Children in care: Is there a way out?
B.C. has a long way to go when it comes to working effectively to reduce child poverty
By Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, B.C.'s Representative for Children and Youth
Vancouver Sun
August 19, 2009

If there is truth in the basic principle that society is judged on how we treat our most vulnerable, B.C.'s lack of progress in reducing child poverty should provoke a lot of soul searching.

Children in families coping with inter-generational or sudden poverty and deprivation are at a significant disadvantage.

They often lack nourishing food and have poorer school performance. They are challenged by impaired language, reading and memory skills, and high degrees of stress and isolation. Often these children live in poor housing in impoverished neighbourhoods with few social supports.

Their comparatively poor health outcomes, as Provincial Health Officer Dr. Perry Kendall recently observed, require harder work on the core problems of poverty.

These children pay a painfully high price. The cost to British Columbians is also great. Paying for the long-term effects of poverty is more expensive than supporting children and families in their time of crisis and need. As well, ensuring that our children have what they need to grow strong and healthy is the right thing to do in a just and equal society. The lack of opportunity for all children to succeed equal to their peers requires more effective interventions. And the depth and breadth of poverty seeping into the fabric of B.C. families demands a response.

But does B.C. have a plan? Is it integrated, coordinated, and focused on making a change?

Not at this point.

Other provinces do, aligning their systems more effectively and retooling their tax systems and supports to reduce poverty….

In B.C. we have a number of fragmented supportive programs, like child care, income assistance, housing programs, and various tax credits. Some of these I monitor and review for effectiveness and responsiveness. I do know that they are not pulled together within a systematic framework built on outcomes, targets and performance measures, or aimed at provoking change and improvement.

We do not have a seamless, coordinated system, with strong single accountability, appropriate to our duty of care to vulnerable families and children.

Families coping with poverty in today's tough economic situation have a very difficult time….

I recently publicly released an investigation report into one such case, in which a young B.C. family in crisis with no resources was instructed to find better housing….

B.C. needs a child-poverty plan widely championed by political, community and business leaders -- a plan that is coordinated and comprehensive. We need strong accountability and a commitment by everyone to ensure that progress is made, for the sake of B.C.'s children. It's the right thing to do, and critical that we do it now.