NORTHWEST TERRITORIES

The government missed opportunities to keep children in their communities, in its response to a laundry list of proposed changes to the Child and Family Services Act, according to Mackenzie-Delta MLA David Krutko.

Ten communities were visited and 266 people showed up to a series of public hearings held by a committee comprised of five MLAs - including Tu Nedhe MLA Tom Beaulieu and Krutko - the result of which painted a scathing picture of the system. The opening sentence of the report states the system carries on the family-breaking legacy of residential schools.

The committee tabled its review of the act at the end of last year, and Health Minister Sandy Lee tabled her department's response last Friday. Twenty-two out of 73 recommendations were accepted and will be implemented, and 10 were rejected.

The rejected recommendations were some of the most vital, said Krutko in the legislative assembly on last Monday.

"Without those 10 recommendations being implemented, it very much undermines the community involvement in a process that should include communities, should include families, and working with the families to find solutions to keep our children in their communities," said Krutko.

In 2009, 35 children were taken from their homes and out of the NWT due to neglect or abuse, 343 were taken out of their homes but kept in the territory, while 236 were kept in the homes - in a report completed by a committee including

Most concerning, said Krutko, was the rejection of a recommendation to ensure funding for prevention of abuse and neglect and early intervention programming for every community in the NWT. It was rejected because the territorial budget had already been written.

Lee said the report came out after the business plan review, and major changes can not be made at this point.

"A major initiative such as this will require significant funding review," said Lee.

"We have, in every way possible, worked to respond favourably to the report," she said, adding that a lot of the rejected recommendations, or the ones agreed with but not implemented, will be put into the business plan for next year.

Forty-one recommendations were accepted either conditionally or "in principle" - which in many cases meant funding was not available, or the department agreed with the recommendation but determined the act already covered the issue - such as mandating the need to prevent taking kids from their homes and working with the child's family.

Yellowknife MLAs Glen Abernethy, Wendy Bisaro and Bob Bromley, Weledeh, were also on the committee and unhappy with the government's response.

"There's a huge opportunity for prevention that we heard from the people (in hearings throughout the NWT)," said Bromley."And the department, while it may feel it's doing prevention, it's clearly not."

Abernethy emphasized how important it is for a child to remain in her community and they be relocated only as a last resort. He feels there are other options, such as involving the child's extended family and community in his or her upbringing.

Abernethy also expressed concern about some recommendations the department said were already covered by the act. He cited a recommendation requesting siblings be kept together when placed outside their home to the greatest extent possible as an example.

"If it was implicit in the act, and we've all read the act, we wouldn't have made the recommendation," Abernethy told the legislative assembly on Feb. 9. He added,

community consultations also revealed practices legislated in the act are not being applied across the territory.

Lee said she is open to working with the committee on making the response into an action plan, and both her and the MLAs expressed a desire to find common ground in the legislative assembly on Wednesday.

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