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Foster care failing native children

The Canadian Press

Latest comment posted at 7:50 PM EDT 08/05/08

Youth on reserves eight times more likely to land in poorly tracked care ...Read the full article

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  1. Donald Morin from Salish Territory, Canada writes: As a former ward of the crown and surviving the physical and sexual abuse of the foster care system, I wholely agree that native children do not get the proper care and support in the fostering system. I know as I was one of the many metis and native children who barely survived the abuse of the fostering system The current system needs a total overhaul and current costs of living for fostering chilodren brought up to par with the economics of the 21st century.
  2. Free The West from Free the West, BC, Canada writes: The foster care system will never be able to counteract the damage done in the first place by dysfunctional parenting, no matter how much funding is delivered.
  3. Hal ManyWounds from Canada writes: Kids having kids and substence abuse so prevelant in FN communities will cost taxpayers a lot of money as we go forward. This should not be a blame the white man of the government situation. FN communities need to look unto themselves for solutions.
  4. Alonso Garnet from Canada writes: Has anyone recommended birth control or planned parenting? By the time these children are put into Foster Care, the damage is already done.
  5. Bill Smith from Saskatchewan, Canada writes: In SK there appears to be reluctance on the part of FN to have children put into non-FN homes in foster care. While I agree that there needs to be an overhaul of the funding system for foster care, I think there needs to be a re-focus on the actuals needs of the children. They should go to the best foster home care available be it FN ot not.

    The fundamental causes of this issue can only be dealt with through education and economic empowement of and by FN peoples. The fix is a long term fix and will only become apparent long after the current crop of politicians are gone. This means that it falls outside the quadrenial planning cycles of government and this means it's not a priority for most including the FN leaders.

    There is a fixation on more money to deal with the short term needs without incorporating a long term plan for educational and economic improvements.

    And of course, in the short term, kids are hurt because of all the petty bickering and political agendas of FN and non-FN leaders.
  6. GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: Bill Smith from Saskatchewan, Canada writes:'The fundamental causes of this issue can only be dealt with through education and economic empowerment of and by FN peoples.'

    If you mean giving more money and power to the bands, chiefs, councils, 'first nations', tribes, etc, then I doubt it would have any detectable effect.

    What is needed is more education and empowerment of the indians themselves, getting out of their dysfunctional communities and self-sufficient in the real world.

    As long as the 'first nations' control the economic fate of most indians, those indians will never escape the trap.
  7. rik smith from Los Angeles, United States writes: Seems like the Auditor General has the most complete picture of what all the Gov't Depts shortcomings and inefficiencies are. If we bother to report on these embarrassing gaps in our Social and Financial institutions, shouldn't the problems in these reports become a mandatory fix? It would appear much gets lost in the translation since many of these issues come up year after year and nothing significant changes.....truly sad.
  8. dirk dirk from Canada writes: Education and prevention need to be stressed as well. We've been hearing the native groups boasting that they are the fastest growing demographic segment in Canada with the highest percentage below 25. However, young people who are ill equipped to look after and support even themselves should be the last people having children. Those stats are nothing to take pride in.

    I know first hand through family who have adopted native children, the consequences of FAS. Look no further than the recent case at yellowquill. That mother just gave birth again a few weeks ago. That would have made her about 6 months pregnant the night she was off drinking while her two other children froze to death.

    These are not pleasant facts, nor are they popular to discuss. But these are harsh realities that the natives themselves must address. Stop having kids you are unable to look after.
  9. Emma Hawthorne from Canada writes: Canada should have a full commission inquiry into it's failure to protect children's welfare and ensure that they thrive. Foster care, adoption, poverty, drug addicted caregivers, violence, mental illness in parents and children, lack of stability, failure to protect them from criminal assaults, toxic parenting and negative teachers working out of non-welcoming schools poisoned by bullying and violence are just the broad striokes. Children need help. Why one earth doesn't the foster care system reach out to intelligent warm-hearted advantaged families who could offer so much? Too many unrefined, insenstive people use foster kids merely for easy income. This should stop. Needy children should also be protected from instability through constant moves.
  10. GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: Emma Hawthorne from Canada writes: 'Canada should have a full commission inquiry into it's failure to protect children's welfare and ensure that they thrive.'

    The current politically correct notion is that indian kids be handed over to indian families, preferably of the same 'first nation'.

    Those who point out that there is a woeful undersupply of suitable potential foster parents under such limitations are decried as racists.
  11. GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: Emma Hawthorne from Canada writes:'... failure to protect children's welfare...'

    Canada also fails to protect its own Society by taking steps to reduce the number of children born into unsuitable households.

    As a start, making long-term passive birth control (IUD, Norplant, etc) a condition for applying for welfare would go far. After all, people on welfare are quite evidently incapable of taking care of themselves, much less take care of more and more babies.
  12. Dan Shortt from Toronto, Canada writes: Here's an idea that might work: if you can't look after the first child that you have, don't have another one ....
  13. Kevin Desmoulin from Toronto, Canada writes: Here we go again. Yes a lot of work needs to done on both sides, our natives and the government.
  14. Fake Name from Canada writes: "GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: As a start, making long-term passive birth control (IUD, Norplant, etc) a condition for applying for welfare would go far."

    Nope ... steps on the charter rights of catholic welfare recipients to reject birth control. Too bad, because it sounds like a good plan.

    PS ... the article says the problem is the government underestimating the need for foster care in the FN community. Wouldn't it be a racist assumption on their child-rearing capacity to set a higher quota, though?
  15. J Hare from Saskatoon, Canada writes: Some people posted regarding foster care and why advantaged people don't perticipate more frequently. I was a foster brother for over 13 years (grade 5 through 4 years of university) as my family took in foster children. I will tell you that foster care agencies plan that every family they bring in will quite within 2 years. It is a very rare home that last longer then this. Those that do, it is partly about the money that the children bring in to the home (about $2,000.00 per month or so) so the financial incentives do exist. Even with this incentive, the burn out rate is huge because it is increadably hard work and enormously disruptive to have these children around. Most people who try are quickly brought to the point of asking "why should I bother?" If you don't "need" to do it you quickly realize that it's not worth the effort. Then you councel your friends that its not worth it or they see it isnt worth it and don't volunteer so this lowers the number of "advantaged" households in the system. Anyway, personally I'll give money rather then do it myself. I just don't think its worth it.

    James Hare
  16. k ant from OUT WEST, Canada writes: Perhaps the statistics support the article but they are completely irrelevant. Of course the children that enter care are failing in school and drop out. They arent in care because they are from stable homes. Most come into care with FASD and drug baby symptoms. Add the toll of sexual, physical abuse and neglect. Now you have a recipe for failure long before they hit the system. These children would fail because they are starting life in a deficit situation. I know many foster families and they are loving and compassionate. Unlike natural children however you are not starting with a clean slate you have to help the children work through all the behaviors that are part of the damage done to them. This damage happened long before they got to their foster home
  17. GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: Fake Name from Canada writes: "... Charter rights of catholic welfare recipients to reject birth control."

    True, that's one more impediment to enlightened policy in addition to the usual blinkered political correctness.
  18. GlynnMhor of Skywall from Canada writes: Fake Name from Canada writes: "steps on the Charter rights of catholic welfare recipients to reject birth control."

    No problem; no one is ever forced to accept welfare money.

    They are still free to choose.
  19. Chris E. from vancouver, Canada writes: The only answer is to bring back residential schools, this time run by the Assembly of First Nations. Funding would be from charitable donations from successful reserve businesses.
  20. Emma Hawthorne from Canada writes: My best friend during high school in Kimberly B.C. was a Shushwap girl taken from her alcoholic parents and placed with a local family along with two other native children. A special room was built for them. But to get there you had to go outside of the house, around the back and then up some stairs. They were fed differently and with cheaper food than the natural children of the adopted family but were regularly pressed into caring for their disabled daughter (Dowen's) along with just about all of the family's housework. My friend never had any illusions. "We're here for the money," she said. Other than their coldness, this family was otherwise not verbally or physically abusive and the children were well-dressed and had what they needed. But still - for children from three different families who were dragged away from their families, it was insensitve, unfair and not enough. My friend wanted to be a nurse and an artist. Instead she moved back to her reserve, took a menial job and then supported nine adults on her unemployment benefits when she was laid off, mostly by eating fried potatoes and onions every day. Added to this, there was racism among the least educated, often alcoholic, local stiffs in Kimberly. This is probably one of the more positive stories.
  21. Mark S Noel from NT, Canada writes: Government fails Native Children more like Bands fail Native Children. Why is it when ever a problem is identified the FN always say give us more unattached money and we will fix the problem. Always the same story but nothing ever gets fixed.
  22. dirk dirk from Canada writes: That is a sad story Emma. Your friend didn't get what she needed as a child growing up. It is difficult raising a family in today's world. And to complicate things by bringing in foster children, often with emotional/behavioural problems takes a special kind of family to provide not just the physical security these kids need but the love and nurturing every child needs. It takes very special people and there just aren't enough of them to fill the need. Let's not forget the original cause of the situation. Alcoholic parents. It is selfishness pure and simple. I really am beyond caring at this point if people want to screw up their lives. But when you have children, it's time to smarten up and get your act together. I'm not interested in anyone's excuses. I don't care how hard it is to get sober. Just do it. Look after your children or don't have them. It's clear from stories like yours and requests for more funding that there can never be enough foster families to meet the need. So the solution is on the supply side. Stop supplying and endless stream of children that require foster care. It's time for parents to look after their children. You can't just think of yourself and your drinky. It's called growing up. I know, I know, it's complicated. I don't understand what these people have been through. Well, I understand one thing. There are little children that need their parents. Get over yourself.
  23. Carly MacKay from United States writes: Wow, poor kids. Emma Hawthorne your story about your friend from Kimberly was terribly sad. The problems that you experience with your natives are not unlike some of the problems we experience with some African- Americans communities in poorer neighborhoods. Drug addiction, alcholism, very high teenage pregnancy rates, single moms with several children by several different fathers, high drop out rates, and disproportionatley high rates of said population on welfare rolls. You can pour all the money you want into the problem but change has to start from within the community. You can lead a horse to water. . . . Here in the city I live in I have seen billboards advertising counselling for drug addicts and alchoholics. They advertise in newspapers and even send home notices from school with children to give their parents. There is a lot of help available, these agencies do get the word out, yet the number of people who accept this help is relatively low. Even those who do not have addictions, that just sit around and collect welfare really do not do anything to improve their situation because it is easier to do nothing than to go out and work and make about the same as if you were on welfare. Sometimes I think the best idea would be to break these communities up and distribute welfare recipients more evenly throughout middle class neighborhoods. Children need to be exposed to different enviroments rather than just seeing the same thing on a daily basis from birth. Children who see drug addiction, physical and sexual abuse and parents, neighbors, friends (the majority of people in their community) sitting around collecting and not earning their keep - are more likely to end up doing the same thing as adults themselves, it is all they know, they think it is 'normal'. Yet to suggest that some of the fault lies with the community itself is "racist".
  24. Chris E. from vancouver, Canada writes: "Sometimes I think the best idea would be to break these communities up and distribute welfare recipients more evenly throughout middle class neighborhoods."

    They already do that in the U.S., and it extremely unpopular with homeowners who experience a drop in the value of their homes and neighborhoods.

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