Labrador house fire shows the need for more improvements in child welfare cases

The death of a child in a Labrador house fire in the summer of 2008 and subsequent internal investigation has again demonstrated the need for improvements in the child welfare system in Newfoundland and Labrador, says Opposition Leader Yvonne Jones. Jones raised the issue earlier today in the House of Assembly.

In the summer of 2008, a 13-year old child in partial custody of the child welfare system died in a house fire in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. Since that time, complaints have been made that the child was failed by the system as prior issues that were identified and raised with the Department of Child, Youth and Family Services were not appropriately acted upon.

“We know that Labrador has unique challenges involving geography, culture, workload and staffing that often require different approaches to dealing with issues,” said Ms. Jones. “Unfortunately, we see time and time again that systemic problems are often impacting the level of care children receive while in the child welfare system. The Turner Report was supposed to overhaul the way in which child welfare and support services functioned in the province, but there are still children falling through the gaps that exist within the system.”

Jones called for an independent investigation into the fire earlier this year. An internal government report into the fire obtained under the Access to Information Act was mostly blacked out with entire pages missing. There were eight recommendations involving improved training, clinical supervision and risk management to address some of the failures in this case, however, other recommendations were blacked out.

“I was very interested in hearing the comments of Kathleen Kufeldt, a child welfare expert, in a CBC story this week. She stated that when these types of incidents occur within the system, an independent investigation is warranted and should be initiated by government. Until our office brought this issue to the Child and Youth Advocate, no such investigation had taken place.”

Jones says she is also concerned about the status of the current investigation as Child, Youth and Family Services Minister Joan Burke stated in the House of Assembly that the current Child and Youth Advocate didn’t feel an investigation into the case was warranted, but was doing it out of obligation instead of necessity.