WAY too much talk happens … not much gets done

In a posting on Facebook, Dale Bass (Kamloops This Week) made note of a blog she had seen from Ron Unrah.  The posting was entitled THE NEED FOR REFORM / 532 (Thursday, May 19, 2011) and can be found online at http://ronunruhgps.blogspot.com/2011/05/need-for-reform-532.html?spref=fb

In his blog post, Mr. Unrah stated that, “Child protection in the English speaking world has failed so frequently because it is fundamentally flawed at so many levels. It appears to have become a system preoccupied with forensics rather than determined and successful at helping families.”

In continuing to read what he had said, it seems to me that his opinion is that Child Protection actually causes more problems than they solve, there are more families that are “fragmented” … and that children do not “come out of the system better for the experience. “

He concludes by saying that, “The reform of child protection must become a priority for our B.C. government.”

The blog is a very short piece, but I think his thrust is that Child Protection is not working the way it is.

What do I think???  I stated that it was a rather brief and unhelpful piece … and that it's like saying the lawn /garden needs watering, and what do we do?

A number of years ago the criteria in many areas dealing with the family was, "community standards". In a time of large government cutbacks, I think those two words allowed for nothing to be done because, 'what are community standards'?   It’s pretty hard to define, and it allowed for a minimum standard to be required for the care of a child.

Until the Ministry of Children and Families, and the community as a whole, come up with standards that will be universally applied, we are going to have serious problems with children in unsafe situations. We have allowed the so called rights of the individual, culture / ethnicity, and money (or lack thereof) to dictate child protection.

That has got to end … it just seems like WAY too much talk happens, and not much gets done.

I believe that this is going to be an issue that never gets resolved until we decide once and for all, if the protection of children is the ultimate goal.  Right now we have children raising children (and I do not mean just chronological age) --- we have the allowance for variances due to culture and traditions within ethnic communities --- we have government budgets (or lack thereof) that do not allow for enough workers --- and on and on the list goes.

Just to be clear … I do not believe that people should have to pass a test and get a license to have children.  That said, I find it incredible that when I got my cat from the SPCA, they had a lot of things that I had to assure them were going to happen for the well-being of that cat … and that was before she was able to leave through their door.

Another person posted to the story that Dale brought to our attention, in part saying, “We need reform, not just quality of service improvements. We need funding for programs and training initiatives and we need social workers to be required by law to register with the college of social workers to ensure their activities in our communities maintain professional codes of conduct & standards.”

On that point I do agree …. I don’t however on another comment she made though … “I believe universal rules, applied to individual conditions, contributes to the problem you describe Alan.  For example, if an individual meets an arbitrary IQ criteria, they are ineligible for a wide variety if services, regardless of demonstrated inability to function. This includes parents and their capacity to provide care for their child/children.”

First – I believe one of the biggest reasons this is, and continues to be a problem, is because we don't have some universal rules.  Secondly there are indeed services provided by a large number of societies, organizations, and by government agencies that offer assistance to families and those raising children.   

In some instance unfortunately there are people who are not aware of these services.  Regrettably though for other children, some caregivers choose to believe the job they are doing is just fine.

I’m Alan Forseth in Kamloops, and those are the thoughts of one conservative.