Representative for Children and Youth (RCY) Report – Caught in the Middle

The Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) is committed to sharing with British Columbians the actions taken in response to recommendations provided by its oversight bodies, including the Representative for Children and Youth (RCY).

On this page:

• Caught in the Middle
• Ministry response
• Network of Care
• Specialized Homes and Support Services (SHSS)

Caught in the Middle

The RCY released the report Caught in the Middle in November 2019. The report examines the investigation into the death of a youth who was in the care of the Alberta government and residing in B.C. under an inter-provincial agreement at the time of his death.

There are six recommendations to enhance interprovincial child welfare practice and create a trauma-informed, child-centered approach to decisions about living arrangements for children in care. The report highlighted the need to speak with children in care about their ethnicity and culture to record this information in the ministry’s information system.

MCFD has accepted the recommendations and is committed to working collaboratively with provincial counterparts across Canada to ensure the best outcomes for children and youth in care. MCFD has provided the RCY with annual updates on the key actions taken to implement the recommendations for three years beginning in 2020.

The ministry welcomes and appreciates this report as it offers valuable insights on strengthening supports and services for children and youth in care.

The ministry recognizes that children and youth experience better outcomes when they remain connected to their community, culture, family, and the people known to them. To improve the Network of Care for children and youth in in B.C., the ministry is implementing a network of Specialized Homes and Support Services (SHSS), outlined below. In addition, MCFD has created a full-time interprovincial coordinator position and an interactive resource guide to support workers with interprovincial placements.

The ministry is committed to using the data it collects, including race and ethnicity information, to inform system improvements and track outcomes for children and youth in care. The Anti-Racism Data Act was introduced into law after its development through engagement with Indigenous Peoples, racialized communities, and other key stakeholders. Under the Anti-Racism Data Act, government is coordinating the collection of new demographic data to understand gaps and inequities in government programs and services. 

Ministry response

The ministry has taken the following steps in response to this report:

• The Provincial/Territorial Protocol on Children, Youth and Families Moving Between Provinces and Territories, which is overseen by the Canadian Directors of Child Welfare, is regularly reviewed and adapted where necessary to reflect the high standard of practice required to fully support children and youth who may move to reside in other provinces and territories. 
• The first interprovincial coordinator for B.C. was hired in September 2019, and is the lead expert in matters regarding interprovincial practice. The coordinator intervenes in matters that require dispute resolution on behalf of children and youth in care and in out of care arrangements in B.C. who are moving out of province, as well as on behalf of children and youth in care under the jurisdiction of another Province or Territory who are moving to B.C.  They also track all children and youth in care who move to another province or territory to live with extended family or return to their home Nation or community and all children and youth in care of another jurisdiction who move to B.C.
  • The interprovincial coordinator meets monthly with, and provides ongoing support to, a dedicated group of practice consultants who support interprovincial practice.
  • The coordinators from each province/territory meet quarterly to remain current on issues relating to their work. 
• Developed an interactive, on-demand interprovincial placement resource practice guide that is available for staff.

MCFD is committed to ensuring our data can be used across systems to better track outcomes for children and families. MCFD is working on improvements to existing ethnicity/race data collection in case management information systems and the use of ethnicity/race information in its practice.

Network of Care

• The Network of Care is designed to help shift the ministry’s services from a reactionary approach to a focus on early intervention and providing a holistic, culturally safe, and trauma-informed network of supports and services that are driven by a child or youth’s needs. This transformation work is in alignment with the Caught in the Middle report, which recommended improvements to better meet the needs of children, youth, and families with complex needs and to ensure a trauma-informed method is used in resourcing decisions.
• The Network of Care includes a continuum of care options, such as living with extended family or community members, foster care, and if needed, specialized homes that can provide additional therapeutic services. Working from the acknowledgement that placing a child or youth in care to live with strangers can cause trauma, the ministry continues to focus on keeping children and youth with family or known community members with the addition of new Enhanced Out-of-Care (EOOC) support agreements. These agreements provide comprehensive, wraparound supports to children and youth with significant and complex functional support needs and their care providers.

Specialized Homes and Support Services (SHSS)

• The ministry is working to overhaul contracted staffed care through the Specialized Homes and Support Services (SHSS) transformation. Within SHSS, specialists will provide highly specialized care to children and youth with complex needs, for whom other less specialized care options are not appropriate.
• The SHSS transformation also includes new services designed to keep families together and strong, such as respite and low-barrier short-term stabilization care.
• All children and youth involved in SHSS are supported through trauma-informed care planning and resourcing decisions. Integrated and inclusive care planning approaches ensure trauma, child/youth strengths and needs, community and family connections, and permanency and reunification plans are reflected as part of every placement decision.
  • Trauma-informed care is an obligation of the care providers, and is supported through improved contract requirements, access to resources for supports for both children, youth and staff, an integrated information management system, and the ministry’s Trauma-Informed Practice Guide.
• SHSS implementation is underway.