Skip to content

    • Category and theme

    • Groups affected

    • Audience

    • Location of recommendation

    • Sector

    • Year

    • Clear search

43 search results

Child Protection

Recommendation 1: The BC government must invest in safe and affordable housing, adequate income assistance, drug and alcohol treatment and harm reduction, mental health services, and supports for victims of domestic abuse, and ensure families are aware of and can access these supports. No child should ever be removed from their family due to poverty — government support should be provided.

Child Protection

Recommendation 2: The government should work with disability organizations to develop and offer free parenting courses, workshops and support groups focused on the unique needs of parents with disabilities, and should ensure that these resources are available across the province.

Child Protection

Recommendation 3: When counselling is mandated in order for parents to keep or have their children returned from care, MCFD should ensure that counselling is meaningfully available to parents with disabilities. This must include providing sign language interpreters for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.

Child Protection

Recommendation 4: MCFD requires significantly more funding and staff to enable it to meet its mandate to keep children safe. Child protection workers have a highly stressful job, and perform critical tasks associated with the safety of children; they require the Ministry’s support to perform their role effectively.

Child Protection

Recommendation 5: MCFD should provide in-person training on its “Best Practice Approaches: Child Protection and Violence Against Women” guidelines to every social worker in the province, and should audit for compliance with those practices.

Child Protection

Recommendation 6: MCFD should provide its social workers with in-person training to manage parental addiction issues, and should ensure that every social worker in the province is familiar with its policies on this issue.

Child Protection

Recommendation 7: Social workers should advise parents that they may be eligible for legal aid as soon as there is a protection concern about their child, and they should advise parents on how to apply.

Child Protection

Recommendation 8: Government must invest in more detox and treatment facilities for mothers with disabilities, and should focus on investing in facilities that allow mothers and their children to remain together during the mother’s treatment, provided this is in the best interests of the child. The Peardonville House Treatment Centre is an excellent model for this type of service. Programs like Sheway and Fir Square should also be expanded across the province.

Child Protection

Recommendation 9: Women experiencing domestic violence should be supported by community based victim services, transition houses, counselling, and supports that are accessible to women with disabilities, including mothers and their children.

Child Protection

Recommendation 10: The Ministry of Justice should work with disability, women-serving and antiviolence organizations to develop and deliver training for professionals working in the child protection system, including lawyers, social workers, mediators, and parenting assessors, on the impact (or lack thereof) of disability on parenting capacity. Professionals working in the child protection context must be guided by the principle underlying BC’s child protection legislation that families should receive the support services they need to provide a safe and nurturing environment for their children.

Back to the top