Advocate Cites Hurdles to Meeting Kid's Needs

The province’s biggest advocate for children took Liberals as well as the NDC (and essentially every British Columbian) to task on Thursday (June 4) for not making children’s needs a higher priority
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Speaking at the BC Council for Families’ Annual General Meeting, Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond said, “Neither mainstream party talked about children” in last month’s provincial election. She said the needs of youth “need to be up there with economic and environmental issues,” while insisting that “British Columbia is child-focused.”

Turpel-Lafond is the appointed Representative for Children & Youth in BC. Time magazine named her one of Canada’s “Top 20 Leaders for the 21st Century.”

The Harvard Law School graduate is a former criminal law judge and professor of law, but she didn’t use legal speak to make her point. She told about 50 in attendance that reducing child poverty “has got to be one of the highest priorities for everyone.”

“Tough economic times tax the child-serving system,” said Turpel-Lafond, “but the system has to be ready both in good times and bad times.”

She mentioned Ontario as a model, where lawmakers “unanimously passed a poverty-reduction act (last month), and they are in the worst shape (economically) in the country.”

Beyond the obvious impacts of poverty, the speaker said it is “the biggest single factor that affects educational outcomes” for children. She went on to cite some other “challenges” facing child services in British Columbia, including what she called “the biggest issue: the lack of coordination in the child-serving system.”

The needs of aboriginal youth pose a particular problem, she said, citing “grinding poverty generation after generation.”
“Sixty percent of aboriginals are living off reserves or in urban areas,” she continued. “They move to get their needs served, but they move away from their culture. And kids have a right to be raised in their own culture and language.”
Speaking candidly without notes, Turpel-Lafond said “throwing money” at youth problems is not the answer, especially in First Nations communities. “They get lots of money to build a gym, but they play bingo in it,” she recalled hearing from one critic who is aboriginal.

She blasted what she called “no accountability” in spending, adding, “We give money to adults, but that doesn’t guarantee it gets spent (on improvements) for kids.”

No matter where BC children are in need, she said, “It is our problem … We all need to care about someone else’s child,” because he or she may be “the surgeon who operates on us – or the man who robs us on the Sky Train.”
A mother of twin girls and a younger son, Turpel-Lafond mentioned parents’ addictions and mental illness as additional factors that can contribute to a child’s plight – as well as the more ominous problem of child abuse.

“We’re not a province without violence,” she said. “You can’t hit your spouse, but you’re allowed to ‘discipline’ your child. I sometimes hear, ‘I hit my child and it’s working.’ I try not to be judgmental.”

The BC Council for Families works “to help create healthy families in a healthy society.” It provides educational resources on topics such as parenting, childhood development, parent-teen relationships, work-life balance, suicide awareness and more.

The council supports family-education specialists by coordinating professional-development workshops and symposiums, participating in conferences, and disseminating research and resources.

Like A-DES, the Council for Families believes in prevention. Outgoing Board President Barbara Graham told the AGM audience, “We believe in preventive support prior to critical needs.”

Giving families “the early support they need … strengthens their ability to care for their own members, and reduces the risk and potential for future problems,” according to the council, which has a staff of 13 and a $1.2 million budget for 2009.

For more information, visit their website at http://www.bccf.bc.ca/hm/