Children’s Aid Society funding model with “perverse incentives” set to change this year
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/03/15/childrens_aid_society_funding_model_with_perverse_incentives_set_to_change_this_year.html
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Ontario’s most vulnerable children kept in the shadows
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/12/12/ontarios_most_vulnerable_children_kept_in_the_shadows.html
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The inquest into Jeffrey Baldwin's death was supposed to shed light on the child welfare system and prevent more needless child deaths. Baldwin's inquest jury made 103 recommendations. Sep 06, 2013.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/inquest-into-boy-s-death-to-shed-light-on-child-welfare-system-1.1699846
Nearly six months after the inquest into the death of Katelynn Sampson began, jurors delivered another 173 recommendations. APRIL 29, 2016.
https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/inquest-into-death-of-7-year-old-girl-emphasizes-duty-to-report-abuse/article29798749/
276 OFFICIAL REASONS FOR CONCERN AND REASONABLE SUSPICION ABOUT THE SAFETY OF CHILDREN IN CARE.
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Reasonable suspicion is a reasonable presumption that a crime has been, is being, or will be committed. It is a reasonable belief based on facts or circumstances and is informed training and experience.
Reasonable suspicion is seen as more than a guess or hunch but less than probable cause.
Probable cause is the logical belief, supported by facts and circumstances, that a crime has been, is being, or will be committed.
The difference between the two terms is that probable cause means there is concrete evidence of a crime, whereas reasonable suspicion is open to broader interpretation.
Reasonable suspicion indicates that it appears that a crime has been committed; the phrase often is used to justify investigation into suspicious behavior when a crime may have been committed.
WHAT IS LOWER THAN REASONABLE GROUNDS FOR SUSPICION?
Simple suspicion is a lower threshold than reasonable grounds to suspect and is synonymous with a “gut feeling” or “hunch”. In other words, simple suspicion means that you have a feeling that something is unusual or suspicious, but do not have any facts.
Reasonable grounds to suspect is the required threshold in child protection legislation and is a step above simple suspicion.
This means that you do not have to prove the facts that led to your suspicion.
However, you do have the obligation to assess the facts that led to your determination of reasonable grounds to suspect the occurrence in front of a judge. The decision as to whether or not to grant a warrant and decide if a violation of law or government child welfare standards has actually occurred should determined by a fair and impartial judicial system under the same rules of evidence used by most every other court in Canada.
Reasonable grounds to believe is a higher threshold than reasonable grounds to suspect and is more than what is required to conduct a investigation without delay. Reasonable grounds to believe means that there is a probability, supported by verified facts. In other words, there is enough evidence to support a reasonable and trained person to believe, not just suspect a child or children are at risk.
For example, law enforcement must reach reasonable grounds to believe that criminal activity has occurred before they can obtain judicial authorizations, including a production order..
OACAS: Duty to report
Under section 125 of the Child, Youth and Family Services Act every person who has reasonable grounds to suspect that a child is or may be in need of protection must promptly report the suspicion and the information upon which it is based to a Children’s Aid Society.
It is not necessary to be certain that a child is or may be in need of protection to make a report to a children’s aid society. “Reasonable grounds” refers to the information that an average person, using normal and honest judgment, would need in order to decide to report. This standard has been recognized by courts in Ontario as establishing a low threshold for reporting.
http://www.oacas.org/childrens-aid-child-protection/duty-to-report/
How do you feel about child protection social workers taking off their lanyards, putting on their union pins and fighting against professional regulation?
WE'RE NOT SOCIAL WORKERS.. WE'RE CHILD PROTECTION WORKERS.
Regulation of child protection workers by Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers: CUPE responds.
Please send or adapt any of the following letters to the Executive Director of your CAS.
DRAFT Letter 2 – Professionalism
I understand that there are plans in the works to force anyone who works in child protection to register with the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers.
One of the reasons given for this change is that regulation will result in higher quality services and bring greater professionalism to the field and that this will improve the standard of child protection work in Ontario.
I would like to point out that a failure to meet standards of care in child protection work is very rarely the result of professional misconduct, incompetence or incapacity on the part of individual child protection workers.
(ACCORDING TO WHO? THE CHILDREN'S AID SOCIETY'S SECRET INTERNAL COMPLAINT PROCESS?)
The stated purpose of the College is to protect the public from unqualified, incompetent or unfit practitioners.
But children’s aid societies already set those standards and ensure their adherence: they determine the job qualifications. They deal with employees they deem to be unqualified or incompetent. And CASs decide whether child protection work in their area can be performed by someone who holds a Bachelor’s degree and has child welfare experience.
I may not hold a BSW or MSW degree, enjoy membership in the College or be subject to its regulation. But I am a professional practitioner in the child protection sector and, as such, I cannot countenance this move toward the regulation of the child protection workforce. I am resolved to fight it at every step of the way and instead campaign for the measures that will bring real benefits to at-risk youth, children and families.
Sincerely,
DRAFT Letter 6 – Privacy and discipline
The move toward a regulated child protection workforce in Ontario gives me cause for serious concern about my privacy as a child protection worker.
One of the rationalizations for registration and regulation with the College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers is the restoration of public confidence in Ontario’s child protection system.
But violating my rights to privacy and confidentiality will do nothing to achieve this goal.
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And what right to privacy?
A person employed by or acting as an agent for another person, private agency or government is not on their own time and have no right to privacy PERSONAL OR OTHERWISE.
http://cupe2190.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/SSWCC_CAS-letters-re-college-regulation_Nov.-2016.pdf
You can hear former MPP Frank Klees say in a video linked below the very reason the social worker act was introduced and became law in 1998 was to regulate the "children's aid societies" and they ignored that..
FORMER ONTARIO MPP FRANK KLEES EXPLAINS "A DISTINCTION WITHOUT A DIFFERENCE." I'M NOT A SOCIAL WORKER, I'M A CHILD PROTECTION WORKER!
https://youtu.be/SA1YyWO0RTQ?list=PLsYhw09i3If44rMBDuZQ0ztayzSQU35Fy
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"All of us can be harmed': Investigation reveals hundreds of Canadians have phoney degrees." Business ·CBC Marketplace.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/diploma-mills-marketplace-fake-degrees-1.4279513
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"You know your system is based on the flimsiest of foundations when you have absolutely no standards on who can do this work,” adds Gharabaghi, director of Ryerson University’s school of child and youth care.
...
OACAS'S Scientific Sounding Eligibility Spectrum.
The Ontario Child Welfare Eligibility Spectrum is a field-developed, eligibility tool for child welfare in Ontario.
......
Field developed by who? Qualified registered child care experts with years of university education and decades of experience or a bunch of high-school graduates with a two year college course in general social work or less claiming to have in some cases decades of on the job experience?
Promoting excellence in our provincial child protection services, the child welfare eligibility assessment instrument supports the Ontario network of Children’s Aid Societies, their associated communities and the children, youth and families they serve.
The Eligibility Spectrum is a tool designed to assist Children’s Aid Society child protection staff in making consistent and accurate decisions about a child or family’s eligibility for service at the time a society becomes involved.
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Funny how similar the spectrum is to a Cosmopolitan Magazine quiz...
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Child protection workers investigate physical, sexual and emotional abuse and neglect and determine if a society needs to become involved to protect children and youth from domestic violence; help children find adoptive families; provide family care for children; and support families and youth in conflict.
http://www.threemountains.ca/oacas
http://www.oacas.org/publications-and-newsroom/oacas-annual-reports/
http://www.oacas.org/publications-and-newsroom/professional-resources/eligibility-spectrum/
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'No standard of care,' former Ontario child advocate says of foster care system in call for overhaul.
Investigation into 3 Thunder Bay homes run by Toronto company found 'horrific' conditions Matt Prokopchuk · CBC News · Posted: May 02, 2019.
Ontario's former child and youth advocate is making another call for the province to overhaul how it manages and legislates the child welfare system in the wake of an investigation into the conditions at three now-closed foster care homes in Thunder Bay.
The investigation, launched in 2016, found that the homes, run by Johnson Children's Services, were unsanitary and inadequate, and that staff assigned by the company to them were at the very least least ill-equipped and not properly trained to provide care to young people with serious mental health issues and complex needs.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/irwin-elman-thunder-bay-report-1.5118815
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Standards of Care for the Administration of Psychotropic Medications to Children
and Youth Living in Licensed Residential Settings.
Summary of Recommendations of the Ontario Expert Panel February 2009.
http://www.children.gov.on.ca/htdocs/English/documents/specialneeds/residential/summary_report.pdf
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“Harmful Impacts” is the title of the Motherisk commission's report written by the Honourable Judith C. Beaman after two years of study. After reading it, “harmful” seems almost to be putting it lightly. Out of the over 16 000 tests the commission only examined 56 cases of the flawed Motherisk tests, administered by the Motherisk lab between 2005 and 2015 and were determined to have a “substantial impact” on the decisions of child protection agencies to keep files open or led to children being permanently removed from their families.
WHAT ARE THE HARMFUL IMPACTS?
Wrongfully Separating kids from parents a 'textbook strategy' of domestic abuse, experts say — and causes irreversible, lifelong damage.
“Being separated from parents or having inconsistent living conditions for long periods of time can create changes in thoughts and behavior patterns, and an increase in challenging behavior and stress-related physical symptoms,” such as sleep difficulty, nightmares, flashbacks, crying, and yelling says Amy van Schagen - California State University.
The Science Is Unequivocal: Separating Families Is Harmful to Children
In news stories and opinion pieces, psychological scientists are sharing evidence-based insight from decades of research demonstrating the harmful effects of separating parents and children.
In an op-ed in USA Today, Roberta Michnick Golinkoff (University of Delaware), Mary Dozier (University of Delaware), and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek (Temple University) write:
“Years of research are clear: Children need their parents to feel secure in the world, to explore and learn, and to grow strong emotionally.”
In a Washington Post op-ed, James Coan (University of Virginia) says:
“As a clinical psychologist and neuroscientist at the University of Virginia, I study how the brain transforms social connection into better mental and physical health. My research suggests that maintaining close ties to trusted loved ones is a vital buffer against the external stressors we all face. But not being an expert on how this affects children, I recently invited five internationally recognized developmental scientists to chat with me about the matter on a science podcast I host. As we discussed the border policy’s effect on the children ensnared by it, even I was surprised to learn just how damaging it is likely to be.”
Mia Smith-Bynum (University of Maryland) is quoted in The Cut:
“The science leads to the conclusion that the deprivation of caregiving produces a form of extreme suffering in children. Being separated from a parent isn’t just a trauma — it breaks the relationship that helps children cope with other traumas.
Forceful separation is particularly damaging, explains clinical psychologist Mia Smith-Bynum, a professor of family science at the University of Maryland, when parents feel there’s nothing in their power that can be done to get their child back.
For all the dislocation, strangeness and pain of being separated forcibly from parents, many children can and do recover, said Mary Dozier, a professor of child development at the University of Delaware. “Not all of them — some kids never recover,” Dr. Dozier said. “But I’ve been amazed at how well kids can do after institutionalization if they’re able to have responsive and nurturing care afterward.”
The effects of that harm may evolve over time, says Antonio Puente, a professor of psychology at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington who specializes in cultural neuropsychology. What may begin as acute emotional distress could reemerge later in life as PTSD, behavioral issues and other signs of lasting neuropsychological damage, he says.
“A parent is really in many ways an extension of the child’s biology as that child is developing,” Tottenham said. “That adult who’s routinely been there provides this enormous stress-buffering effect on a child’s brain at a time when we haven’t yet developed that for ourselves. They’re really one organism, in a way.” When the reliable buffering and guidance of a parent is suddenly withdrawn, the riot of learning that molds and shapes the brain can be short-circuited, she said.
In a story from the BBC, Jack Shonkoff (Harvard University) discusses evidence related to long-term impacts:
Jack P Shonkoff, director of the Harvard University Center on the Developing Child, says it is incorrect to assume that some of the youngest children removed from their parents’ care will be too young to remember and therefore relatively unharmed. “When that stress system stays activated for a significant period of time, it can have a wear and tear effect biologically.
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Nearly half of children in Crown care are medicated.
Psychotropic drugs are being prescribed to nearly half the Crown wards in a sample of Ontario children's aid societies, kindling fears that the agencies are overusing medication with the province's most vulnerable children.
According to documents obtained by The Globe and Mail under Ontario's Freedom of Information Act, 47 per cent of the Crown wards - children in permanent CAS care - at five randomly picked agencies were prescribed psychotropics last year to treat depression, attention deficit disorder, anxiety and other mental-health problems. And, the wards are diagnosed and medicated far more often than are children in the general population.
"These children have lots of issues and the quickest and easiest way to deal with it is to put them on medication, but it doesn't really deal with the issues," said child psychiatrist Dick Meen, clinical director of Kinark Child and Family Services, the largest children's mental health agency in Ontario.
"In this day and age, particularly in North America, there's a rush for quick fixes. And so a lot of kids, especially those that don't have parents, will get placed on medication in order to keep them under control."
Psychiatric drugs and children are a contentious mix. New, safer drugs with fewer side effects are the salvation of some mentally ill children. But some drugs have not been scientifically tested for use on children, and recent research has linked children on antidepressants with a greater risk of suicide.
Yet the number of children taking these drugs keeps rising, even in the population at large.
Pharmacies dispensed 51 million prescriptions to Canadians for psychotropic medication last year, a 32-per-cent jump in just four years, according to pharmaceutical information company IMS Health Canada. Prescriptions sold for the class of antidepressants, including Ritalin, most prescribed to children to tackle such disorders as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) rose more than 47 per cent, to 1.87 million last year; a new generation of antipsychotic medication increasingly prescribed to children nearly doubled in the same span, climbing 92 per cent to 8.7 million prescriptions.
And with close to half of Crown wards on psychotropic medication, their numbers are more than triple the rate of drug prescriptions for psychiatric problems among children in general.
With histories of abuse, neglect and loss, children in foster care often bear psychological scars unknown to most of their peers. But without a doting parent in their corner, they are open to hasty diagnoses and heavy-handed prescriptions. Oversight for administering the drugs and watching for side effects is left to often low-paid, inexperienced staff working in privately owned, loosely regulated group homes and to overburdened caseworkers legally bound to visit their charges only once every three months.
Unease over the number of medicated wards of the state is growing: This September, when provincial child advocates convene in Edmonton for their biannual meeting, the use of medication to manage the behaviour of foster children across Canada will be at the top of their agenda.
'whole range of disorders'
Nowhere is concern greater than in Ontario, where the provincial government recently appointed a panel of experts to develop standards of care for administering drugs to children in foster care, group homes and detention centres.
The move was made after the high-profile case last year of a now-13-year-old boy in a group home outside Toronto came to light. The boy was saddled with four serious psychiatric diagnoses, including oppositional defiant disorder and Tourette's syndrome, and doused daily with a cocktail of psychotropic drugs before his grandparents came to his rescue. Now living with his grandparents, he is free of diagnoses and drugs.
Marti McKay is the Toronto child psychologist who, when hired by the local CAS to assess the grandparents' capacity as guardians to the boy, discovered a child so chemically altered that his real character was clouded by the side effects of adult doses of drugs.
"There are lots of other kids like that," said Dr. McKay, one of the experts on the government panel. "If you look at the group homes, it's close to 100 per cent of the kids who are on not just one drug, but on drug cocktails with multiple diagnoses.
"There are too many kids being diagnosed with ... a whole range of disorders that are way out of proportion to the normal population. ... It's just not reasonable to think the children in care would have such overrepresentation in these rather obscure disorders."
The report from a government investigation into the case obtained by The Globe uncovered group home staff untrained in the use and side effects of the psychotropic drugs they were doling out; no requests from the psychiatrist to monitor the boy for problems, and little evidence of efforts to treat the boy's apparent mental-health issues other than with heavy-duty pharmaceuticals.
James Dubray, executive director of the Durham CAS where the boy was a Crown ward, acknowledges that the agency's monitoring of children on medication was lacking.
But it is no small feat, he said, for agencies like his to raise challenging children and adolescents - including some with behaviours so insufferable that their parents turn them over - when there is a chronic shortage of children's mental-health services across Canada and disruptive young people are stranded on waiting lists for psychiatrists and therapies for as long as a year.
With few specialists available, growing numbers of child-welfare workers are turning to family physicians, typically with next to no training in psychiatric disorders and no expertise in the new cutting-edge psychotropic drugs.
Are children being overmedicated out of expedience?
"I don't think that's an unfair conclusion," Dr. Dubray allowed. "I find it hard to make a judgment. I just know we tend to see kids for which there are either no resources or their parents can't handle them."
Behaviour management
For Judy Finlay, Ontario's chief child advocate, the use of psychotropic drugs is a burning issue.
Since the inquests into the deaths of a handful of troubled adolescents being forcibly restrained in group homes a few years ago - and the tougher regulations on the use of physical restraints that followed - she has observed a growing trend among group homes to turn to chemical restraints to control unruly behaviour.
These children have trauma and loss in their backgrounds and, as they grow older and foster parents can no longer tolerate their behaviour, they are moved to group homes operating on a culture of strict curfews and rules. Here, too often, troubled teenagers live in close quarters, staff turnover is rapid, police visits are not uncommon, and watching television is the usual pastime.
"It's more about behaviour management than it is about intervening into mental health issues," Ms. Finlay said.
"It's the adolescents who are being given medication usually, and it's adolescents who are noncompliant. But they're supposed to be," she added. "That's their job. So as adolescents grow and challenge the system or challenge staff, it's at that time that we begin to medicate them. They are going to be challenging, and medicating isn't the way to help them through adolescence."
In fact, child psychiatrists and physicians say they face a tricky call when confronted with a tormented child or adolescent whose behaviour appears to be the symptom of a disorder that, if not treated with drugs and other therapies, will inevitably grow harder to tame.
The newer drugs are safer and backed by a growing stack of research, and physicians insist they allow some mentally ill children to function normally when nothing else works. Yet many drugs have never been tested on children by the pharmaceutical companies funding most of the research; have been studied for only short periods that fail to measure the impact of prolonged use; and are not formally approved to treat the condition being addressed.
"Just because it's safe and effective in adults doesn't mean it's safe and effective in a young person, and that's one of my concerns about the lack of research in young people," said Stan Kutcher, a child psychiatrist and Sun Life Financial chair in adolescent mental health at the IWK Health Centre in Halifax.
"Young people aren't little adults. They have different physiologies. They have different metabolisms. Their brains react differently. Their bodies react differently to drugs."
And therein lies a "horrible conundrum" for doctors. "I'm uncomfortable with kids being really sick," Dr. Kutcher said, "and I'm uncomfortable with the treatments that we have."
The National Youth in Care Network, an advocacy group for young people raised in the child welfare system, is just completing a three-year study, funded by Health Canada, of psychotropic drug use among children and adolescents in care across the country.
The researchers have found that not only were psychotropic drugs prescribed to a clear majority of the current and former wards interviewed, but most were diagnosed with mental-health disorders by a family doctor, never visited a child psychiatrist or another doctor for a second opinion, and doubted the accuracy of their diagnosis.
A disturbing number, the network's research director, Yolanda Lambe, added, have traded the child-welfare system for a life on the street.
"A lot of people are using drugs now," she said. "There's a lot of homeless young people who have been medicated quite heavily."
By the numbers
47%
Children in Crown care at five randomly selected Ontario agencies taking psychotropics
51 million
Psychotropic prescriptions sold to Canadians last year
1.87 million
Antidepressants prescribed to children for attention disorders
Doctors' orders
Stan Kutcher, a child psychologist and Sun Life Financial Chair in Adolescent Mental Health at the IWK Health Centre in Halifax, estimates that between 2 and 6 per cent of children ages five to seven suffer from mental-health disorders requiring treatment; for early adolescents under 14, the number rises to 7 to 11 per cent; by the late teens, research indicates roughly 18 per cent have diagnosable mental-health issues.
The documents obtained by The Globe and Mail included Crown wards reviews at the Children's Aid Society of Toronto, Toronto Catholic Children's Aid Society, Durham Children's Aid Society, Family and Children's Services of Niagara, and Windsor-Essex Children's Aid Society. The children in permanent care with those agencies accounted for a little more than 18 per cent of the province's roughly 9,400 Crown wards.
Psychotropic drugs most commonly prescribed to children:
ANALEPTICS
Examples are Ritalin, Adderall XR, Biphentin and Concerta.
Used to treat inattention, distractibility, agitation, impulsiveness and hyperactivity.
Approved by Health Canada for use with children.
Doctors in Canada recommended their use to treat children 17 and under an estimated 1,125,000 times in 2006.
ATYPICAL ANTIPSYCHOTICS
Examples are Risperdal, Zyprexa, Seroquel and Clozaril.
Used to treat schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and mania.
Not approved by Health Canada for use with children.
Doctors in Canada recommended their use to treat children 17 and under an estimated 363,000 times in 2006.
SEROTONIN REUPTAKE INHIBITORS
Examples are Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Celexa, Luvox and Anafranil.
Used to treat depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic disorder and eating disorders.
Not approved by Health Canada for use with children.
Doctors in Canada recommended their use to treat children 17 and under an estimated 360,000 times in 2006.
Sources: IMS Health Canada, Health Canada
Ritalin's reign
Ritalin, the brand name for methylphenidate hydrochloride, has been the drug of choice to treat children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) for nearly 40 years.
Developed by the pharmaceutical company Ciba in 1954, it was initially prescribed to adults as a treatment for depression, chronic fatigue and narcolepsy.
Beginning in the 1960s, the central-nervous-system stimulant began to be prescribed to hyperactive children for its calming effect. In particular, it increased the time children could stay focused on an activity.
During the 1980s, prescriptions in the United States for children really began to climb. Canada wasn't far behind, with the psychotropic drug's popularity soaring in the 1990s. Prescriptions were up 500 per cent from the previous decade.
Pediatricians began to take notice of the worrying trend and recommended in 2000 that Ritalin be prescribed only in very limited circumstances, and, even then, only for as long as necessary.
Worldwide, about 75 per cent of Ritalin prescriptions are for children, with four times as many boys on it as girls.
The Public Health Agency of Canada in 2004 reported that many adolescents were taking Ritalin as a recreational drug to stay awake, to increase attentiveness, to suppress appetite and to get high.
Research out of Atlantic Canada found that about 8.5 per cent of children in Grades 7 to 12 had taken Ritalin for non-medicinal purposes, compared with 5.3 per cent who were prescribed it.
Unnati Gandhi
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Use of 'behaviour-altering' drugs widespread in foster, group homes.
Almost half of children and youth in foster and group home care aged 5 to 17 — 48.6 per cent — are on drugs, such as Ritalin, tranquilizers and anticonvulsants, according to a yearly survey conducted for the provincial government and the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies (OACAS). At ages 16 and 17, fully 57 per cent are on these medications.
In group homes, the figure is even higher — an average of 64 per cent of children and youth are taking behaviour-altering drugs. For 10- to 15-year-olds, the number is a staggering 74 per cent.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/12/12/use_of_behaviouraltering_drugs_widespread_in_foster_group_homes.html
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What’s worse is that the number of children prescribed dangerous drugs is on the rise. Doctors seem to prescribe medication without being concerned with the side-effects.
Worldwide, 17 million children, some as young as five years old, are given a variety of different prescription drugs, including psychiatric drugs that are dangerous enough that regulatory agencies in Europe, Australia, and the US have issued warnings on the side effects that include suicidal thoughts and aggressive behavior.
According to Fight For Kids, an organization that “educates parents worldwide on the facts about today’s widespread practice of labeling children mentally ill and drugging them with heavy, mind-altering, psychiatric drugs,” says over 10 million children in the US are prescribed addictive stimulants, antidepressants and other psychotropic (mind-altering) drugs for alleged educational and behavioral problems.
In fact, according to Foundation for a Drug-Free World, every day, 2,500 youth (12 to 17) will abuse a prescription pain reliever for the first time (4). Even more frightening, prescription medications like depressants, opioids and antidepressants cause more overdose deaths (45 percent) than illicit drugs like cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines and amphetamines (39 percent) combined. Worldwide, prescription drugs are the 4th leading cause of death.
The Star obtained the reports in a freedom of information request and compiled them according to the type of serious event that occurred — something the ministry does not do.
They note everything from medication errors to emotional meltdowns to deaths.
Restraints were used in more than one-third of 1,200 serious occurrence reports filed in 2013 by group homes and residential treatment centres in the city, according to a Star analysis.
At one treatment facility, 43 of the 119 serious occurrence reports filed to the Ministry of Children and Youth Services include a youth being physically restrained and injected by a registered nurse with a drug, presumably a sedative.
How is a society that's against spanking isn't against tying children to their beds and drugging them?
The language used by some group homes evokes an institutional setting rather than a nurturing environment. When children go missing, they are “AWOL.” In one instance in which a child acted out in front of peers, he was described as a “negative contagion.” Often, the reasons for behaviour are not noted. Children are in a “poor space” and are counselled not to make “poor choices.”
Blame is always placed on the child.
Their stories are briefly told in 1,200 Toronto reports describing “serious occurrences” filed to the Ministry of Children and Youth Services in 2013. Most involve children and youth in publicly funded, privately operated group homes.
https://dailyhealthpost.com/common-prescription-drugs/
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Between 2008 and 2012 the PDRC choose to review the deaths of 215 children in care. In 92 of those cases the cause of death could not be determined while the majority of the remaining deaths were listed as homicides, suicide and accidental. The PRDC reported during that same time period only 15 children with pre-existing medical conditions in care had died of unpreventable natural causes.
158 CANADIANS SOLDIERS DIED IN AFGHANISTAN BETWEEN 2002 AND 2011.
Canada in Afghanistan - Fallen Canadian Armed Forces Members.
One hundred and fifty-eight (158) Canadian Armed Forces members lost their lives in service while participating in our country’s military efforts in Afghanistan. You can click on the names to explore their entries in the Canadian Virtual War Memorial.
https://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/remembrance/history/canadian-armed-forces/afghanistan-remembered/fallen?filterYr=2009
“There are lots of kids in group homes all over Ontario and they are not doing well — and everybody knows it,” says Kiaras Gharabaghi, a member of a government-appointed panel that examined the residential care system in 2016.
Parents rights were ripped out by the roots...
Parents rights were ripped out by the roots...
Lives were ruined. Parents’ lives, and quite possibly children’s lives. Siblings and grandparents and other family members’ lives, too. Irreversibly ruined. And in many cases, it seems this was allowed to happen primarily because people were poor.
“In many of the cases we reviewed, when a Motherisk hair test came back positive, CAS (Children’s Aid Society) workers focused solely on the apparent substance use instead of considering any actual effect on parenting,” Beaman writes. Use was considered proof of addiction, and addiction was considered proof of “an inability to parent.” That, sometimes in the absence of any other meaningful evidence at all, led to children being taken away from their parents.
Removal from the home — permanent removal — is not supposed to be a move taken lightly. The report goes over the legal principles, laying out that it should be a last resort. It is the “capital punishment” of child protection, according to one citation, absolutely devastating to parents, and for children it is “often the beginning of a life sentence.”
Yet in the cases reviewed here, it is imposed, often apparently cavalierly and without even a trial, for reasons that amount to a punishment for being poor.
Rich parents who are alcoholics, after all, are not having their children taken from them after a single relapse. Few rich parents, in fact, are having their children taken from them at all.
“The underlying issue in many child protection cases before the court is poverty,” the report says. Much of the time, Beaman writes she heard what families most needed was help with groceries or babysitting, counselling or mental health treatment, help providing safe shelter.
What these parents and children needed, in other words, was help.
And as we see all too clearly, the CAS are the systematic ruination of thousands of people’s lives.
What they got instead was the irrevocable breakup of their families. The loss for life of any contact at all with those in the world they loved most, and those who loved them most. They got harm, permanent harm.
It is hard to think of anything worse than that.
By EDWARD KEENAN Star Columnist Fri., March 2, 2018.
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2018/03/02/motherrisk-reforms-show-struggling-families-dont-need-to-be-split-up-they-need-our-help.html
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Respecting The Canadian Constitution And Our Procedural Safeguards..
The Motherisk Commission details years of rights infringements by courts. "If the same problems were identified in criminal court, there would be a huge public outcry." Tammy Law.
(put up your hand if you think CAS workers would recognize their own rights were being violated in a court of law)
There is a major power imbalance between an impoverished parent (we know that families of low socio-economic status are hugely over-represented in the child welfare system and race has little to do with it) and the state funded agency. To guard against such an imbalance, it is critical that our legal system respect the time-tested procedural safeguards developed to specifically ensure that the disadvantaged party is treated fairly.
Yet according to the Motherisk report, these safeguards were ignored. The report describes a litany of procedural injustices perpetrated on parents: parents were pressured to consent to testing; were not informed of their right to reject testing; they had adverse inferences drawn against them when they rejected testing; they were required to prove the unreliability of testing instead of the other way around; and they were refused the right to cross-examine Motherisk "experts" at summary judgment motions.
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees procedural fairness when the state interferes with fundamental personal rights, such as the right by parents to care for their children. Ironically enough, the issue of taking body samples (such as hair for testing) without proper consent for the purpose of criminal investigations was found to be an infringement of the Charter 20 years ago by the Supreme Court.
The problems detailed in the Motherisk report’s 278 pages are too numerous to go into in detail. They document the many problems with the SickKids lab’s testing and with the child protection system’s overreliance on those results. The hair testing process produced inconsistent and untrustworthy results despite being perceived as carrying the unimpeachable weight of scientific authority. That much we pretty much knew because of earlier reporting, though the detailed breakdown of it and the specific case references make the injustice of it sickeningly vivid.
According to the Toronto Star out of the cases they reviewed Motherisk reported positive results 93% of the time and lets say Motherisk only strongly influence decisions to apprehend children in 56 cases, how many times did Motherisk results strongly influence the decision to keep files open and how much did that cost the taxpayers?
The 2017-2018 Expenditure Estimates set out details of the operating and capital spending requirements of the Ministry of Children for the fiscal year commencing April 1, 2017.
Restated total operating expense $4,369,258,414
$4,306,237,616
https://www.ontario.ca/page/expenditure-estimates-ministry-children-and-youth-services-2017-18
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Motherisk hair test evidence tossed out of Colorado court 2 decades before questions raised in Canada.
A Motherisk expert testified for the defense in a Colorado murder case. The judge mocked the lab’s processes. But the case remained virtually unknown in Ontario until now.
For more than two decades, Motherisk performed flawed hair-strand tests on thousands of vulnerable families across Canada, influencing decisions in child protection cases that separated parents from their children and sometimes children from their siblings. (CBC)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/motherisk-colorado-court-case-1.4364862
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Judge rejects proposed class-action over Motherisk drug-testing scandal.
By RACHEL MENDLESON Investigative Reporter. Thu., Nov. 2, 2017.
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2017/11/02/judge-rejects-proposed-class-action-over-motherisk-drug-testing-scandal.html
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Parents lose second bid to launch class-action suit against Motherisk over flawed hair tests.
By RACHEL MENDLESON Investigative Reporter. Tues., Nov. 27, 2018.
https://www.thestar.com/news/investigations/2018/11/27/parents-lose-second-bid-to-launch-class-action-suit-against-motherisk-over-flawed-hair-tests.html
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Five things to know about Motherisk hair testing..
1. The tests were preliminary
The tests performed by Motherisk relied on the unconfirmed results of its enzyme-linked immuno-sorbent assay (ELISA) tests.
ELISA is often used as a screening tool before more in-depth tests are undertaken. It can be used in toxicology as a rapid presumptive screen for certain classes of drugs. It’s useful if you need to screen a large number of samples when the presumption that only a small percentage will test positive. But it’s not definitive and the results can be erroneously interpreted.
The Motherisk Lab did not follow-up its presumed positive ELISA results with follow-on in-depth tests. Therefore, the results simply could not be relied upon to provide the absolute certainty needed.
As Craig Chatterton, a forensic toxicologist and a proponent of hair sample testing, correctly explains in the CBC report on Motherisk, a preliminary test like ELISA can be spot on - but, tragically for the families implicated, it can be 100% incorrect, too.
Susan Lang’s report went on to say "No forensic toxicology laboratory in the world uses ELISA testing the way MTDL [Motherisk] did."
2. Motherisk had no written standard operating procedures
Having standard, professional operating procedures in place is one of the central pillars of any testing environment, not just hair sample testing.
In this regard, Motherisk failed egregiously. The Lang report found no evidence of any written standard operating procedures at Motherisk. This raises serious doubts about the reliability and, crucially, the standardisation of its testing procedures.
Both forensic and clinical laboratories should have standard operating procedures in place for each of the tests they perform. Motherisk had no clear, documented procedures which means the processes could have varied substantially in each individual case, calling into question, rightly, the integrity of the lab’s results.
3. No transparency
Motherisk’s next misstep was the lack of formal process and documentation meant that it was almost impossible for any third party to robustly assess its results.
When the entire process isn’t adequately captured, it becomes easy for the lab to skirt over anomalies and simplify conclusions.
At Cansford Labs, for instance, we share the evidence in full. This is an absolutely vital component when the test will be involved in a highly sensitive matter like child custody.
The fact that Motherisk offered no insight into how its results were arrived at beggars belief.
4. Inadequate training and oversight
The inadequacy and transparency issues within Motherisk seeped all the way into the employees at the lab.
From reading the Lang report, Motherisk scientists were operating without any forensic training or oversight. The ELISA tests were inadequate, but even if they weren’t, the individuals interpreting the results weren’t properly trained.
Nobody at Motherisk, including, rather incredibly, Dr. Koren himself, had the proper training.
The lack of training manifested in all manner of amateurish mistakes. Staff routinely failed to wash hair samples before analysis, for example. One mother tested positive for alcohol because her alcohol-laced hairspray had not been washed off the sample. With the right training and process, these issues could easily have been avoided.
5. A compromised chain of custody
In the CBC report into Motherisk, one mother recalls how her second test was conducted after she disputed the first test’s results: “With my second test, the hair was done in the social worker’s office with the scissors out of her desk, tape off her desk and cardboard from the trash.”
Her sample tested positive for crystal meth, but laughably when she next saw her “hair sample”, the hair that allegedly belonged to her was longer and a different colour.
It should go without saying, but any robust testing process requires professionalism throughout. It’s not just about testing the sample, but also about how the sample is collected and treated.
The chain of custody is of paramount importance. Trusted professionals need to be present at every stage of the process, guided by the lab that will do the testing, and the procedures need to be the same for every single case.
Motherisk was an aberration:
When things go as wrong as they did at Motherisk, it’s important not to stick our heads in the sand. Especially when it involves vulnerable individuals.
But Motherisk wasn't just an aberration IT WAS AN ABERRATION that SPECIFICALLY targeted impoverished families.
The science of hair sample testing remains a powerful tool when the analysis is done correctly, appropriately, with quality control and assurances and interpreted by qualified experts.
Indeed, it’s only right that for vulnerable individuals, that nothing but the best will do. A fact that Motherisk seemingly forgot.
https://blog.cansfordlabs.co.uk/the-drug-and-alcohol-testing-blog/5-reasons-why-the-motherisk-scandal-shouldnt-happen-again
http://projects.thestar.com/motherisk/part-2/
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2013: In leaked memo, Peel CAS staff asked to keep cases open to retain funding.
An internal memo from Peel Children’s Aid Society management asks staff not to close any ongoing cases during March, as part of a strategy to secure government funding.
According to the memo, when service volume is lower than projected, there is less money for the CAS.
There is a Province-wide funding deficit of $67 million for Children’s Aid, and agencies shoulder millions more in historic debts. What’s happening in Peel right now is just the tip of the iceberg,” added Carrie Lynn Poole-Cotnam, Chair of the CUPE Ontario Social Services sector..
Last week, a leaked memo revealed that Peel CAS was taking unusual steps to ensure ongoing funding. While the Ministry of Children and Youth Services has engaged in discussions with Peel CAS, Poole-Cotnam says the Province needs to take meaningful action to address the funding shortfall faced by children’s aid societies across the Province.
The memo, signed by seven senior service managers, instructs staff to complete as many investigations as possible (no fewer than 1,000), transfer as many cases as possible to “ongoing services,” and not close any ongoing cases before the end of the fiscal year, March 31. The memo indicated that these strategies were necessary to reduce the society’s current deficit and secure future funding from the province.
“Wrongly opening or leaving these files open can have a damaging impact on these clients’ lives. For example, some parents are separated from their kids, some parents have to take time off work to meet with us when their files should have been closed, and some parents are unable to return home because of a false abuse claim — and all of these cases leave these families in emotional limbo,” wrote the employee who would not reveal their identity for fear of retribution.
Gene Colman, a Toronto family lawyer who handles cases involving CAS, said his office has been puzzled by the substantial increase in people calling because of CAS intervention in their families.
Playing dumb he said “I thought, ‘What’s going on, why are we getting so many calls?’ I wonder if it’s related. I don’t know,” he said not looking a gift horse in the mouth.
Though the CAS claimed the purpose of the memo wasn't to inflate numbers, between 2011 and 2013 the 46 (at that time) separate societies opened a combined total of 42 000 files or about 14 000 files per year, in 2014 - after the Peel Memo Leak - and launching a new government funded advertising campaign and reopening 20 000 previously closed files the societies opened a combined total of over 82 000 files to meet their funding goals that year as reported by the Toronto Star.
That's an awful of lot work for an awful lot of scumbag lawyers...
GONE FISHING
Fishing Expedition:
A speculative demand for information without any real expectation about the outcome of the demand.
A fishing trip is an informal legal term used to cynically refer to attempts to undertake more intrusive searches of a private home, person and possessions when there is insufficient probable cause to carry out such a search.
Extortion (also called a shakedown or shakedown racket, outwrestling and exaction) is a criminal offense of obtaining money, property, or cooperation from an individual, through coercion. ... Extortion is commonly practiced by organized crime groups and the children's aid societies of Ontario.
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/03/14/in_leaked_memo_peel_cas_staff_asked_to_keep_cases_open_to_retain_funding.html
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/03/15/province_in_talks_with_peel_childrens_aid_society_over_strategies_in_leaked_memo.html
http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/peel-cas-funding-shortfall-just-province-wide-tip-of-67-million-iceberg-1769188.htm
https://cupe.on.ca/archivedoc2283/
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C.A.S. ATTITUDE: WIN CHILD WELFARE CASES AT ALL COSTS $$$.
By Gene C. Colman of Gene C. Colman Family Law Centre posted in Child Welfare on Thursday, January 1, 2015.
It should not be a matter of "win" or "lose" when it comes to Ontario child welfare law yet it isn't actually about the actual condition of the child or the child's welfare. It's about accusations, Cosmo quiz style parental risk assessments and fake experts and every time the society decides your a risk they get paid.
Ontario's Child and Family Services Act tells us that the paramount purpose is to "promote the best interests, protection and well being of children." One might note the glaring lack of any reference to family. In fact, there is a paucity of references to family throughout the entire CFSA even though many judges recognize the importance of maintaining family whenever possible.
I had a recent experience with CAS counsel at court when representing a family unjustly caught up in the system. Our office had prepared a very persuasive and comprehensive response to the Society's Application. We attended at the mandated five day hearing that follows apprehensions from parental care. The CAS certainly had not expected such forcefulness; normally parents are so overwhelmed at this early stage that they are unable to mount an effective defence. Generally, the court will rubber stamp the CAS requests. We did not agree to just stand idly by at the first appearance and CAS counsel was surprised by our aggressive (yet fair) approach.
Our written material seemed to have persuaded the judge. He instructed the lawyers to prepare a consent endorsement along the lines that we were seeking (which of course included an immediate return of the children to parental care). As we were returning to the courtroom after preparing the consent, the experienced and respected CAS counsel turned to me and my clients and remarked: "This is the third time your lawyer has beaten me."
The CAS counsel's comment was made innocently enough and indeed was intended to be complimentary. But still I was shocked (but probably should not have been). Why was I so shocked?
https://www.complexfamilylaw.com/blog/2015/01/cas-attitude-win-child-welfare-cases-at-all-costs.shtml
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2016: Report shines light on poverty’s role on kids in CAS system.
The effect of provincial policies on struggling families was especially apparent in the late 1990s, when the conservative government slashed welfare payments and social service funding at the same time it introduced in child protection the notion of maltreatment by “omission,” including not having enough food in the home. The number of children taken into care spiked.
A new report cites poverty as a key factor in families who come into contact with the child protection system.
“We’re able to tell a story of maltreatment, but we have not done a very good job in telling a story about poverty,” Goodman said, referring to Ontario’s 47 privately run children’s aid societies.
Goodman suggests silence suited the provincial government more than it suited the society's funding goals, in particular the Ministry of Children and Youth Services, which regulates child protection and funds societies with $1.5 billion annually.
On average, 15,625 Ontario children were in foster or group-home care in 2014-15. The latest figures indicate if your still willing to blindly take the society's word for it that only 2 percent of children are removed from their home due to sexual abuse and 13 percent for physical abuse. The rest are removed because of neglect, emotional maltreatment and exposure to violence between their parents or caregivers.
“The ministry has been pretty clear with us that advocacy is not part of our mandate,” Goodman said. “It’s not like they’re asking for the (poverty) data. They’re not.”
The poverty removal rates were extracted from the government-funded Ontario Incidence Study of Reported Child Abuse and Neglect, compiled in 2013. A team of researchers examined a representative sample of 4,961 child protection investigations conducted by 17 children’s aid societies. The cases involved children up to 14.
Co-author Kofi Antwi-Boasiako, a PhD student at the University of Toronto’s faculty of social work, will be expanding the report into a full-fledged study.
Goodman credited the report with revealing “the glaringly huge elephant in the room.” Children’s aid societies have long witnessed the grinding effect of poverty on families but have rarely spoken out about it or pressured policy makers.
https://www.ourwindsor.ca/news-story/6810640-report-shines-light-on-poverty-s-role-on-kids-in-cas-system/
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“It is stunning to me how these children... are rendered invisible while they are alive and invisible in their death,” said Irwin Elman, Ontario’s advocate for children and youth. Between 90 and 120 children and youth connected to children’s aid die every year. (rendered invisible by the PDRC)
Between 2008/2012 natural causes was listed as the least likely way for a child in Ontario's care to die at 7% (only 15) out of the total deaths reviewed while "undetermined cause" was listed as the leading cause of death of children in Ontario's child protection system at 43% of the total deaths reviewed. The of the deaths were categorized as homicide, suicide and accidental.
43% equals 92 children out of just the deaths reviewed by the PDRC. 92 mystery deaths and like every other year no further action was taken to determine the cause...
Undetermined means those 92 had no pre-existing medical conditions and there was no reason for them to have died.
http://www.mcscs.jus.gov.on.ca/english/DeathInvestigations/office_coroner/PublicationsandReports/PDRC/2013Report/PDRC_2013.html
http://www.mcscs.jus.gov.on.ca/sites/default/files/content/mcscs/images/195633-19.jpg
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Coroner’s panel calls for overhaul of Ontario child protection system.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/09/25/coroners-panel-calls-for-overhaul-of-ontario-child-protection-system.html
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Only 10 Youth out of the nearly 16 000 children in care will have say in coroner’s review of group and foster home safety.
Young people will play a key role in determining how to prevent more youths from dying while in the care of group homes and foster homes.
Ontario’s chief coroner, Dirk Huyer, is putting together a team of up to 10 youths with experience in the child protection and mental health systems to inform a panel of experts probing the deaths of 11 young people in residential care over the past three years.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/02/06/youth-will-have-say-in-coroners-review-of-group-and-foster-home-safety.html
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Chief coroner reviewing children in care, fire safety in Indigenous communities
Review of 11 deaths of children in care expected to be completed this summer and study of fire deaths in Indigenous communities likely to take a year.
https://www.tbnewswatch.com/local-news/chief-coroner-reviewing-children-in-care-fire-safety-in-indigenous-communities-828777
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Foster homes investigated 7 times within a year but Ontario didn’t close them until Tammy Keeash died: court documents.
Nation to Nation, National News | November 15, 2018 by Nation to Nation.
https://aptnnews.ca/2018/11/15/foster-homes-investigated-7-times-within-a-year-but-ontario-didnt-close-them-until-tammy-keeash-died-court-documents/
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Ontario coroner finds ‘potential’ crime in review of foster care deaths
https://aptnnews.ca/2018/03/14/ontario-coroner-finds-potential-crime-review-foster-care-deaths/
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Teen says child welfare experience left him with nightmares NEWS Feb 16, 2011.
MUSKOKA – Gordie Merton has nightmares.
When talking to Merton, 19, in his family’s comfortable and bright basement apartment in Gravenhurst, he seems well adjusted.
During the day he will watch televised parliamentary debates and energetically offer informed comment on each bill that comes to the floor. Then he goes to work at a nearby pizza place.
But ask him about the four years he spent as a Crown ward within the children’s aid society system, being jostled between foster care and group homes, and his expression changes.
And when talking in his soft voice about his final placement at a privately owned psychiatric treatment centre in southern Ontario, he will say, “That was worse than hell. I would have rather been in hell than that place.”
At age 12, Merton, who was diagnosed at a young age as developmentally delayed with attachment disorder and attention deficit disorder, had been in the care of his paternal grandmother.
When his mother tried to regain custody of her son, the court ruled that, because of a complex mental disorder, Merton would become a Crown ward, and he was placed under the guardianship of the government.
He started living in foster homes across northern Ontario, and Merton alleges he was mistreated to varying degrees in each of them. In one instance, he said he had a miniature statue of Buddha taken away because his foster parents practised Christianity. In another instance, he said his remarks about being sexually abused by a fellow student were seemingly disregarded both by his foster parents and by his children’s aid worker.
“I didn’t know who to go to, so I would act out in anger, so then they would listen to me. Unfortunately, they would listen to me too late,” he said.
In the Family, Youth and Child Services of Muskoka offices there are stacks of boxes containing hundreds of documents regarding Merton’s case. Interim executive director Marty Rutledge said the documents include incident reports, serious occurrence reports, case worker notes and medical and psychiatric records pertaining to Merton’s case.
“Gordie’s behaviour was not controllable in the community,” said Rutledge, stating Merton had a history of auditory and visual hallucinations and had threatened to hurt or kill himself on multiple occasions. “We had him placed in all levels of care — foster care, group care and institutional care.”
The psychiatric care centre Merton was sent to features individual rooms, psychiatrists on site and staff available 24 hours per day, among other services, said Rutledge.
“If you get (there), you’re a kid who has really got some serious difficulties that haven’t been able to be managed anywhere else,” said Rutledge.
By age 15 Merton was moved to the centre. While there, he alleges, he was restrained, over-medicated and physically abused.
Although he lodged several complaints, nothing seemed to improve, he said. Merton recounted a time when a staff member demanded he refold the clothes on a shelf in his room. As the teenager did so, the staff member would push the clothes off and make him start over.
Frustrated, Merton said he eventually tossed the clothes back in the staff member’s face. When he did, he alleges, the staff member hit him in the face, knocking him to the floor. The third time it happened, Merton took a swing at the staff member, he said. They were the only two people in the room.
The staff member then left and returned with other staff to restrain Merton to his bed for his violent outburst. But Merton said staff often improperly restrained him and at one point his forearm was cut open, creating a wound that would leave a permanent scar.
Rutledge said incident reports are filed each time a child is physically restrained and these are filed with the Ministry of Children and Youth Services, which reviews them. The physical abuse Merton described above launched an independent child protection investigation into his case that involved the Ontario Provincial Police and the Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth.
“The police laid no criminal charges and the child protection agency concluded there were no child protection concerns,” said Rutledge.
An independent review of Merton’s files and treatment was then conducted by a southern Ontario children’s aid society and Merton and his mother filed complaints with the Residence Placement Advisory Committee.
Through his time with the society, Merton was depressed and suicidal. He was prescribed several drugs. In his final placement the psychologist increased his medication dosages, including that of lithium, a drug used mainly to treat mania and bipolar disorder.
“Picture you’re in a house, looking out the window, and everything is going slow,” said Merton. “Really slow. And all of it is grey. That’s what I was seeing when I was on the medication.”
He said he blames the medication for his hallucinations.
Merton was able to visit his family one weekend a month and during one summer night at home things came to a head. Frustrated with the medication and his treatment in care, he said he grabbed a kitchen knife while his family wasn’t looking and went outside to kill himself.
“When the police got there, something changed in me. When I looked at the officer, he was holding back tears, so I knew somebody was listening,” he said. “I threw down the knife.”
He was taken to Sudbury Algoma Hospital, a mental health facility, where a doctor determined Merton had three times the recommended amount of lithium in his system. The doctor recommended Merton be taken off the drug.
Rutledge said Merton’s medication had been under constant review and the Sudbury doctor’s medical opinion had differed from those at the psychiatric institution and the surrounding area, including a hospital physician who had suggested another increase in Merton’s lithium dose to control his hallucinations.
“We have a number of medical professionals who had seen Gordie up to this point,” said Rutledge referring to Merton being admitted to Sudbury Algoma Hospital. “He (the Sudbury doctor) was the first one to say ‘I don’t think this medication regime is appropriate.’”
Rutledge said the children’s aid society “tried to insist” the doctors consult each other, but it did not happen. According to the society, Merton’s medication regime was reviewed twice annually and mental health risk assessments were also administered.
Meanwhile, Merton’s mother had been working with the Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth and a lawyer to bring her son home. They, along with Family, Youth and Child Services, developed a plan of care, which involved house visits from the society and counselling.
Merton was home by his 16th birthday.
“When they walked out of the house and didn’t come back, that was the happiest day of my life. I cried. It was a huge weight gone,” Merton said.
However, he said he has constant nightmares and things such as music can trigger negative feelings and thoughts related to his time in care.
Rutledge said the psychiatric institution lodged a formal complaint with the Ministry of Social and Community Services, which existed at the time, about Merton’s discharge “to say that we (Family, Youth and Child Services of Muskoka) were acting irresponsibly, that Gordie was a high-needs kid with high-level psychiatric needs and that he was being discharged from (the centre) against medical advice.”
Merton said he wants to use his experiences to help others. He attends rallies in Ottawa and Queen’s Park and said he is drafting a bill to submit to the legislature that would create transparency within children’s aid societies.
“If I fight now, maybe in the future this will never happen again,” he said. “I want them to realize what they’ve done and admit it.”
He said he would like to see a full disclosure of the complaints made by children in care.
For those who are not satisfied with the service received from a children’s aid agency, there are options. They can lodge a client concern or complaint with the agency, contact the Child and Family Services Review Board at 1-800-728-8823 or contact the Residential Placement Advisory Committee at 705-476-9790 or 1-877-535-2299.
They can also contact a lawyer, their area member of provincial parliament or the Office of the Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth by visiting www.provincialadvocate.on.ca.
https://www.muskokaregion.com/news-story/3627327-teen-says-child-welfare-experience-left-him-with-nightmares/
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