The province of sa国际传媒 has many systems to protect children 鈥� but when one 14-year-old called repeatedly for help, those systems collapsed. In a heartbreaking report called Lost in the Shadows, representative for children and youth Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond catalogues the failures of many people and agencies in the months before the girl committed suicide in 2011.
The girl had an intellectual disability, lived with a violent and mentally ill mother, suffered physical and emotional abuse, and was probably sexually abused on her rural First Nations reserve.
The first line of defence for any child has to be her parents. But this girl鈥檚 mother was more danger than protector. Outside her family, no one else stepped up to provide the help she needed.
Social workers, school officials, doctors, nurses, the provincial government and the federal government let her down.
One social worker in the region was doing the job of seven, and the regional office was in 鈥渃haos,鈥� Turpel-Lafond said.
Social workers avoided going to the reserve because they had been threatened and intimidated in the past, even though the law requires them to go.
Minister of Children and Family Development Stephanie Cadieux said her department didn鈥檛 do an internal review of the case, although it should have. In response to this case, her ministry has revived the position of director of child welfare.
Doctors and nurses, people we expect to watch out for such things, failed to tell child-welfare staff about the danger the girl was in from her mother, who heard voices telling her to 鈥渟nap鈥� her daughter鈥檚 head. No one acted when the girl cut herself and talked about suicide.
At the federal level, Turpel-Lafond said, officials showed no 鈥渃oncern or leadership鈥� to ensure the child-welfare system was working.
Unusually, Turpel-Lafond also criticized the sa国际传媒 Coroners Service, an agency that is generally seen as the neutral investigator of death in the province. We ordinarily look to the coroners for answers when someone dies, but the advocate said that in this case, the service fell down on the job.
The coroners service took a year to complete its report and made no recommendations in a case where Turpel-Lafond found enough for a 110-page report.
Chief coroner Lisa Lapointe admitted the coroner鈥檚 report took too long, but said coroners often don鈥檛 make recommendations if they know other agencies 鈥渁re already addressing the issues that have been brought to light.鈥�
The service鈥檚 child-death review unit looks into about 300 deaths a year and makes recommendations. However, Lapointe said the children鈥檚 representative鈥檚 office has to take the lead on deaths of children in care because it has more expertise in the child-welfare system.
The history of First Nations and child-welfare authorities is a long and troubled one. Many reserves fear that children who are taken away will never come back. But the first priority must be the safety of the children.
If the community cannot or will not protect endangered children, the province must do so.
If necessary, social workers can call on the RCMP to accompany them, but it would be much better for the ministry to sit down with representatives from reserves and work out a way to co-operate.
Chief Doug Kelly of the First Nations Health Council called for a balance between protecting children and keeping families together. That is the wrenching question that child-welfare workers face every day.
But the quest for that balance must not be a licence for inaction. Where a child is in physical danger, the safety of the child must always take priority.
Tragically, it was not a priority for anyone in this case.
