REASONS TO BELIEVE CHILD PROTECTION SERVICES ARE OUT OF CONTROL / 560

Child Protective Services in British Columbia fall under the mandate of the Ministry of Children and Family Services (MCFD). MCFD responds to reports of child abuse or neglect. Premier Christie has been championing the notion of servicing families effectively since she was elected this year. It remains to be seen whether there will be legs to this lofty promise. Real cases of disenfranchised families interrupted by MCFD in what often appears to be unnecessary severity as in child removals continue to occur and government in Victoria predictably responds with a no comment statement.

CONCENTRATE ON IMPROVING THE OUTCOMES / Part 419 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

This post is specific to child protection. There will have to be a change in casework practice within the Ministry of Children and Family Development in B.C. The Ministry Office in Victoria has to make changes and immediacy is imperative.

This Ministry can no longer endure bad press. Shocking stories continue. Many families who could be helped never receive help. I am talking about help. It's difficult for me as a taxpayer and fair-minded and democratic spirited man to understand why resourcing help to families is such a difficult concept to affect. Of course I do not understand all of the human dynamics of individual cases, the stresses that social workers feel when working with adults, parents who are challenged by habits, substances, and life. I do not understand how budgetary cuts have reduced the availability of services that can be offered. Still, it concerns me that we have authorized people, many with bachelor's degrees, even master's degrees in social work, to work with families and subsequently so many of these families instead of gaining strength and remaining intact, become 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.

logo design by james wenzel

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 three children to their biological parents, Paul and Zabeth Bayne, for which a ruling is expected from Judge Crabtree by January 19th. Stay posted.

OPTIMUM POSITION/ Part 399 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

If you stand too close to a painting, you see only the broad brush strokes of colour.

If you stand too far back you are unable to see the details.

But at that optimum position you can see enough detail that the composition evokes a Wow!

'Mary's Eyes' closeup

The Director and his team all the way to the social workers who are in regular contact with Paul and Zabeth Bayne are too close to the painting of the Bayne family ordeal and they see only the heavy impaso of the Baynes refusal to acknowledge responsibility for their youngest child's injuries three years ago. They see only the thick application of public exposure. They see their own Ministry overtures as fair and generous and considerate and they view the Baynes as uncooperative. They are so close that they cannot see the nuances of the changing brush strokes over the past three years. They see the Baynes determination, and unwillingness to acquiesce to Ministry pressures.

Mary Polak, Leslie du Toit and all of the associates in Victoria are standing too far away to see the details. They cannot see that the portrait is really not one canvas but a diptych, two canvasses side by side, one showing the distress of a family separated and the other showing the joy at being together. The Victoria viewers have no appreciation for the pathos and expression of this family portrait. They cannot see the pain on the faces or the tears on the cheeks. Nor can they see pleasure on the faces of parents holding their children and happiness on the countenances of the children as they play with one another among the familiar items of home. Nor does Victoria care. And the crew in Victoria stand too far away to see the mistakes that have been making in creating the A side of the diptych while preventing the B side from being realized.

'Mary's Eyes' by Ron Unruh 2010

The premise for the creation of the position of Representative of Children and Youth was that an official should be charged with responsibility to stand at the optimum position in order to view family portraits like that of the Baynes. While the Bayne portrait may not be a classic it nonetheless grabs a viewers attention from across the room and with each step closer it delivers and holds the viewer's attention. We were hoping that the Representative's Office would stand at the optimum position and notice that Side A was not completed and would then conclude that Side A should never have been begun. But that is not the Representative's mandate. We were hoping that the Representative would engage with the idyllic Side B composition and offer an opinion but that is apparently not mandated either. As much as I hate to admit this, this leaves only us, the discerning public to stand at the optimum place to see both the entire composition as well as the strokes that have achieved these results. If we feel strongly about this portrait we will have to invite countless other people to examine it as well, critics, journalists, news networks, politicians, legislators.

THE PARADIGM AND THE BAYNES / Part 315 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne/

The child-saving paradigm

Child welfare began in the last century as a sincere effort to rescue children from abusive or negligent parents and home situations. That was admirable then. Children were plucked from horrendous environments. Decades have passed and economies changed. Generations have come and gone and most parents manage parenting well and family life flourishes. A need still remains for resources targeted to children and families that experience difficulties. But what we seem to have perpetuated in our child welfare systems is the save the child paradigm. You rescue best if you remove the child. The child is hungry in the home? Take the child away. The child is inadequately clothed? Take the child away. For all the expertise and credentials and dollars we are throwing at child welfare, we remain anchored in this culture of salvation for the children by removing them from their homes and families. That is of itself so counter-cultural to ethnic groups who have come to Canada to live and thrive. It is counter-productive to homegrown citizens to whom life has dished out hardships and finding themselves unemployed or unhealthy or otherwise dysfunctional, instead of finding help from our heavy tax invested government ministries, find opposition and invasion of privacy and rights, and find harm that sends some over the edge. Aboriginal communities particularly have experienced the insidious results of child-saving philosophy. Not respecting First Nations families, our provincial governments in Canada have mistakenly removed many children on the premise of helping them, saving them. Is some of this being addressed now? Yes! But slowly and in small increments.

Child Welfare Enterprise in B.C.

Child welfare is not important to the general population. Young families live and love life and generally get on quite well. Why would they pay attention? It is only when one ordinary family ends up in the child welfare system that these few individuals learn how difficult life can become. Child welfare is also tough I believe for those who must work within it. The work load is increasing for each worker. From among B.C. children approximately 1 to 1.5 percent are in the care of the government. After years of leadership upheaval it may appear now that the Ministry has achieved a turn around. We are still waiting to see. After all, from 2004 to 2006 there were four different ministers. Four deputy or acting deputy ministers served during this same period. Then along came Ms. Dutoit and Ms. Polak and Ms.Turpel-Lafond and the system transformation plan.

Child Protection and the Bayne Family

Tomorrow counsel Finn Jensen will begin his summary statement to the Court. I intend to be there although I do not look forward to it. I wish to report to you the essence of this final day in court for this case. The treatment of this family over almost three years has been nothing short of an escalating disgrace. It has been a discredit to the good Transformation intentions that are birthed in Victoria's Ministry offices. I am convinced that the regional ministry suspects that they are losing this case. They have been scrambling. It's shameful and you may yet hear about it.

The Bayne Story / Part 304 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne/

Soon compelling documentaries will publicly review the B.C. government's victimization of a five-member family. Victoria is not going to like this. News networks are ready and waiting.

Paul and Zabeth Bayne had it all. They were young. They had love for one another, faith in God, a home and property for children to play on. They had one son whose birth was not easy for Zabeth, and then another son born with the challenges of serious prematurity, born at 25 weeks. Zabeth and Paul had strength, resiliency and determination. They took this child for medical checks several times each week and various services to assist his development were brought into the family home, services to assist with feeding and muscle toning and general health developmental. Their family doctor was pleased with the children's health and the parents' care of their children. And then a daughter was born and their joy was immeasurable. She too had a premature birth.

The Ministry of Children became involved with the Baynes during the first year of their second child's life, prior to the arrival of the baby girl. At his sixth month he was suddenly crying inconsolably and as he squirmed they noticed his arm hung limply. Tests at hospital revealed a fracture. Standard protective procedure you might say. Both parents were questioned. Paul was asked to leave his house for two weeks. A study identified prematurity of bones in the child and Paul was permitted to resume his role at home. But a Bayne file had begun in the MCFD database.

Paul and Zabeth have looked forward to a large and thriving family and they love their children, so the family of five was just beginning their lives together when that determinative day occurred. The new baby was doing well, fed well, slept well – all was well. Of course she, like her brother would contend with the conditions that pertain to premature birth. Then a household accident. Can be perceived as preposterous but then how many similar mishaps have occurred in our homes. This one had serious consequences. One child active and happy fell on the baby resting on a blanket on a carpeted floor where daddy could see her and to whom mommy would soon return from the other room. Zabeth says she saw the fall. You know much of the rest of this story. Within hours their girl's feeding habits changed and other serious signs prompted Paul and Zabeth to take her to local hospitals and clinics without anyone accurately identifying her issues over several days. Then at last the baby was taken to BC Children's Hospital where the brain bleed and other symptoms were noted and the shaken baby syndrome assessment was made.

Even the RCMP needed to investigate a possible case of abuse but closed that down early. The MCFD was loath to discard the SBS and Abuse storyline, even when other medical experts disputed the SBS diagnosis. What you will not know is the archived attitudes, tactics, setups and actions by the local MCFD to sustain the assumption of risk to the children at the hands of their parents or to trip up the parents. I won't bother covering it. Journalists are poised and will be all over this. I am guessing that when these become public, Victoria will not be pleased.

WHAT IS THIS DESTRUCTIVE PHENOMENON? / Part 178 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne/

Ever since I became interested in the Paul and Zabeth Bayne family retrieval, I have been exposed to a phenomenon which I am seeking to understand. The phenomenon is noticeable in the stories people tell me about their experience with the Ministry of Children and Family Development. I personally feel a rising level of the phenomenon myself as I read the history of disappointment with and attempts to revise the MCFD through the years.

I have tried to identify this phenomenon with an appropriate word or a tag. Cynicism and skepticism come to mind. Either one may be suitable but not exact. Cynicism with regard to MCFD is the belief that only selfishness motivates the actions and decisions of those involved in the Ministry and of the wider government that authorizes them. Skepticism maintains doubt about the statements, the promises, the agreements, the plans of MCFD employees and questions the validity of anything the MCFD purports to be factual. Another close kin word may be pessimism. Pessimism is an inclination to emphasize adverse aspects, attitudes, intentions, and outcomes of MCFD involvement. That is not exact enough either.

I believe the proper term is 'distrust.' If the other three terms are disheartening, when associated with a Ministry that we all fund for our mutual benefit, the application of the term 'distrust' to the Ministry with the power to alter lives is demoralizing. Yet 'distrust' is what I hear from people.

Distrust is the confident expectation that Ministry employees' motives, intentions, policies and behaviors are sinister and harmful to one's own interests. That's what I hear from people. This may often entail a sense of fear and anticipation of discomfort or danger. Distrust naturally prompts us to take steps that reduce our vulnerability in an attempt to protect our interests. Distrust is not the exclusive domain of parents who feel wronged. Distrust is experienced by Ministry people toward some parents and supporters as well. Distrust possesses a destructive potential. Up go the adversarial, competitive walls. Cooperation gets lost. Conflict is exacerbated.

Once distrust has been established, it frames subsequent events in the relationship so that even good-faith efforts by the opposing party in the relationship are met with disbelief and suspicion. The result is a "self-fulfilling prophecy," where every move the other person makes is interpreted as additional evidence that justifies an initial decision to distrust him/her. This distrust not only inhibits cooperation in the relationship, but also may result in retaliation that causes the conflict to escalate. When the other person reciprocates this sentiment, there is mutual distrust that further fuels the escalation of conflict.

I cannot express how dismayed I am with the behaviour of Fraser Region Ministry case management. Paul and Zabeth Bayne are not villainous but are wounded parents whose innocence of responsibility for their daughter's injuries has been met with the Ministry's unrelenting insistence on their culpability. When supporters spontaneously appear to encourage their friends at court, the Ministry assumes the Baynes have invited them. When the Baynes request more visitation time with their children in a park setting or at a pre school or kindergarten event, the Ministry assumes there is another agenda behind the request. Folks, these are people who want to be with their children. Time is marching on. The Fraser Region and the Ministry office in Victoria need to give their heads a shake. Of course there is publicity around this case. Publicity is the only instrument helpless parents have in response to a Ministry with absolute power. Ministry! Consider the obligation you have to make this family work again. But then ….oh well, that distrust is kicking in again.

(painting: 'Distrust Too' by Stephen Clarke, Perth Ontario)

Zabeth and Paul Bayne – Part 56 – The Bayne Campaign for Justice

A QUESTION OF INEQUITY

Paul and Zabeth have been informed in the past that when they visit their three children on the two afternoons each week, they are not to speak to their children about the past. That’s correct. They are not permitted to talk about what it was like to be a family two years ago. They are not to remind them of home as it was before the Ministry of Children stepped into their lives in October 2007 and removed the children from all that was familiar. These two little boys have been in four foster homes in two years, yet Paul and Zabeth are not permitted to speak hope to them about the possibility of coming home to be a family again. A supervisor sits in all these family gatherings and listens, even making notes of what is observed and heard. Paul and Zabeth must be in compliance or visiting rights may be removed completely, because these children now belong to the province of British Columbia under an interim court order. Interim lasts a long time - over two years apparently!

But then, please note this inequity! The other afternoon while Zabeth and Paul visited their boys, one of them told mommy and daddy that the caregiver has told him that if the Judge rules that she can keep the children, then she promises to put them in swimming lessons. Would you consider that to be talking about the future and seeking to engender hope for a certain future outcome? I would. So apparently the same conversational restrictions are not applicable to the temporary care giver. It’s challenging for me to envision a foster caregiver wanting to kindle in a child an expectation for a result that terminates an existing family completely. This child has been told that he will be with the caregiver for a long time. How much more constructive would it be for a foster parent working for the province’s child protection and family development agency to be on assignment to encourage that child to believe that his family will come together again because that is what ‘we all want.’ ‘We’ should pertain to every member of this MCFD enterprise. ‘Restoration’ seems not to belong in the vocabulary of the MCFD officials who have managed the Bayne portfolio. On this same afternoon Paul and Zabeth were reminded that they are not allowed to speak to their children alone or out of the hearing range of a supervisor. No private conversations are permitted.

The regional MCFD should be all over this to insure the integrity of the Ministry’s mandate is not compromised. The regional MCFD office that manages the Bayne case is the Fraser Region. It will be interesting to learn whether this is acceptable MCFD practice or whether the Victoria MCFD front office conscience alarm goes off when they learn of this.

Zabeth and Paul Bayne – Part 44 – The Bayne Campaign for Justice

I WISH I UNDERSTOOD THE LACK OF CONCERN

I have been an organizational CEO. I know the stimulus of a high purpose. I thrived on the motivation of providing services that improve something for someone else. I know what it is like to have a roomy office and the electronics that empower me through connection and information. I know the satisfaction of having executive and administrative assistants outside my door efficiently completing tasks to which I assigned them or exercising initiatives as part of the team. I know the sense of pleasure that accompanies good performance reviews. I know the exhilaration of travel, of seeing new places and faces, of being recognized and called to speak to captive audiences. I know the autonomy of leaving the work day and ignoring all attempts to draw my attention away from personal relaxation.

So I know why the executive leaders of the Ministry of Children and Family Development in Victoria do not relate to the predicament of one British Columbia family. Responsibilities for MCFD are delegated down a lengthy chain of command. When the primary players at MCFD come to the office each day they focus on big picture policy matters and reports and speech writing and perhaps photo opps rather than individual family cases. That’s understandable. Those details belong to others down the command line.

However, when networks like CBC and Global TV air news hour segments that call a specific case into question with respect to MCFD conduct, evidence and decisions, then you would think that those occupying the high chairs in Victoria would think they should review the case files. Such a news story broke last spring with respect to Paul and Zabeth Bayne and their contest with MCFD. MCFD has had custody of their three children for two years. MCFD should have resolved this within three months. MCFD will say this long delay is entirely the Bayne’s fault. MCFD will say that the Baynes have failed to cooperate. That failure consists of not admitting to shaking their infant daughter which is something of which they were not guilty. RCMP after arresting and interrogating dropped all charges of wrongdoing against the Baynes.

In Spring 2009 then Minister of MCFD Tom Christensen as well as Premier Campbell were briefly interviewed and both said they would give it some attention. Perhaps they did.
Perhaps Christensen’s successor Mary Polak has read the file documents too. Perhaps the Deputy Minister Dutoit has as well. If that has not prompted an internal QUIZ SHOW then that is what I don’t understand. The MCFD position birthed and sustained by the Fraser Valley chapter of this frequently criticized Ministry should be causing the chief honchos in Victoria to sweat. This entire case against a loving family is founded on ethereal arguments based on suspicion and a need of evidence. I don’t understand that.

This MCFD wrong-headedness has injured this BC family in so many ways, caused children to question their parents’ love for them because of the separation; compelled them to hire solicitors whose fees have devoured their asset in a home; required a visitation schedule that has compromised the Baynes’ day jobs; caused them to focus all their energy into recovering a family they should never have lost.

It is time to fix this. I understand this. Strong leadership can do this.

Sign this Petition. 450 people have already signed. Do not make an ONLINE BAYNE CAMPAIGN DONATION at this petition site. Once you sign, exit the site. Your signature will still appear.