New Brunswick’s child, youth and seniors’ advocate is calling on the province to ensure children in the welfare system are kept safe through several recommendations to provincial legislation.
Kelly Lamrock says it’s crucial the province reclaims a sense of urgency on child welfare since children don’t grow up at the speed of government study.
“The six-year-old who struggles in school quickly becomes a 10-year-old who has given up on school. The five-year-old who sees violence in the home quickly becomes a nine-year-old for whom violence is normal,” said Lamrock at a media event on Friday.
“That’s when people become susceptible to other influences, so we’ve got to reclaim a sense of urgency.”
Easier to Build is the first of two reports on protecting at-risk children in New Brunswick’s welfare system. It follows up on the Behind Closed Doors: A Story of Neglect report, published by former child advocate Norm Bossé.
This report makes five main recommendations such as creating a dedicated Children’s Act, a commitment to integrated service delivery, and improved case planning and collaboration with government offices such as the Department of Social Development, so children can access the services they need.
“We need to understand that when a child struggles, the clock is ticking,” said Lamrock.
“The clock is ticking before they become a teenager who’s given up or an adult who’s broken.”
It also calls on New Brunswick to protect children from abuse personally and academically, entrenching children’s rights into law and reforming court procedures and rules that affect at-risk kids, such as removing a child from a home when necessary in the best interest of the child.
According to Lamrock, child protection and welfare cases often drag on without resolution due to a lack of resources or a mistaken focus on the rights of parents – rather than keeping the child from harm.
“There are simple reforms that would allow judges more discretion to make placement to join cases to consider other family members to look at kinship care that should be done,” said Lamrock.
“We’ve got to have a renewed focus … on making sure services respond at the rate at which children need them.”
The full report can be found here.
