie Van Dyk should not have been removed from parental care on the 16th of June 2011, and given that she was removed, she should have been returned to parental care much sooner than the six months, the 196 days that she has been in government care.

I am asking you to sign this petition. I want you to sign it. I am not the sponsor but merely a supporter of this child's return to normalcy. The petition as of this posting requires 48 more signatures to reach 5000. Here is the link to the petition site, HELP BRING AYN VAN DYK HOME.

This blog has been chronicling Ayn's story for some time. If you don't know about her, you can scroll back or review the index on the left side of the page. In a capsule Ayn is autistic which accounts for her obstreperous behaviour. She is predictably unpredictable. Parents of autistic children understand this. They experience their children’s bizarre and sometimes fantastic behaviour. They cope. They muddle through. They read and learn and try and practice to manage their child’s autism. They become experts, authorities. A college degree does not an authority make. So, social workers and educators who simply observe a child’s conduct are sadly not conversant with the complexities of such a child’s necessary care. Let’s call it indispensable care. So possibly on the basis of school reports about a child’s aggressive outbursts, or a neighbour’s report about a child’s unaccompanied walk on the sidewalk, or a police report after a wandering child is located, social workers apprehend the child. While government clinical or foster care can provide shelter and food and medication and some social interaction, that which is integral to this child’s necessary care is absent – her father’s love, his voice and his embrace. She is being deprived of what is indispensable to her welfare - her best interests.

Ladies and gentlemen, the girl wandered from her home, scaled a fence to do it and was gone for three hours. It was a concern but it happens to non autistic children too. The Ministry of Children does not seize all those children who take a hike without permission. Neither should MCFD have taken Ayn. It was unnecessary. MCFD could have worked to assist Derek in his care of his child. He cares well enough for his other two children, sons, one of whom is also autistic. This is a preposterous case. MCFD officers should be embarrassed. PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION.

We made it......... It took fifteen hours but the petition now has 5,026 signatures, 74 of them added today.

Some other links pertinent to Ayn Van Dyk

Derek's email: iconoclast_ensues@yahoo.com
Fundraising email: aynsfreedomfund@gmail.com
WEBSITE: www.Justice4Ayn.com

PLEA FOR AYN: http://on.fb.me/pUnuk0

THE PETITION: http://bit.ly/mrfdlE

VISIT OUR BLOG: http://bit.ly/qqO7ig

FUNDRAISING: http://on.fb.me/noNues

DOCUMENT LIST: http://on.fb.me/nQassx

A LIST OF GPS BLOG TITLES PERTAINING TO AYN VAN DYK

2011-12-28T00:00:00.000-08:00

A LIST OF GPS BLOG TITLES PERTAINING TO AYN VAN DYK

In reverse order of appearance this list of links is appropriate for the period, of June to December 2011. Ayn has been in government authorized foster care since June 16, 2011. An absurdly unreasonable decision by the Ministry of Children (MCFD). This girl is 10 years old, autistic and should be at home with her family. Wandering away for a couple of hours is not a crime nor is not seeing her climb a fence indicative of punitive negligence. This child did not and does not require government protection.

▼ 2011

▼ December (28)

▼ November (14)

August(25)

July (30)

June (24)

DEREK AND A STANDARD OF CARE

2011-12-27T05:25:00.001-08:00

Ayn's case management is clearly out of focus

Derek Hoare is the father of all three children. He is still the primary parental caregiver to his two sons and before the June 16, 2011 apprehension of his daughter Ayn, he was her principal caregiver as well. These are Derek’s and Amie’s children. Derek and Amie are no longer together, and in their settlement Amie agreed that Derek should have custody of the children. Derek is a stay-at-home father. Mother and father also agreed that Ayn’s surname shall be her mother’s maiden name.

Was Ayn Van Dyk removed from her father’s active care because he was negligent in his care of her?
Was the standard of care customarily expected from a responsible parent violated?
Is there any breach of parental trust that is measurable enough to warrant her removal from her family and her subsequent foster care for the past 200 days?

If the front-line social workers employed by the B.C. Ministry of Children and Family Development and who were charged with the responsibility of responding to a June 12, 2011 incident deemed that the answer to the above questions was ‘Yes,’ then their casework should be called into question.

The answer to each of the questions is a categorical “NO.”

Read this and tell me whether or not you agree with me. Ayn Van Dyk is a ten-year old girl diagnosed with autism. She has a brother who is also autistic, and yet another old brother who has no such condition. Ayn has demonstrated throughout her short life, the typical manifestations of severe autism. Derek has been committed to a gentle personal intervention and resolution to each occurrence of inflamed or bizarre behaviour. His reward has been the experience of witnessing an autistic girl making progress and loving music and art and her father and mom and brothers. Yet, on June 12th, 2011 while playing in large playhouse on stilts in her backyard, she managed to scale a tall fence and to walk a neighbour’s home. When Derek noticed her absence, he did an immediate unsuccessful search and then called authorities. Police found her three hours later, safe and playing nearby. She was returned to Derek that day but four days later she was taken from her school by MCFD.

Referring to the original questions and based on a cursory acquaintance with the relevant family information, I must conclude that Ayn’s trip down the block is an unreasonable basis to presume Derek was overwhelmed by his childcare duties, or was actually negligent. Every parent of a non autistic child is familiar with the anxiety of a child suddenly out of sight and even lost for some time. This is generally a result of a child’s inquisitive mind rather than a parent’s inferior child care. Of course I understand that MCFD had a file with Ayn’s name in which prior incidents or issues were recorded and these would have influenced the caseworkers’ judgement. Nonetheless, the accumulated weight of evidence at the time of Ayn’s removal could just as easily have been used to conclude that if the MCFD provided Derek with some additional resources, he would be able to do an improved job of parenting two autistic children. That expenditure would undoubtedly have been less than the cost of placing her in a foster home and paying foster parents to look after her. It would have been the most reasonable course of action when it was apparent before and it has been manifestly evident since, that this girl loves her father and thrives within her family. That social workers did not recognize that then, and that case workers do not acknowledge that now is demonstrative of an appalling level of professional negligence. By any levelheaded standard of care, the best interests of this loving child have not been considered and certainly not improved by forcing her to live apart from her family for over six months.

DEREK'S 2011 CHRISTMAS DAY PUBLICATION

2011-12-26T07:48:00.000-08:00

Derek Hoare is the father of three children, two of whom are affected by autism. Ayn is his youngest and she is now in foster care. On June 16th 2011 she was removed from her school and then Derek was informed. Workers from the Ministry of Children arbitrarily concluded Derek was struggling to manage the responsibilities. As an advocate for this family, I believe that evidence will not support this conclusion, and will further call into question the wisdom and competence of front-line workers as well as the policy and structure of our monolithic child protection agency. Today is Boxing Day. Yesterday, Derek wrote this piece.

"I'm sure it goes without saying that I have been hurtingover these holidays... my boys have been hurting, my ex has been hurting, thefamily is hurting. I do hope Ayn was able to find some happiness today, I hopeshe was sufficiently distracted to recall the nightmare she is trapped within. Icannot, in fact I would not forget even if I could. I need to know thisfeeling. Each Christmas around the world people gather together for gift givingand great meals. They tell stories, share laughter and embrace those they holddearest. These are days I do not get back.... ever. I can and will be havinggreat celebrations upon Ayn's return however these days are gone...nearly 200now.

On its face it would seem that the worst thing about this ishaving your child taken but it isn't. The worst thing is being powerless to getthe child back. It is indifference that is shown by this powerful bureaucracyand how it disregards care and logic to prefer policy and salaries. There is noreason for keeping this girl from her family, but MCFD doesn’t care. ChildProtection has her and this is simply MCFD’s function so its performs it. To MCFDsocial workers, this is just how it is. They feign kindness and they feigncaring, but the reality is they do not even know Ayn. They do not even care toknow her. How is it they can then claim to know what is best?

Child Protection Services is not a person. It is a facelessabstract created by us, the people whom it supposed to serve. We create andfund an entity like this under the notion that children need to be protected, butthat is where it ends for most of us, with a notion. We do not read the laws. Wedo not learn the policies. We do not examine audits. In short we do not takethe time to see if it is working. We rest on the assumption that because itspurpose was pure and its function is good that everything must be okay. Well it’snot okay!

If I could give people anything this Christmas it would becourage to change these things. I don't think people ever imagined what wouldhappen if this institution that we created to protect children, became sobureaucratic and policy-driven that it did not take the time to thoughtfullyexamine what might truly be best for a family. MCFD gets in excess of $1,000,000000 dollars a year here in BC, (Yes one billion).... they MCFD has still neverbothered to determine how my daughter behaved in the home, scarcely a questionto that effect. Do we understand what that means when an organization sopowerful can remove children without even having to consider how the child wasin the family home? Yet MCFD continues to be funded and we continue to lookaway, seeking comfort in the original notion that children need to beprotected.

I still have two children and now I have the knowledge thatthere exists this institution which can march in and kidnap your child at thewhim of someone who does not even know you. This is not something that sitswell with me. When MCFD took my daughter I didn't know what to do. I only knew that it was wrong. I love mychildren and would never harm them. Ihave sought to learn the most I can about their disability and to try tounderstand them and how best to treat them, but child protection workers still tookher anyway. They did not spend an hour of thought on my daughter or my familybut felt that they had the authority to do us. I am fairly certain that theycannot keep her forever, but that may simply be me turning to another societal institutionand its underlying notion upon which it was founded... Justice.

On this Christmas Day I hope everyone holds their loved onesclosely and focuses on the happiness which they can bring to one another. Ihave spent the past few days giving some much needed attention to my boys Wyattand Lyric, whom I would like to thank so much and to let everyone know howproud I am of them. They have both shown such great strength and character inthe midst of all this strife. And to all of you who have supported methroughout this, I know I have thanked you all so many times and I do not wantit to lose its lustre but please know that it has meant so much to me in thisbattle that there are others still out there for whom child protection is morethan just a notion. That you all can put a face on these children and take someof your time to help fight for them is a wonderful thing... and hopefully itmeans that we as a people have not reached a point of apathy where we will sitidly by as noble concepts get ripped to shreds.

Please have a Merry Christmas everyone. Do not lament in mysadness but rather find in it a reason to share your joys and loves with otherswhom you find worthy of it. Cherish them and each moment you have together.Time is fleeting but our love does not have to be fleeting. Thank you so mucheveryone, enjoy your holidays. I am going to go and hug my boys and look atpictures of my baby girl."

CHRISTMAS DAY 2011

2011-12-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

I trust that you have awoken to a day of joy and gratitude. May all of the happiness customarily associated with this day be yours. And I trust that Derek Hoare and his boys are able to enjoy the day, even though he grieves the absence of his little girl as she remains in the custody of government child care, for reasons not entirely disclosed to him.

CHRISTMAS EVE - THE 24TH DECEMBER

2011-12-24T00:00:00.000-08:00

A Tricia Romance painting

She paints in watercolor

lives in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario

a place I know well.

Her originals have been popularized

by thousands of prints

adorning canvases, posters and dishes.

She illustrates themes akin to Norman Rockwell

and an entire career has chronicled the childhoods

of her own children now grown.

A believer in the Christ child

she has captured warmth and pleasure of a family

on Christmas Eve.

May you and your loved ones enjoy

the love of personal relationships as well as the reminder

that it was for all of us that Jesus came that first time.

Perhaps pray for Derek Hoare and his two boys whose
Christmas is tempered by sadness
since his daughter Ayn is still not at home
but with the Ministry of Children - UNJUST!

MERRY CHRISTMAS

2011-12-23T08:20:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas my Friends

I trust you will have a safe and happy holiday.

Don't forget to pray for Ayn Van Dyk and her daddy Derek and her mom Amie, and her two brothers.

The family is spending Christmas without her in their home.

SANTA FOR AUTISTIC CHILDREN

2011-12-22T00:00:00.000-08:00

Parents of an autistic child know that the long lines, pulsating and twinkling lights and loud noises can be overwhelming for their child – even unbearable. If you haven’t heard of this before, this should gladden your spirit at Christmas. I found a story about a sensory-friendly Santa Claus event. articles on autism. The event was sponsored by the Lawyer’s Autism Awareness Foundation in Tampa, Florida. Two Hillsborough County circuit court judges traded off playing the role of the patient jolly man in red. No twinkling lights or loud music were used in ensure that children were comfortable. Appointments were scheduled to ensure each child had one-on-one time with Santa without having to wait in long lines. What a great holiday story! Perhaps a bit late for this year, but I think some of you can make this happen in your locality next year.

One day ago, Derek posted this on Facebook. It is as poignant a statement of what this kind of careless child removal does to a parent as any I have read before.

“Ok so quite the past few days I have had.... spent much of it on the phone trying to get as much advice as possible on how to move forward under the circumstances. I am waiting to hear when a meeting with MCFD will be possible for the soonest date. And hopefully the next meeting I do have with them will be very productive. With my proposal in and my offers to overcome visitation long since presented, the next steps seem to be resolution based. I am ignoring the calendar for the most part, but got a peek at it today and I am absolutely aghast that it could possibly be so late in the year. Going to post up little packages of the stuff we had printed off for everyone to see and get. And I think I will spend a bit of time today listening to some of Ayn's music and making some crafts with the boys for her; perhaps will play around a bit on Photoshop as well. There is a looming sadness which hangs on each minute, it doesn't abate, it doesn't grow smaller, it just hangs there staining each second with memories that draw smiles then tears.”

I am sure that Derek would have loved to take Ayn to one of these sensory-friendly Santas. It’s a difficult season for him. He will be resilient for the sake of the two sons at home with him. They deserve his joy-filled presence and he will deliver.

Are you as intrigued as I am to read in the first paragraph of the Lawyer’s Autism Awareness Foundation in Tampa? How incredibly beneficial that is to families of autistic children, to have a group of informed lawyers available to advise other lawyers and families and represent them well in legal entanglements with child protection agencies that have mistakenly or irresponsibly erred in the administration of their functions. I can only hope for that to develop here and in other localities. You can find the Tampa group on Facebook.
And here is a YouTube story on the foundation. Understandably, it began with lawyers with children with autism.

Another video version of a Michigan Santa is presented in this story. Santa Visits Children with Special Needs.

SOME THOUGHTS ON AUTISM

2011-12-21T07:02:00.000-08:00

by Ray Ferris

In today’s post, my friend Ray Ferris offers a cautionary and common sense glance at Autism. You may concur with his observations or you may challenge an aspect of the piece. Leave a comment.

“Derek Hoare rightly reminded us the other day that there is no precise definition of autism. It is a description of a spectrum of symptoms, which may have a number of possible causes. Most of the suggested causes are speculative. In the field of autism, as with many other areas of psychology, there are numerous experts with special theories. There are numerous experts who have their own special theories about how to treat autism. So we find that we are in a subjective and speculative minefield, which can completely confuse the parents of a child who has been labelled autistic. Thus it is important to know what we can really rely on and what we cannot.

One of the major problems is that there is no reliable field of research , which makes it difficult to decide what is going to help and what will not. We have many experts who assert how to train autistic children. They all have one weakness. They all describe process, but there is no data on outcomes. When we look at actual outcomes, the picture changes. Consider the following.

Very few autistic children are able to function independently as adults.

Most autistic children are functionally at the level that we used to call mentally retarded.

Many "mentally challenged" or retarded children are labelled autistic, because the label carries less stigma.

The concept that autistic children are very bright, but impeded by a communication problem is without any evidence other than anecdotal. Anecdotal evidence is considered unreliable in scientific research. The evidence suggests that a miniscule fraction of autistic people have some unusual gift. The idiot savant is a rarity.

If we compare autism with a known syndrome like Downs syndrome, we can see big differences. We know what causes Downs and we have long known the range of things to expect. We know what training and occupation to use. Parental expectations are realistic. With autism too much is speculative and parents do not know what to expect. Parents will naturally want to believe the best and can be led to believe in all sorts of false hope.

With many sorts of social dysfunction, one thing is important to know. Some behaviours can be changed with training. For others behaviour can only be managed. If you do not know how to tell the difference, you will spend a lot of money and effort trying to train people whose behaviour can only be managed. For instance, the chronically mentally ill, habitual criminals, severely retarded and so on. If we start to do away with false hopes and concentrate on behaviour management, we will develop a very different model.

There is always the danger that any new theory will create an industry. Autism has its own industry. You think that I exaggerate? Just look at the programme at the University of Syracuse NY. The multi-million dollar funded programme called "facilitated communication for autistic children" thrived for years. There were dozens of "facilitators" hired, who held the hands of autistic children while they tapped out messages on a keyboard. The parents and the facilitators all believed that bright children had penetrated the veil of autism through this method and were really revealing their thoughts. All went well until something very predictable at the time happened. One after another the children started to reveal that they had been victims of sexual abuse. Now with court cases coming up, the evidence demanded critical examination.

An accredited research team came in and quickly revealed the whole scheme as an elaborate exercise in self delusion. A major public affairs programme covered it and the funding disappeared. I mention this to show that in the field of autism anything goes. Even the bright lights in academia can be duped with ease, when wishful thinking prevails.

What lesson can Derek and other parents learn from this? Autistic children are children and they need love and security just like any other child and that is really all one can truly rely on. The ministry of children and families is just as ignorant as anyone else about how to handle autism. The best they can do is to offer help and relief to parents. If a kid cannot function in a school classroom environment, then do not send them to school. Try to make behaviour management programmes realistic and affordable. The ministry should not interfere unless they can guarantee to make the situation better.”

Ray is an unapologetic critic of MCFD mistakes. Ray is the author of 'The Art of Child Protection'. You can purchase it from him by writing to rtferris@telus.net.

IMPROVE THE OUTCOMES

2011-12-20T00:00:00.000-08:00

James Wenzel logo designer

There will have to be a change in casework practice within the Ministry of Children and Family Development in B.C.

I cannot comprehend why resourcing help to families is such a difficult concept to affect. Many families that could be helped never receive help. Of course I do not understand all of the human dynamics of individual cases. I cannot know the stresses that social workers feel when working with adults and parents who are challenged by habits, substances, and life. I do not understand how budgetary cuts have reduced the availability of services. Yet those issues do not ultimately account for what I have been learning in recent years.

Authorized people with bachelor's degrees, even master's degrees in social work, are working with B.C. families and so often the result is a family, instead of gaining strength and remaining intact, becomes severed as a result of MCFD's involvement. The Ministry office in Victoria hears the negative public vibrations all over the province, but it does not understand what is wrong or how it can be corrected. Regional MCFD teams are not going to initiate significant change themselves. This Ministry can no longer endure bad press. Shocking stories continue.

We need a model of casework that ensures consistent practices which support improved outcomes for children, youth and families. It seems simplistic and it should be self evident that MCFD needs to place a greater emphasis upon intake and assessment of children, youth and families at the initial contact in every case in order to insure that the services that are planned are as effective as possible. What a novel idea to concentrate on improved outcomes for all clients using intervention supports and services. There are countless people reasons to explain why we do not have confidence that best practice and improvement is a priority to which our MCFD is committed.

This Blog has been advocating the return of Ayn Van Dyk to her daddy Derek Hoare who is her cistodial parent, who loves her and his devoted to her, and his highly capable of caring for her.

DEREK ASKED FOR SOME ADVICE - HE GOT IT

2011-12-19T00:00:00.000-08:00

The social worker assigned to Derek's and Ayn's case is on a leave of absence for an undetermined period of time. The case has been reassigned to a new case worker for whom the learning curve on the relevant information will be steep. Derek was informed that he would have opportunity to communicate with the social worker's superior who is familiar with the details of Ayn's case. Derek is eager for this because he desires to emphasize to MCFD how important it is to value all that has been accomplished within the past six months of client/social worker interchange.

When Derek invited his Facebook supporters to proffer him counsel about what to say to this superior, many of us responded but we had misunderstood. We thought he already had an scheduled appointment, so we spoke accordingly. We have learned since offering the advice that he was simply sending an email request for an appointment and wanted some wise guidance about that request content. What you will read below from contributors speak to that understanding. Then I offer some ideas from that same misinterpretation but I believe there is value in what I and the others have said.

With the personnel change, Derek has understandable concerns that his case may experience setback; that previous ground will have to be retraced; that further delay will occur; that Ayn will be forced to remain in foster care indefinitely.

Derek said, “Obviously the biggest concern of mine is that MCFD does not let all the dialog and work which I and the previous SW have achieved be in vain. I would like them to honour it and to carry on that dialog as best they can under the circumstances. So the question becomes how can I express myself to ensure that the dialog does continue unabated and yet occurs rapidly and that we do not allow this social worker’s absence to slow the process down. Ayn needs to come home now.”
Derek invited the several thousand Facebook friends of ‘Help Bring little Autistic girl back to her daddy’ to offer him counsel. People responded. Some of them have gone through similar trials with child protection personnel. Others empathize and speak from common sense. A few remain angry at the hurt inflicted upon this family by an unnecessary removal of a child and the unduly long separation already (6 months). Here are some of their thoughts.

I would suggest you talk from the heart.
I personally say be yourself!!!
Ayn deserves to be with you but I don't think being rude or cranky with them will get you what you want.
They just need to see for themselves how amazing you are, and what your kids mean to you!
Ask them if there is a way that the process can be sped up so that Ayn can come home specially before Christmas.
You can try and understand their tough position on being in the job that they are, trying to settle matters and taking children from the homes and separating families; that it must be difficult for them as well (GAG), that you are not blaming them; your main concern is for Ayn and what it is doing to her; that you want to get her home with her family back into her familiar surroundings, into her familiar routines before too much time has lapse.
There is no such a thing as over-explaining an issue and I believe that repeating things over and over is very necessary.
Don’t cut the workers any slack.
Maintain your innocence and document everything.
Stay on top of everything and do not trust their word but place everything in writing, and you will win.
Don't get conned.
The only thing which will stop them is the fear of litigation and / or public exposure.
Make sure your attorney is present and that you tell your attorney everything and let the attorney talk to them on your behalf - never go to any meeting without your attorney. Make your attorney work for you.
Do not let them try to bail on it (prior commitments); hold their feet to the fire; tell them how it will go and at same time have your attorney submit the proposal you wrote as well.

Derek, I doubt that anything we tell you is something to which you have not already given thought. I will venture a couple of suggestions.

As you communicate with the superior, you have no idea what the MCFD agenda is. They will speak first. They called the meeting. It will be wise to let them speak. It will also be wise to listen thoughtfully, and without a display of emotion or disapproving reaction. Any opposition you have to what is said should be expressed with calm and intelligent communication. You want to convey that you are a man with appropriate deep feelings for his family yet a man in control of his disposition. You are strong and stable. You are a survivor. You will carry this through to its satisfactory conclusion. They must witness this demonstrably in you.
Print copies of your entire Proposal and again give a copy to each person in the room with you. At an appropriate time in the conversation, present it emphatically as an evidence of the due diligence you have exercised to fulfill MCFD expectations. Underscore that you have taken this task seriously because it has been your understanding with the previous social worker that this is groundwork to Ayn’s return. Emphasize that you have been given the unmistakable understanding that this is preliminary to Ayn’s sure return to you. Stress that you expect the full cooperation of MCFD to this end.
Since you may be talking to people who are not as familiar with your case as was the previous social worker, do not hesitate to reiterate the essentials of this case, such as Ayn’s autism, your son’s autism, your commitment to caring for them, Ayn’s compatibility in the home environment, the progress and development she has gained through the initial years, the restraint of her outbreaks affected by your compassion and patience.
If it comes up, you may have to accede to some further MCFD expectations or requirements to get her back, so think seriously about them without rejecting them out of hand.
Go with confidence that you have a case, that is, the MCFD action although defensible from a legal standpoint, has been a breach of common sense, decency, good social work, and full compliance with the Child, Family and Community Service Act. They are in the right but they are wrong. You are in the right and you are right.

VIDEOS AND IMAGES OF AYN AND DEREK

2011-12-18T00:00:00.001-08:00

If you have some time, watch Ayn Van Dyk's story. Six months in the care of the government children's ministry, and even this past week as she celebrated her tenth birthday, she was not with her family, her mom and dad, her two brothers. Her dad's name is Derek. Derek's sister made this video in July 2011 when this ordeal was still young. She wrote, "This is a home made video dedicated to my brother Derek Hoare. He needs to know he is not alone anymore. I own nothing to the song, and the video content was shot by me. Any graphics are mine."

Supporters in the thousands celebrated Ayn's birthday all over the world. In this video from Niagara Falls some of Ayn's friends who have heard about her online, launched balloons in honour of her.

A Music Video with music by Bryan Adams Ayn's Amigos cannot do enough for her, and they feel so sorry for her and her family, that making a collection of still shots and video are one of the expressions. Free Ayn video shows Ayn at various stages of her childhood.

Requiem for Ayn is a touching video with an accompanying story to be read as slides change.

Faces of Hope Radio put up this video, 'Abducted by Autusm - The Ayn Van Dyk Story.

Ezra Lavant interviewed Derek for a show that was aired, 15 July 2011. Sun Time News footage on the removal of 9-year old autistic Ayn from her father Derek Hoare.

This is Roadkill Radio - Hear from Derek Hoare, a loving, committed father of 3 children. Two have autism and require his round-the-clock care and love in order to survive. However, his autistic daughter has now been snatched by the Ministry of Destruction - BC's corrupt Ministry of Children and Family Development. Hear from the children's mother in this segment for a deeper understanding of how these criminals falsify records, bully families, and steal children in order to feed their agency with more and more tax dollars. Please watch the entire 3-part series.

THIS IS MY BEAUTIFUL GIRL, AYN

The description accompanying this video states: "WARNING COURSE LANGUAGE: My name is Derek I am a single father of 3 children, my youngest 2 have been diagnosed with severe autism. Though a constant challenge, I have done my best to protect and nurture them, as I love them so much and have dedicated my life to their achievement of happiness. My youngest child is a bright little spitfire named Ayn. Ayn is naive and unaware of the dangers that exist in the world, so when on Sunday she escaped the backyard we were very worried for her safety. After a brief search of the house, yard and neighbourhood, i called the police. Fortunately Ayn was discovered two doors down playing in a backyard. The challenges I have faced in caring for my daughter have been very dynamic, new challenges arise as fast as the old ones depart. Vigilance will be required to face this new found challenge, as it stands today I may never get that opportunity. This morning two workers from CPS arrived at my home to request that I "voluntarily" give Ayn over to them, if I refused (which i did) they would coercively remove her. They do not say that she was abused, they simply say that as a single father I have an overwhelming amount of responsibilty and workload, and that Ayn's naivity renders her a danger to herself, and due to my having so much to deal with they should remove her in effect to lighten my workload. The greatest successes this little girl has had were nurtured in the home, she loves it here, she loves her brothers and she loves her Dad, please help me get my little girl back. http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_152278868178942&ap=1"

WORK TO RULE & the Ministry of Children

2011-12-17T00:00:00.000-08:00

Today's post was written by Ray Ferris.

"What does that phrase mean? Does it mean to work while strictly obeying all the rules, or does it mean to work in order to rule other people. Well, let me explain how it means both.

When people want to take job action in order to put pressure on an employer, there are various things they can do. There are numerous forms of striking. One can have rotating strikes or full time strikes. There is also a very effective method known as working to rule. A lot of organizations have multiple layers of bureaucracy and nothing can get done without lots of signing and countersigning. These organizations can only function because people learn to work around the rules. There is a lot of rubber stamping and signing of approvals after the fact.

So when people work to rule, they do only what the strict observance of all the rules and regulations require and they take no short cuts. They work the way the bosses imagine that they should be working all the time. If you wonder why the ministry of children and the courts are unable to do anything within the time frames dictated by legislation and why they have to invent new terminology to disguise the fact that they have no hope of following guidelines, there is a staggering cause. It is it has become the norm for the ministry and the courts to 'work to rule.'

The ministry is so bogged down in bureaucratic procedures that it is impossible to follow the true mission of the ministry. The means have completely derailed the ends. The courts are so bogged down in process, that good sense, compassion and common humanity are no longer able to play a role. In the end it looks as if they are all working to rule other people. It becomes a certainty that all the rights of parents and children will burn in the bureaucratic inferno.

And you know what? Most of the people who operate the system are not really comfortable with this, but they have no idea what to do about it. They almost feel like victims--especially when the news media roasts them. Social workers, supervisors, directors, lawyers and judges all see themselves as having no choice. Procedures must be followed at all costs. Of course they are aware that the outcomes are often disastrous and indefensible. That is why a good line of spin is absolutely necessary. The spin maybe ludicrous, but as long as it can convince the top brass, it doesn’t really matter. Why should anything change? It never has before. Even the judgements become spin. Cherry picking the evidence to spin a case to justify whatever has been done. To justify that on the judge's watch, every guideline of the act was ignored and he tolerated the rules of evidence becoming a mockery.

Work to rule does not work at all and does nothing for the rights of children. All it means is more and more judges, social workers and lawyers get jobs."

JUSTICE IN ANY LANGUAGE - THIS IS NOT IT!

2011-12-16T00:00:00.000-08:00

For some time a large team of international supporters of Ayn Van Dyk have been advocating for her release from the care of the Ministry of Children and Family Development because we believe that this autistic 10 year old should be at home with her father and her two brothers. We believe that her removal was unnecessary and reactive and uninformed. We believe that having separated her from the father she loves for six months now is not in her best interests. Some weeks ago we articulated our message in several languages (English, Chinese, Italian, French, Polish, German) and these are available and being broadcasted. THIS IS NOT JUSTICE

This is not Justice by Dr. Ron Unruh (English Version)
Justice does not mean treating everyone the same way but rather treating people appropriately. Neither Ayn Van Dyk who carries her mother’s surname nor her father Derek Hoare who is her primary caregiver and legal custodial parent, have been treated appropriately by the social workers and their immediate supervisors. That is, it means little that they hold meetings with Derek to mediate the parameters of a possible or an eventual return of this girl to her father’s immediate care, when the presenting issue was the Ministry’s avoidable removal of the child from his care and his home. That was inappropriate treatment. To look after one’s own child should not require special pleading of human rights language but it definitely has in a case like Ayn’s, an autistic child of nine years of age, soon to be ten. To be made to bear personal responsibility for autistic manifestations at a public school and for a characteristic wanderlust from one’s backyard that warrants a physical apprehension and removal by strangers and a separation from the family who give meaning to her life is beyond scandalous. It is wicked. It is the epitome of incompetence. Fair-minded people find no justification in the mission and policy of the Ministry of Children and Family Development, for seizing this particular child, defaulting to a hasty drug behavioural control program, placing her in environments and with people with whom she is unfamiliar, and distressing her so she carries a photo of her father everywhere and kisses that image in lieu of the real face, and is tortured by the knowledge that she can’t be with her dad and her brothers whom she adores. This is not appropriate treatment and it is therefore not justice.

這是絕不公義 - 殷羅恩博士 (Dr. Ron Unruh) (Chinese Version)
公義並不是意味著以同一樣方式去對待每一個人，而是恰當地去對待他人。然而，跟著自己母親姓氏的Ayn Van Dyk及作為她主要照顧者和法律監護人之父親 Derek Hoare都未被社工們及他們的上司以妥善的方法所對待。這就是說，他們與 Derek開會去調停有關將這女孩交還給他父親照顧之可能性是一件變得沒有什麼意義的事，因為問題是在於他們將這女孩從她父親家中的照顧之下取去的一事，本來是一件可以避免的事。這是一個絕不恰當的處理。去照顧自己的孩子本不需要用到人權的語言來作出特別的懇求，但作為一個9歲而快到10歲之自閉症兒童的 Ayn而言，這是變得明顯。為著在公立學校中有自閉症的表現，而且為著從後園流浪出去的癖好，她被陌生的人帶走及要與賦予她生活意義的家庭所分隔開，這已超越了令人憤慨的事情。這是邪惡的行為。這是無能的一個縮影。公正的人都沒法在兒童及家庭發展廳的使命和政策上找到正當的理由，使他們去抓住這個孩子，使她去接受倉促的藥物行為控制計劃，將她放置在一個她感到陌生的環境中，因而令她感到痛苦，使她隨身帶看她父親的照片及以親吻這照片在代替他的真實面目，而且因著知道不能與她所敬重的父親及兄弟在一起而感到被折磨。這是不恰當的處理，因此，這是絕不公義。

'QUESTA NON E' GUISTIZIA' di Ron Unruh (Italian Verrsion)

Giustizia non significa trattare tutti allo stesso modo ma piuttosto trattare la gente in modo coerente. Sia Aykn Van Dyk che porta il cognome della madre sia il padre Derek Hoare che per primo si è preso cura di lei e ne è stato il legale rappresentante, non sono stati trattati in modo coerente dagli impiegati dei servizi sociali e dai loro supervisori. I servizi sociali hanno organizzato degli incontri durante i quali hanno fatto credere che sarebbe stato possibile per la ragazza ritornare con il padre, mentre in effetti cercavano solo di portarla via dal padre e dalla sua casa. Questo è stato un comportamento inappropriato. Prendersi cura del proprio figlio non dovrebbe richiedere il ricorso alle leggi sui diritti umani mo lo è stato nel caso di Aykn , una bambina autistica che a breve compirà 10 anni. E’ altresì scandaloso il fatto che questa bambina sia ritenuta responsabile per le manifestazioni comportamentali dovute all’autismo, ed è ancor più scandaloso e perfido averla allontanata dalla propria famiglia per essere affidata a persone a lei estranee. Persone ragionevoli non possono trovare giustificazione nelle normative del Ministero per lo sviluppo dei minori e delle famiglie che includono anche l’allontanamento di bambini dal loro ambiente famigliare per sistemarli in ambienti e persone a loro sconosciute dove vengono sottoposti a programmi che includono medicinali potenti che mirano solo al controllo quasi meccanico del comportamento del bambino. Infatti la bambina in questione porta sempre e dovunque, con sè, una foto di suo padre e bacia lo schermo del computer portatile dove c’è l’immagine di suo padre. La bambina è tormentata dalla consapevolezza di non poter stare con il suo papa e i suoi fratelli che lei adora. Tutto ciò non è coerente e quindi non può essere considerata giustizia.

CE N'EST PAS LA JUSTICE par le Dr Ron Unruh (Français)

La justice ne signifie pas traiter tous de la même manière, mais plutôt traiter les gens de manière appropriée. Ni Ayn Van Dyk qui porte le nom de sa mère ni son père Derek Hoare qui est son principal pourvoyeur de soins et juridiques parent gardien, ont été traités de façon appropriée par les travailleurs sociaux et leurs superviseurs immédiats. Autrement dit, cela signifie peu qu'ils tiennent des réunions avec Derek à la médiation des paramètres d'un possible ou un éventuel retour de cette jeune fille aux soins immédiats de son père, lorsque la question de présenter a été la suppression évitables par le Ministère de l'enfant de ses soins et sa maison . Cela a été un traitement inapproprié. Pour s'occuper de sa propre enfant ne devrait pas exiger plaidoyer spécial du langage des droits humains, mais il a certainement dans un cas comme Ayn, un enfant autiste de neuf ans, bientôt dix ans. Pour être astreint à supporter la responsabilité personnelle pour des manifestations autistiques dans une école publique et pour une nostalgie typique d'une arrière-cour qui justifie une appréhension physique et l'enlèvement par des inconnus et une séparation de la famille qui donnent un sens à sa vie est au-delà scandaleux. Il est méchant. Il est l'incarnation de l'incompétence. Foire d'esprit des gens trouvent aucune justification dans la mission et la politique du ministère de l'Enfance et de la Famille, pour saisir cet enfant en particulier, par défaut d'un programme de contrôle des drogues comportementales hâtives, en la plaçant dans des environnements et avec des gens avec qui elle est peu familier, et affliger si elle porte une photo de son père partout et embrasse cette image à la place du vrai visage, et il est torturé par la connaissance qu'elle ne peut pas être avec son père et ses frères qu'elle adore. Ce n'est pas un traitement approprié et il n'est donc pas la justice.

TO NIE JEST SPRAWIEDLIWOŚĆ (Polish Version) Dr Ron Unruh
Sprawiedliwość nie oznacza traktowania wszystkich ludzi jednakowo, lecz traktowanie ich odpowiednio. Ani nosząca nazwisko matki Ayn Van Dyk, ani zajmujący się jej wychowaniem ojciec Derek Hoare, który jest również jej prawnym opiekunem nie są odpowiednio traktowani przez kanadyjskich pracowników socjalnych i ich bezpośrednich przełożonych. Oznacza to, że spotkania w których uczestniczy Derek i podczas których negocjuje się warunki ewentualnego lub ostatecznego powrotu dziewczynki pod jego bezpośrenią opiekę mają niewielkie znaczenie w obliczu możliwego do uniknięcia przymusowego pozbawienia jej ojcowskiej opieki i uprowadzenia z domu, w którym z nim mieszkała. Z całą pewnością nie można tego nazwać odpowiednim traktowaniem. Opiekowanie się własnym dzieckiem nie powinno wymagać specjalnego powoływania się na prawa człowieka w oficjalnym języku, ale stało się to nieodzowne w przypadku Ayn, dziewięcioletniej dziewczynki dotkniętej autyzmem, która wkrótce będzie obchodzić dziesiąte urodziny. Obwinianie kogokolwiek za typowe dla dziecka z objawami autyzmu zachowanie w publicznej szkole oraz charakterystycznej dla tego upośledzenia eskapady z własnego podwórka i użycie jako uzasadnienia do fizycznego zatrzymania dziewczynki, uprowadzenia jej przez obcych ludzi i odseparowania od rodziny, która nadaje jej życiu sens to coś więcej, niż skandal. To nikczemność. To podniesiona do najwyższej potęgi niekompetencja. Trzeźwo myślący ludzie nie potrafią znaleźć jakiegokolwiek uzasadnienia w misji i polityce proceduralnej Ministerstwa do Spraw Dzieci i Kształtowania Rodziny Kolumbii Brytyjskiej (BC Ministry of Children and Family Development) dla zatrzymania tego właśnie dziecka, natychmiastowego, programowego zmuszania go do zażywania leków kontrolujących zachowanie (psychotropowych), umieszczenia w całkowicie mu nieznanym środowisku wśród nieznanych mu ludzi, oraz doprowadzenia do tak rozpaczliwego stanu, że dziewczynka nie rozstaje się z fotografią ojca, którą całuje z braku jego prawdziwej twarzy i cierpi tortury wiedząc, że nie może być razem z tatusiem i braćmi, których uwielbia. To nie jest odpowiednie traktowanie i to nie jest sprawiedliwość.

ES IS DAHER NICHT GERECHT (German Version) by Dr. Ron Unruh
Gerechtigkeit heißt nicht dass alle gleich behandelt werden, sondern dass die Behandlung von Menschen angemessen ist. Weder Ayn Van Dyk, die dem Namen ihrer Mutter traegt, noch ihr Vater Derek Hoare, der ihre primärer Bezugsperson und rechtlicher sorgeberechtigter Elternteil ist, wurden entsprechend von den Sozialarbeitern und ihren unmittelbaren Vorgesetzten behandelt. Es bedeutet wenig, dass sie Treffen mit Derek halten um die Parameter für eine mögliche oder eine eventuelle Rückkehr des Mädchens zu ihrem Vater und unter seiner Versorgung zu sein, wenn die eigentliche Aufgabe des Ministeriums die vermeidbare Entfernung des Kindes von seiner Pflege und sein zu Hause war. Das war untragbare Behandlung. Um auf sein eigenes Kind aufzupassen sollte keine speziellen Bitten der Menschenrechte Sprache noetig sein, aber in dem Fall von Ayn, ein autistisches Kind von neun Jahren, bald zehn scheint es der Fall zu sein. Persönliche Verantwortlich zu sein weil ein Kind autistische Symptome zeigt und an einer öffentlichen Schule Wanderlust zeigt und das Hinterhof verlaesst und deswegen von Fremden entfernt wird und von ihrer Familie getrennt wird die ihr Leben einen Sinn geben, ist darüber hinaus ein Skandal. Es ist böse. Es ist der Inbegriff von Inkompetenz. Aufrichtige Leute finden keine Rechtfertigung in der Mission und Politik des Ministeriums für Kinder-und Familienzentrum Entwicklung, fuer die Ergreifung dieses besonderen Kindes, standardmäßig auf eine übereilte Drogen Verhaltenssteuerung Programms, indem sie sie in einer unbekannten Umgebungung und Menschen mit denen sie nicht vertraut ist, und sehr betruebt mit einem Foto ihres Vaters überall rumlaueft und das Bild kuesse anstelle des wirklichen Gesichtes, und das Wissen dass sie nicht mit ihrem Vater und ihren mit ihren Brüdern sein kann die sie ueber alles liebt. Dies ist nicht eine angemessene Behandlung und es ist daher nicht gerecht.

MCFD HAS CHANGED AYN’S ASSIGNED SOCIAL WORKER

2011-12-15T00:00:00.000-08:00

Listen! We all understand life and business. Sometime employees are reassigned and replaced. Sometimes personal life events require time off. So in one sense it is not surprising to learn that the Ministry social worker to whom the Ayn Van Dyk case was allocated, is off the case and a different social worker has now got the file. Of course he or she doesn’t merely have Ayn’s case with which to become familiar, but several others, perhaps many more cases. That sounds daunting. It also generates concern for parents that the resolution of their cases will be unsettled and delayed. There is apprehension that the mediation already accomplished will be misunderstood, forgotten or dismissed. That is certainly some of the unease with which Derek Hoare has been left after recent phone calls.

On Tuesday Derek said, “Well I just got off the phone with the new SW for the first time.... interesting to say the least. They would not comment on the length of absence to be expected. We seem to be looking at a very steep learning curve ahead for this worker. They are going to read the file, but as of yet seem largely unaware of where we are at in our dialog.”

He continued, “I was very forthright with the worker.... can't even think of how to summarize what's racing through my mind. This is pretty disconcerting, because the worker seemed to have very little understanding of my case and was not simply handed my case to catch up on but all of them... I cannot imagine the magnitude of the task which lies before them. But I for one am not here to redo everything I have done so far, I expect MCFD to honour our talks thus far. I pressed for quick contact but it did not seem reciprocated. I think perhaps I should go up higher to someone who has a better working knowledge of this file. Unbelievable."

Now you must understand that his daughter Ayn has been in Ministry care (foster home) for six months. The earlier case worker had agreed that Derek should prepare and submit a plan of care for Ayn which the Ministry would consider as essential to returning her to him. He worked for many days to prepare a thorough and convincing proposal and he submitted this with satisfaction and confidence not long ago. Derek says, “they (case worker) did not even know my proposal had been submitted…. and knew nothing about my proposals to overcome our visitation sticking point.” The latter comment refers to Derek’s adamant decision not to visit Ayn, despite the tear on his own heart. He has passionately articulated in other documents why the trust in his autistic daughter’s heart would be shattered irreparably if he showed up and then left."

Some supporters, disenchanted with the practices of the Ministry of Children and Family Development, have alleged that this personnel change is a postponement scheme to which Derek responds. “I do not think it is a stalling tactic, I think that the other worker is gone, for whatever reason, and this is the worker tasked with covering all their files. But it does not appear to be isolated to me, however in the meantime all those files are families, families right before Christmas, who had plans and expectations, and now this worker has been given a task which is bordering on impossible: to learn, meet, understand and exercise judgement on those families. What possible sort of timeframe is it that they will need just to get caught up let alone to intelligently proceed. Ayn should be home NOW, this is not the time for them to do this... return her and then play catch-up.”

“And once again they put me in a situation where I cannot fault this individual worker (yet), but this entire process is indescribable, the strongest of terms are necessary. "Incompetent" is not a good word, for I think even the most competent of people would be unable to adequately protect children while operating under a policy framework such as this. "Evil" is not right either, because I believe the above would apply to the most moral worker as well. And the word "Authoritarian" really does not go far enough to describe the connotation which should be placed. One thing is for sure this is a nightmare. And the only way this could not be perceived as "Psychological Warfare" is if MCFD has no understanding whatsoever of Psychology. Tortuous.”

You can hear Derek’s agony, his helplessness. Derek concluded his comments on this occasion with one further exasperated gasp. “Time to research a whole new worker... let's hope they are as diligent as I. Then they will see a how good I am for Ayn.”

I would underscore, in Ayn's best interest, her father Derek Hoare is good for her and she will thrive most effectively in the nurture of his home and her family, her brothers. What can a Ministry of social workers possibly be thinking their mandate is when they remove a child like this from the love and comfort of her own family? Even if there is some value in a brief intervention for assessment or observation to permit lengthy delay, no rather to subject a child to prolonged deprivation has violated basic human rights and expectation.

HAPPY 10TH BIRTHDAY AYN

2011-12-14T00:00:00.000-08:00


Happy 10th Birthday Ayn

We want this to be a very happy day for you Ayn. We know this birthday is different from the other nine that you have had. Perhaps your birthday will be something like this.

Ayn's Birthday Balloon

It is the morning of Ayn's tenth birthday. She is not at her home. She is at the friends' house. The house where she has been staying since Little Ayn was taken away from her daddy. Ayn's biggest birthday wish is that she can go home.

Today, there are lots of balloons that help Ayn celebrate her special day. One of the floating balloons has a large string which Ayn grabs. As she holds it, the balloon becomes larger, and larger and larger. As it grows, it seems to be tugging her off the ground. First, she is standing on tippy toes and then she is lifting from the ground.

Up, up she floats, slowly and higher. And the little breeze blows Ayn and her balloon over houses and trees and playgrounds. The balloon seems to know where it is going. She loves this ride. Up, up and onward, forward she moves. Then, as she looks down, she sees familiar things, and look! There is her house. She can see it. She can see the back yard. She can see her play house.

And now the balloon is getting a wee bit smaller and she is coming down so slowly, and it looks like she is coming down from the sky right by her daddy's house.
Who is that? Someone came through the front door. That's daddy, "Daddy, daddy, daddy" Ayn calls. He calls back, "Hi baby! Look at you. You are amazing."

Then she is on the ground, and daddy comes rushing toward her, and as he does Lyric and Wyatt are running toward her too, so happy to see her. Daddy scoops Ayn up into his arms and hugs her so gladly, and they are all screaming with delight. It's the best group hug of their lives. And guess what! Ayn got her birthday wish. She is at home. Happy Birthday Ayn. The end.

Addendum: With a piece of fiction, the writer can end it wherever he chooses. In real life, MCFD would come and apprehend her again. That sounds like fiction. But it's not. One would think that Ayn was an escaped prisoner and that her daddy is a bad man who has done something very wrong. She isn't and he isn't. But that's the condition with which they are living, and all of it created by an agency of their own government.

CLEAR COMMUNICATION

2011-12-13T00:00:00.000-08:00

Ideally Blue stands for Parent, yellow stands for Social Worker, and red stands for Director. Information freely flows between them as they work to solution. But there is something wrong with that picture. It wasn't accurate to the Baynes' story, or to many others as well. I followed that one and rejoiced when in August 2011 the family of six were reunited permanently after four years of separation. Their story is an intolerable string of injustices.

Like the Baynes, what I learn from Derek Hoare and other parents like him is that at every stage that their child is in the protection process with MCFD, the parents are repeatedly deprived of basic information. That should strike you as discourtesy, irresponsibility and offense. That is certainly contradictory to the (CFCSA) Child, Family and Community Services Act intention and prescription because it is essential that the concerns of the Ministry be communicated in order for the parents to improve their situation so they can get their child back home. Derek can go weeks without an update about Ayn. Does He ask? I don't know. Should he have to? Hasn't the SW promised a regular report? Yes. Now his SW is off until June, and a replacement has been assigned. So how will the information be shared?

It is the duty of social workers to keep parents informed about the status of their file and the plan for their child. In spite of that, parents claim they are uninformed or even misinformed. Parents should be apprised of the steps in a plan by which they can have their children returned. Parents also should be notified of any changes of their child’s placement, or health or medical appointments or procedures and it should disturb us all that parents can give evidence of how often their input is not requested and they are left in the dark or at best informed at the last minute. Rather than clear communication a more apt term for what parents should be able to expect is ‘transparent communication.’ Nothing concealed or disguised. It’s preposterous that I even need to describe these distortions of appropriate practice.

And keep in mind as you read today, that Ayn Van Dyk, Derek's daughter, was removed from his care on June 16th, 2011 and now six months later she is still in Ministry care, and tomorrow, the 14th of December will be her TENTH Birthday, and she will not be at home for it. Her father will not be with her to celebrate. He has his reasons. Also keep in mind that this little girl is an autistic girl, and her behaviour is predictably unpredictable sometimes, so on June 12th she left home for three hours until she was found by police, and that was deemed as neglect. Of course there are numerous other behavioural incidents in her brief history but these are not uncommon to autistic families and these now have become the evidence of parental neglect, or putting it more diplomatically, "Daddy is overwhelmed."

RAY FERRIS TOLD THE MINISTER ABOUT AYN ONCE AGAIN

2011-12-12T00:00:00.000-08:00

Today I have posted a letter written by Ray Ferris. He has given me permission to publish it. This has been directed last week to the people named below. Ray is an unapologetic critic of the MCFD mistakes. Ray is the author of 'The Art of Child Protection'. You can purchase it from him by writing to rtferris@telus.net.

From: Ray Ferris
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2011 1:34 PM
To: Mary McNeill ; Claire Trevena ; nicholas simons ; maurine Kargianis ; stephen Brown
Subject: Ayn Van Dyk

Ayn is a ten year old autistic girl who was removed from her home about six months ago. Her case is getting a lot of coverage on the child protection blog of Dr. Ron Unruh. He also covered the case of the Bayne family, which wasted up to a million dollars of taxpayers money. Ayn had climbed the fence in her home yard and was found at a neighbour’s. Since the apprehension she has escaped from ministry care at least twice, in spite of being heavily medicated.

This is another case where it appears that every rule in the family, child and community services act is being broken. There is no provision in the act for adjourning presentation hearings and yet the presentation hearing, instead of being summary and completed as quickly as possible, has been stretched to four months. Instead of getting to a protection hearing within 45 days, a date has been set sometime next year for a court conference at which the parents will not be allowed to speak, or demand the director show his evidence. If contested it will take another year to get to trial and possibly much longer. In the Bayne case it took 27 months to commence a protection hearing. Whatever happened to the guidelines under sections 2 and 4 of the CF&CSA?

It is increasingly obvious that the courts are so log jammed that they are no longer capable of serving the purpose of ensuring that the best interests of children as defined under section 4 are protected. Judges now have little choice but to rubberstamp the applications of the directors. Parents get no say for months or years. It seems therefore that there must be greater onus on the deputy minister and on the director of child services to scrutinise field practice. It cannot be left solely in the hands of judges whose hands appear to be tied. The ministry officials can only influence what takes place within the court room by instructing counsel. However, they have great control over what gets into the courtroom and what is presented to the judges. Weak evidence should be sorted out by the imposition of standards of practice and by staff training. I have seen too many cases where children were kept in care for many months, only to have the case withdrawn before trial.

Another matter of concern is that the director in this case is one who has a proven track record of adversarial and obstructive behaviour. I believe the name Bruce McNeill is well-known to former opposition critics. This is the director who banned the feeding of breast milk to the newborn Bayne baby only a few months ago.

I think that it is high time that the minister ensures that the act can be followed as the legislature enacted it and intended it to be followed, or find a much better way of protecting children from adversarial employees. It is too bad when parents begin to feel that only the news media can protect them.

Note to Mr. Brown and the Hon. Mary McNeill, do not bother to send me a form letter explaining that you cannot discuss these cases because of privacy concerns. However, I would be most happy if you could respond in a more or less intelligent manner to the general issues that I raise. I have already made a submission to the joint standing committee covering the above and many other points.

Ray Ferris speaks from 31 years of service in child welfare and protection as a social worker and district supervisor and family court coordinator. He cannot tolerate unseemly case work or the injustice imposed upon families in too many cases.

PARENTAL CAPACITY ASSESSMENTS

2011-12-11T00:00:00.000-08:00

If you want to know what a Parental Capacity Assessment is, today's blog post is written by Ray Ferris. Ray had career of 31 years service in child welfare and protection as a social worker and district supervisor and family court coordinator. Ray is the author of 'The Art of Child Protection'. You can purchase it from him by writing to rtferris@telus.net

"Parental capacity assessments are essentially a method of making an inventory of the life skills of parents. PCAs are similar to Risk Assessments and the main difference is the starting point of each assessment. A risk assessment usually starts with a perceived risk and then assesses the strengths of a parent to resolve that risk. A parental capacity assessment is principally geared to assessing the historical and current functioning of a family in order to provide a profile. This past and present profile is then used to assess the likelihood of future risk. Some types of risk cannot be assessed properly without considering profile.

Now I am going to jolt some of you out of your mental ruts by stating that adoption and foster home studies are in fact parental capacity assessments. In an adoption study one looks at age, health, education, training, earning ability, income, occupation, housing and marital history. One is looking at whether the couple is stable and responsible enough to raise a young child to adulthood. One does look at a number of other things, but the main components are the same as those of a PCA. While a foster home study is similar to the adoption study there are important differences. Foster parents usually have children of their own or they have raised their own children. One can assess parenting ability by observing direct results. Adopting parents take a nice little baby and after a few months they are on their own, just like any other family. With foster parents one seeks very special qualities and the selection process is much more exacting. These foster caregivers will have the challenging task of taking children, who may have suffered severe and prolonged abuse or neglect. The children will be in the home for various lengths of time depending on court outcomes and life plans and so on. Foster parents will need a lot of support and guidance until they gain experience and they must learn to work with the social workers, for better of for worse.

A parental capacity assessment should be an objective and fact-based record of age, health, education employment. A life skills inventory is not very difficult to do. The vast majority of children coming into care are from homes where the life skills are conspicuously absent. They have little education and employment skills, poor job histories and often unstable marital histories. They are poverty stricken and often live in substandard housing. There are money problems and schools complain about hygiene and lack of lunches. So you can see that whether we are talking risk assessment, or parental capacity assessment, the people who discuss and design the outline of these studies are mostly discussing the lowest economic strata in society.

Children get injured all the time and these injuries are nearly always accidental. So how does a doctor assess the cause of an injury? He or she looks at profile. If the injury happens to a child who seems to have decent, caring parents who have looked after the health of their child, he will take the parents' word about the injury. However, if the family has a history of alcohol or drug abuse, family violence, or a criminal record with violence, then the picture is different. Another warning sign is if there are simply too many injuries occurring in the family.

Now you can see why shaken baby is such a dangerous hypothesis. In Ontario and many states of the USA, SBS charges and convictions put a lot of innocent people in jail, many of whom are now being released and compensated. In child protection and Shaken Baby diagnosis is an automatic accusation of deliberate injury and an exemplary profile will not save you. The obvious inference should be that if the profile contradicts the probability of deliberate injury, then one should ask if the doctor might be mistaken and certainly a second opinion should be sought. Definitely, the profile should not be re-invented to match the accusation as it has been in a recent case. People with good life management skills and apparently good social profiles can be a cause of concern for future care of children if they are becoming problem drinkers, or if they are developing a diagnosable mental illness. Marital disputes can become problematic and so on. However, not all addictions cause behaviours which put children at risk and so on.

So there you have it, a parental capacity assessment is a systematic record of the functional abilities of the parents. It can be done on a very factual basis. Who is qualified to do a parental capacity assessment? The assessment is to gather and record a specific body of information and make an informed opinion about it. Who is able to do that? Basically anyone with the background and interpersonal skills to follow the guidelines can do them. Anyone with a degree in one of the social sciences should be able to take the training in doing such assessments. It takes time to develop those interview skills and the experience to assess the material. One needs to be able to read people. For instance you have received a positive written reference and you choose to interview that person. In the interview she seems to hesitate about certain things and shows some discomfort. There is something she is not telling you and your interview skills draw out the fact that this mother has an explosive temper that gets out of control.

With some exceptions one must bear in mind that education is not training, but it does provide a sound platform for certain types of training. An MSW does not qualify one to do child protection; neither does an MA in counselling psychology. Psychologists own the expertise in doing psychometric and certain related testing. No one else can do it. One must have a doctoral degree for licensing and those with an MA often become registered clinical counsellors, but one can have other degrees to join. This is not a legally protected title like licensed psychologist or registered social worker.

Family court counsellors often have bachelor’s or master’s degrees and they are called upon to do custody and access reports for which they are provided guidelines. The college of psychologists also has similar guidelines for psychologists so evidently one does not need a doctoral degree to do these reports. However, one does need extra training and mentoring to do them. I was once involved in helping a man in a custody dispute. Both a family court counsellor and a psychologist had done custody and access reports, so I obtained both sets of guidelines and studied them. Neither person had come remotely close to following the guidelines. The chief difference between them was that one cost a pile of money. Similarly with guidelines for parental capacity assessment, psychologists and social workers need additional training. However, I would say that the skills needed are much closer to social work skills than general counselling skills. For instance psychologists do not generally make home visits and so on. In general it is not necessary to use a psychologist for a PCA, but I would not hesitate to use one if psychometric testing were needed, should I suspect intellectual deficit. In the same way I would use a psychiatrist if I suspected a diagnosable mental illness.

Ray Ferris, knowledgeable - retired from MCFD

There were three things that got me interested in the Bayne case. I read about them on the CBC blog and contacted them. The first was that the director pursued the case against advice of counsel and I had already had a very bad experience with the same man. Secondly, it seemed to me that all the time guidelines had been bent out of shape and the act was not being followed. Thirdly, it only took about an hour on the phone to convince me that the parental profile completely contradicted a likelihood of abuse. You see one of the advantages of having done hundreds of cases is that you can work very fast and focus on the essentials very quickly. I guess it was a skill I learned early with caseloads of 250 cases." by Ray Ferris

SAMPLE QUESTIONS FOR A PARENTAL CAPACITY TEST

2011-12-10T00:00:00.000-08:00

If the Ministry is concerned to know Derek Hoare's capacity to parent three children, why not within a five month period state that? Make that happen. What is so fundamentally wrong with the people engaged in this work that the obvious is not apparent?

If you were participating in a parental capacity assessment, would you know what to expect? Have you already been through one of these?

There are several components to an assessment but certainly the elemental interview will subject you to a series of questions which can either appear conventional and non-threatening or if you are nervous to entrust your future to the psychologist who administers the test, they will be unsettling and worrisome.

The psychologist engaged by Child Protection may not develop the questions unilaterally but often a case worker or a team of child protection case workers suggests the questions for which they want to have answers. The parents are customarily presented with these questions in advance of the meeting with the psychologist. If you have had a PCA done, do these questions reflect your experience?

Keeping in mind that this is an assessment of capability to parent, rather than an assessment of parents' relationship with the MCFD Director and protection workers, what questions would be appropriate to ask a parent whose parental capabilities are in question? Here are sample questions that might be posed to Derek Hoare given his daughter's history with the MCFD and in school over recent years.

I am sure that SWs want to hear how convincingly Derek can express his desire and ability to care for his three children, and that will be a question that is asked.
Can Derek express assurances that he is able to and determined to provide reasonable safety from injury for his children?
Can the Derek supply substantive evidence that he possesses the necessary resources to securely parent three children (resources: financial, residential, family relationships, community)?
Does Derek believe that he not only can but that he will work collaboratively with the Ministry to make certain the safety and health of his children?
Do Derek have a reliable and responsive resource network upon which he can and will call when and if the demands of parenting three children becomes strained?
Is Derek able to present a demonstrable plan for a home setting, facilities and environment/atmosphere that speaks effectively to child safety, practicality and health?
Has Derek adequately considered the needs of his children, specially two children with special needs, and is he able to attend to these needs?
When and if one of the children has an appointment with a medical professional for any reason, can Derek provide assurance that he will listen to and follow medical recommendations concerning that child’s needs?
Does Derek express an openness and a willingness to follow forthcoming recommendations with regard to further requisite activities and/or resources that will possibly derive from the Parental Capability Assessment?

There are questions that it will not be appropriate to pose to Derek. This is an assessment of parenting capacity. Derek's lawyer should advise him and should intermediate this aspect of the pre-PCA agreement.
If you are a parent who has done one of these assessments, did you receive the questions prior to answering them, and was your lawyer permitted to contest the use of any question that was deemed inappropriate? And are these questions similar to those asked of you? Or were there other kinds of questions?

WE NEED A FORUM OF CHILD PROTECTORS AND CLIENTS

2011-12-09T05:34:00.001-08:00

Over some time a transformation of democratic freedom has occurred so that enforced compliance to bureaucratic rules and codes is the obligation.

We should be deeply concerned with the actions of B.C.’s child protection services and other similar international agencies about which we read. Citizens need to be heard. They need a voice. There must be a forum, an audience that will listen to the heart cries of thousands of British Columbia’s population. Perhaps the citizens themselves must organize a conference to which news media are particularly invited. And if we move in this direction, we should know what brought us here.

Our constitution defines Canada as a democracy with power in the hands of the whole people. In theory and in most practical ways private disputes are settled from the basis that everyone is equal before the law. When conferring public responsibility upon one person it is not class membership but personal ability that is decisive. Therefore in political and daily life Canadian life is free, open and tolerant. We respect people who are in positions of authority and we obey law.

Over some time a transformation of democratic freedom has occurred so that enforced compliance to bureaucratic rules and codes is the obligation. In hand with this there has been an observable evolution of society into a welfare state and the expectation by citizens is that government will solve most or all social problems. To accomplish this, trillions of dollars must be spent to effect necessary remedies to social ills. Yet social problems to not diminish but escalate, as though society is becoming sicker and that may demand the conclusion that the therapeutic state is incompetent.

When the government is deemed the therapeutic manager of social ills then it must also decide which problems should be addressed with the limited resources of our tax-funded budgets. Bureaucracies determine what problems require curing and what remedies should be used. Prudently, our government has concluded that vulnerable children must be protected. Recklessly, our government has authored a policy that invites abuse from ill-advised protectors, and authorized a protection practice which has virtual performance immunity on the field. Consequently, we have received the delivery of services too often spotted with hasty decisions, inadequate assessment, mistaken conclusions, and unjust treatment of BC residents and citizens. We need a forum by which to say to our government through the media, "we are not going to take it any more."

DEREK HOARE IS IN PAIN - SOME DAYS MORE THAN OTHERS

2011-12-08T18:24:00.001-08:00

Derek Hoare talked out loud this morning. He shared his feelings. Deep, deep feelings. His girl is gone. Her birthday is six days away. Christmas is around the veritable corner and Ayn, his nine year old, soon to be TEN, sweetheart is not at home. He has not seen her for over five months, and that’s another story which if you want to read it, it’s here. But today, just hear him.

“I miss her so much, not sure why these past few days have been so emotional, nothing seems to set it off in particular... just washes over you. Or more like it begins in your chest as tightness and then diffuses throughout you. Comes and goes... and off to a terrible start today.... dreamt of her again, woke very upset, took 10 minutes just to write this.”

“And why is it that when we are upset, instinctually we hold our breath, or stop breathing.... and then proceed to gasp when we can.”

“I still hear her voice and I can close my eyes and see her.... this is just a nightmare.”

“Gonna be a rough day.”

“It hurts like it was yesterday.”

“Terrible.”

“Weird, I don't really know why it is so potent now either, I think it is because now with the proposal out of the way I have time in front of me, and can see the time behind me, and it is so terrible.... I just miss her so much. And when I am busy doing things to get her home it is like I am with her or distracted or something, and now there is just a void filled with pain.”

NOTE: Ayn is autistic. On June 12th she left her back yard and went down the street. Derek couldn’t find her. Police were called and found her three hours later. Although she was happily returned to him that day, on June 16th, social workers removed her from her school and then notified Derek. Ayn was assessed, prescribed anti-psychotic drugs to which she is not accustomed, and was eventually placed with foster parents. She cried for the first eighteen days until she was given a photo of her daddy. Can you appreciate what that does to a father? He has two sons as well, one of whom is also autistic. The Ministry did not remove Ayn due to neglect or abuse or any other defensible reason. One social worker intimated the removal was to ease Derek’s load. Okay, how’s that working for him. You heard him above. Derek Hoare’s burden is one thousand times heavier because of the intervention by a protection agency in British Columbia that concentrates in incompetence. It retains employees who possess modest aptitude for distinguishing what is correct, suitable, honorable and true. Policy permits them to blunder with lives without apology, without timely treatment, without regard for universally understood “best interest.” With this kind of workmanship, it will always be a rough day for some children and parents in this province. Secrecy and unaccountability does not serve citizens well.

AYN IS CAUGHT IN A SYSTEM WITHOUT GRACE

2011-12-07T08:10:00.001-08:00

2007 Album Cover by group 'Without Grace'

Ayn was removed from her father and her home over five months ago. Ostensibly this will have been to observe her. The precipitating cause of this government child welfare action was her three hour unescorted daytrip on June 12th when her father lost touch with her. He was concerned. She had climbed over the fence in the family back yard. She was exploring. Children do that. Autistic children do that. Ayn is autistic. It’s somewhat more difficult to reinforce understanding of potential harm and cooperation with parental authority with an autistic child. Ayn’s exploration took down the street to a neighbour’s yard where she was found playing. She was returned to her father that day.

The Ministry of Children flagged this case. Due diligence would have uncovered a typical litany of episodes and challenges of bizarre behaviour and outburst as well as a record of charming conduct and loving moments. Due diligence would have revealed the primary care of a father, Derek, as dedicated, attentive, systematic and loving. The results of this due diligence would unsurprisingly be confidence in Derek’s parenting skills and a commitment to return Ayn to him in her best interests. How long does a due diligence assessment take? Certainly not five months. Furthermore, whatever paltry assessment was done on Ayn in the initial days of her incarceration, it was sufficient in the estimation of medical professionals associated with her care to justify the prescription of a recipe of anti-psychotic drugs to render her placid. A docile child is manageable and that was especially necessary when the principle calming agent, her father, was withheld from her.

What the Ministry created on the 16th day of June was a basket case child because she cried for eighteen straight days. Then this disgusting excuse for a government care agency requested from Derek, a photo of himself with Ayn so that she could be comforted - BINGO! Wouldn’t that inform intelligent, well trained, perceptive, altruistically-spirited social workers? Of course! So what have we serving the needs of children arbitrarily removed from parents? Something less than appropriate. Something flawed at its heart. Something populated by social workers who cannot break free from the restraints of bureaucratic and judicial shackles in order to be humane. Something administered by well paid bureaucrats who become deaf to the cries of the camps of parental refugees on this democratic continent, and who become sight impaired so they cannot distinguish between true and misleading cases of abuse and neglect.

Ayn is only one of the many cases in which the Ministry of Children and Family Development has erred and failed to acknowledge the error in judgement but subjected children and parents to treatment we all find reprehensible, as would some of the social workers were they on this side of the fence looking over. It is no wonder that we have lost faith in a system that cannot respond with grace.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE

2011-12-06T00:00:00.000-08:00

ISN'T SHE A BEAUTY?

During the past 10 years, an average of 271 children in government care have been adopted annually in B.C. Many are of school age and many are siblings who should stay together. The Government of British Columbia proclaimed November as Adoption Awareness Month. The hope is to raise awareness about children in care who are waiting for adoptive homes, and also to recognize adoption as a valued way to build a family. Perhaps you know children whose parents perished in some unfortunate way or who were incapable of caring for their children, and therefore you see the worth of an adoptive family. I do. However, I have a hefty concern about Directors with the Ministry of Children and Family Development who pursue permanent care of children when to reasonable and informed people this seems absurdly excessive and unambiguously mistaken.

Children who are in permanent care in B.C. may be placed for adoption through the Ministry of Children and Family Development. Permanent care occurs when the courts have determined that the child cannot return to the care of their birth parent(s). Paul and Zabeth Bayne’s four children were being contested in a court of law in 2010 and 2011 and it was MCFD’s intention to have a judge rule a Continuing Care Order which would eventuate in the adoption of these children. How absolutely terrible that would have been. Today, after having been separated for four years, the children and Paul and Zabeth are contentedly living together and have been for the past three months following a magistrate’s ruling last March that shaken baby had not been proven but that because the infant’s injuries were not explained satisfactorily the parents could not have the children returned immediately but had to work with the Ministry through the summer to reach amicable resolution. This could have and should have been done within the first year rather than going four years and then trying to take the children permanently.

This year, to celebrate this Adoption Awareness Month, a travelling art gallery promoted by Adoptive Families Association of BC helped to promote Expressions of Family, raising awareness about the need to find more adoptive homes for teens. The gallery featured 14 pieces of artwork from youth, aged 12 to 24. Each told the story of the artist's adoption and foster care experiences. Teens represent more than 30 per cent of children in government care registered for adoption but average less than 10 per cent of adoptions every year. Two hundred sixty-three children and youth in government care in B.C. were adopted last year, but 1,200 others are still waiting for a family to call their own.

Please, please, please, you who are working the case of little Ayn Van Dyk, do everything that you possibly can right now to return her to her father’s parental care. This is the expression of the family that Ayn has and needs. Derek Hoare is a good man, a capable father. He understands autism and he facilitates Ayn’s positive development. Five and one half months has been enough of an interruption into their happiness. She has not benefited from this removal from a family of love. The apprehension was unnecessary. Any improvement or development of Derek’s parental skill that MCFD wished to address should have been handled with counsel rather than punishment and it still can. This girl will never live in an environment where she is wanted and loved more than in her Dad’s house with her two sibling brothers. She will celebrate her tenth birthday on December 14th. Please help her to remember this birthday for all the right reasons – most importantly that she is at home.

10 DAYS UNTIL AYN'S 10TH BIRTHDAY

2011-12-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

What a marvelous smile Ayn has

Within ten days, the world will celebrate Ayn Van Dyk’s TENTH birthday. I did say the world. International friends and advocates from numerous continents and countries and climates will be honouring Ayn with customized birthday merriment. There will be balloons and music and decorations and cake and candles and videos and website and blog entries and letters and cards with thousands of congratulatory expressions.

That’s right! The Facebook page called Help Bring little Autistic girl back to her daddy contains the moment by moment interactions of almost 5000 people whose heart has responded to the injustice meted out to this little girl when she was nine years old. It was on June 16^th 2011 that the Ministry of Children and Family Development in B.C. took her from her school and then informed her father Derek that they had her in their custody. That was to be viewed as in her best interests and brazenly Derek was to consider this the Ministry’s proactive step to relieve him of burden because he was seen as overwhelmed.

And this preposterous conclusion was result of a more than standard walk away by Ayn on the 12^th of June. She climbed over a high fence and was gone from her yard for three hours. Autistic children do this. They wander off. Do you understand how a parent might not have his or her eyes glued to a child who is contained safely in a fenced back garden? Her brief trip could have been addressed by constructive follow-up with Derek, and for no reason whatsoever, did Ayn need to be taken from her safe and loving home. Worse than even the separation her physical welfare has been invaded by a plethora of antipsychotic drugs over these months. So now, she arrives at her birthday month and she is not at home. By the time of her birthday it will be six months, one half of a year, 180 days that she has been prevented from returning to her family home.

People all over the world understand that this represents injustice, grievance, infringement and unfairness.

This band of 5000 is requesting that the Ministry of Children and Family Development return Ayn to her family in time for her December 14^th TENTH BIRTHDAY.

Some of the Global Participants of this 10^th Birthday Celebration are these folks, united by nothing other than love for Ayn.

ABBOTSFORD, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Derek Hoare;
TILLSONBURG, ONTARIO - Moy Harries
TILLSONBURG, Ontario, Canada - Aunt Moy, Uncle Jeff & Cousin Cole
BOURNEMOUTH, UK - Mindy Moobs;
NIAGARA REGION OF ONTARIO, CANADA- Bobbie Gellner, Pat Niagara AND Canada Court Watch;
NETHERLANDS - Aaltje Welle Donke;
UNITED KINGDOM - Shelly Williamson;
NORTHUMBERLAND STRAIT between NOVA SCOTIA and PEI - Jean Nicol;
SURREY, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Carolyn Doherty;
SURREY, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Ron Unruh;
SHUSWAP, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Cheryl Mclean;
EDEN, ONTARIO NEAR TILLSONBURG - Carol Burwell;
VANCOUVER, BC - Sarah Leary;
WESTERN CANADA - Mea Jones;
CHILLIWACK, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Lynda Thexton Willson;
ALLISTON, ONTARIO - Geralda Cyr;
DELTA, BC - Renee Boisvert;
HAMMONDS PLAINS, NOVA SCOTIA - Victoria Ettinger;
DUBLIN, IRELAND; Loraine Matthews;
MISSION, BC - Melanie Berry;
NORFOLK, UK - Debbie Woodrow Norwich;
AGASSIZ/HARRISON HOT SPRINGS, BC - Laura-Lee Hagan-Chadwick; MONTREAL, QUEBEC - Chantale Bitemeh;
ONTARIO - Alfredine Linda Plourde;
ALBERTA - Velvet Martin;
CANADA - Protecting Canadian Children;
MINNESOTA - Beth Wilde;
STATEN ISLAND, NEW YORK - Katrina Valentino
WILTSHIRE, NEAR STONEHENGE, UK - Emma Ashton
MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA, USA - Rob Campbell
COQUITLAM, BC - Tabetha Farnell
SOOKE, BC - Hubert L Johnson
INDIALANTIC, FLORIDA (EAST COAST) 20 MILES EAST OF COCOA BEACH CAPE KENNEDY - Paul Green
NORTHFIELD, NJ, USA - Shilo Apron Previti
SINGAPORE - Michelle Johnson
BALLARAT VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA - Bonnie Arnold
SOUTH DAKOTA, USA - Mary Scheel-Buysse
AICHI-KEN, JAPAN - Aiji Aki
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, USA - Sylvia Calderon Lopez
WALES, UK - Carol Greenwood
PAWTUCKET, RHODE ISLAND & QUINCY, MASSACHUSETTS, USA - Elisa Marie Poleet & Family
COQUITLAM, BC, CANADA - Carmella Saulino
ISLE OF MAN, UK - Regina Kaniewski
AUSTRALIA - Trace Kelderman
FRANCE - Indira Mercier
SAINT PAUL, MN, USA - Laura Thunstrom
PADUCAH, KENTUCKY, USA - Karen Driver
LANGLEY, BC, CANADA - Denise DeVries Boldt
ELORA / FERGUS AREA, ONTARIO, CANADA - Cynthia McCall
WILBURN, BOAZ, ALABAMA, USA - Janice Wilburn
BREMEN, INDIANA USA - Marla Wise Miller
Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada - Melissa Mitchell
JACKSONVILL, FLORIDA, USA - Barbara McClure
CORBY, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE, UK - Paul McHutchison
ST. JOHNS, NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADA - Lori Pynn
UNIVERSITY OF CHICHESTER OR CHICHESTER CATHEDRAL, UK - Ana-Alicia Bryant
MELMERBY BEACH, NOVA SCOTIA, CANADA - Jean Nicol
PETERBOROUGH, UK - Wendy Hirst
MONCTON, NB, CANADA - Michelle Bainbridge
MONCTON, NB, CANADA - Carl Bainbridge
ALBERTA - Kristie Janel
MINNESOTA, USA - Honer Rebecca
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, USA - Lola Birtick-Boyd

SINGAPORE - Michelle Johnson
BALLARAT VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA - Bonnie Arnold
SOUTH DAKOTA, USA - Mary Scheel-Buysse
AICHI-KEN, JAPAN - Aiji Aki
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, USA - Sylvia Calderon Lopez
WALES, UK - Carol Greenwood
COQUITLAM, BC, CANADA - Carmella Saulino
ISLE OF MAN, UK - Regina Kaniewski
AUSTRALIA - Trace Kelderman
FRANCE - Indira Mercier
SAINT PAUL, MN, USA - Laura Thunstrom
LANGLEY, BC, CANADA - Denise DeVries Boldt
ELORA / FERGUS AREA, ONTARIO, CANADA - Cynthia McCall
WILBURN, BOAZ, ALABAMA, USA - Janice Wilburn
BREMEN, INDIANA USA - Marla Wise Miller
MOOSE JAW, Saskatchewan, Canada - Melissa Mitchell
JACKSONVILL, FLORIDA, USA - Barbara McClure
CORBY, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE, UK - Paul McHutchison
ST. JOHNS, NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADA - Lori Pynn
MELMERBY BEACH, NOVA SCOTIA, CANADA - Jean Nicol
PETERBOROUGH, UK - Wendy Hirst
MONCTON, NB, CANADA - Michelle Bainbridge
MONCTON, NB, CANADA - Carl Bainbridge
ALBERTA - Kristie Janel
MINNESOTA, USA - Honer Rebecca
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, USA - Lola Birtick-Boyd
AUSTIN, TEXAS, USA - Stephanie Philippi
PASADENA, CA USA - Nicole Biegenzahn & Family
COQUITLAM, B.C. - Sally Bretherton Comin
TURKEY - Christina Maria Kassama Bag
MILTON, ON - Laurie Hatton

Ethical Issues in Child Protection

2011-12-04T07:01:00.001-08:00

The management of child protection concerns arouses strong emotions and controversies and creates ethical tensions for everyone concerned.

The ethical and legal duties of health-care professionals and law enforcement personnel and educators are to act in the best interests of the child by safeguarding children and reporting concerns. However, almost always this will involve conflicts with parents and produce reluctance among some professionals to become involved in the process, especially controversial situations. Of course this reluctance is met with mandatory reporting here in British Columbia and that compels people to overcome their reluctance. One wonders at times how effective such a compulsory reporting mandate is in the face of diagnostic uncertainties or social and family reservations. Assembly of a stronger evidence base should be seen as ethically justified, but the law requires reporting of a mere suspicion or a concern. This becomes ethically and morally problematic because suspicion, concern, and even a comprehensive evidence base involve value judgements. People compelled to report are not always competent to properly assess a situation. The result is too often, unjustified and vexatious complaints. I truly believe that in Ayn Van Dyk’s case, the signs were misjudged, the indicators were insufficient for taking her away from her father, whether to assess her health, or her conduct or her father’s management skill as a dad.

If Ayn’s case is indicative of current approaches to child protection then they may neither promote greater understanding nor be in the best interests of children. I am convinced that child protection in British Columbia requires a revised social contract, a new policy to dictate practice. Then the effective protection of children could include: a duty of care that adequately addresses the primacy of the child's welfare; the acquisition of a sound evidence base; Ministry of Children and medical, law enforcement and education professional transparency and accountability; suitable protection from malicious and vexatious complaints; and a shift emphasis towards a more inquiring system that embraced the principles of truth and reconciliation.

DRUGS PUT FOSTER CHILDREN AT RISK

2011-12-03T00:00:00.001-08:00

Which is easier?
1) To medicate an autistic child
2) To physically restrain an autistic child
3) To pay $200 per hour to a therapist to talk an autistic child through problems.

Guess which option MCFD has used with Ayn Van Dyk?

Because it is prescribed to them, children in foster care are more likely to take multiple antipsychotic medications for longer periods of time than any other group of children. These types of medications include stimulants, antidepressants and mood stabilizers. Taking multiple antipsychotics is not generally considered standard medical practice for children. But that doesn’t appear to give medical practitioners connected with MCFD pause for reflection. A greater number of children with physical, mental and developmental problems are being placed in foster care and are already on the medications. And what if the drugs are used "off-label," that is, for purposes other than those for which they have been approved? Is that happening?

Antipsychotic medication can cause a litany of health problems such as severe weight gain, an increased risk of diabetes and irreversible movement disorders, yet it is among the top-selling drugs in North America.

BRINDA ADHIKARI, JOAN MARTELLI and SARAH KOCH authored an article on December 1st entitled, “Doctors Put Foster Children at Risk with Mind-Altering Drugs.” In the article, among other things they say, “Across America, doctors are putting foster children on powerful, mind-altering drugs at rates up to 13 times that of children in the general population. What's more, doctors are prescribing foster children drugs at doses beyond what the Food and Drug Administration has approved, sometimes in potentially dangerous combinations, according to a new report by the federal Government Accountability Office.”

Here's a list of some of the most common drugs that are prescribed:

Abilify is approved to treat schizophrenia, bipolar disorder in some adolescent and teens, as well as irritability associated with autism spectrum disorder. But the drug is prescribed off-label in children as a mood stabilizer and to treat ADHD symptoms. Abilify received a black box warning label for inducing suicidal feelings in children.

Seroquel/Seroquel XR is approved to treat schizophrenia and acute manic episodes of bipolar disorder in some adolescents and teens. Its long-releasing version, Seroquel XR, is not approved for children. However, both drugs are used off-label as a sedative for children with sleep and anxiety disorders.

Risperdal is approved to treat acute manic episodes of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in children as young as age 10. It is also used to manage irritability in children with autism spectrum disorder. The drug is used off-label to treat Tourette syndrome, and anxiety and eating disorders.

Zyprexa, also approved to treat acute manic episodes of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in children as young as age 10, is also used off-label to treat anxiety and eating disorders, depression and Tourette syndrome. One of the most common side effects noted in the drug has been serious weight gain.

We should not accept that the only way to reach a child or restrain a child is through psychotropic drugs. Doctors, even when employed by MCFD should be super-vigilant about the rush to prescribe drugs to children and youth. Michel Jackson’s doctor is gone for a couple of years. Criminal charges are possible and lawsuits are viable in British Columbia as well as California. But far beyond the peril of legal action, we shouldn’t accept drugging of children as the optimum behavioural remedy when there are other compassionate and humane ways to do this that cost the investment of personal time and effort and love.

A PROPER ASSESSMENT OF DEREK'S PARENTING

2011-12-03T00:00:00.000-08:00

Identifying neglect or negligence and assessing risk is a multifaceted procedure. Seldom can social workers establish negligence in the care of a child based upon a single incident or event. Incidents with respect to an autistic child should be deemed an even greater challenge to assessing whether a parent is providing adequate care.

Proper procedure assumes that social workers will assemble a picture of the family as the context for understanding a specific incident. That picture will require conversations and information from numerous sources such as relatives, friends and neighbours and professionals. Always such information will anticipate variable degrees of reliability and yet social workers are expected to make judgements and then to act concerning the welfare of children in these cases. Sometimes they must act quickly.

Certainly in some cases social workers must make rapid judgements about the character of people, parents and informants but all these should be checked and rechecked for an investigation to be considered thorough. Initial information, a report, a call-in must be checked scrupulously for accuracy and reliability since child abuse or neglect is so emotive and reports can be exaggerated or even false. When investigative procedure is suitably conducted, it will result in data that may revise the initial case assessment. There must be a willingness to change an opinion. Moreover, a social worker may find that given some reflective time away from the child and the parents, and in collaboration with others such as a supervisor, the facts produce a different picture of the case.

The social workers charged with the task of looking into Ayn Van Dyk’s three hour absence from her home did not take the time to ask enough of the important questions to enough people. They acted hastily and should not have done so. Not for one moment do I believe that a methodical and comprehensive evaluation of Derek Hoare as a man and a father has been done. Had it been done between June 12th and June 16th, social workers would not have removed Ayn from Derek’s capable care, had it been done anytime in these past months, a responsible team of social workers would not allow five and one half months to pass without a serious attempt to return Derek’s daughter Ayn to him. The June 12th incident that precipitated her removal on June 16th was not so mysterious that its details could not be ferreted out within hours. The reason why Ayn had a few minutes unseen by her father to clamber over a fence from a high standing playhouse, could have found easy explanation. Even if the answer was not satisfying or if it required some cautionary instruction or directives to Derek about Ayn’s care for the future, that could have been done by a conscientious social worker so that the child could remain where she rightly belongs. 'Conscientious' did not need to be equated with quick removal of the girl from her loving father and brothers.

Here on this blog for three years now, I have reflected the tension which we, the public create for social workers because on one hand we want to insure the protection of children against parental abuse and or neglect and on the other hand we want to champion the family as the citadel of democratic freedom with which no one including governments should interfere. So social workers desperately need to get it right this time. In the mediation that has transpired during recent months, Derek has been charged with the responsibility of develop a plan of care for Ayn. He has expended significant care and time in researching, writing and proofing the content of his proposal and that has now been presented to MCFD. He is assured by expert reviewers that his is a strong proposal, so social workers need now to endorse this quickly and as hastily as they took Ayn, now return her to Derek, so she can celebrate her 10th birthday with her family on the 14th of December.