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"Building a better tomorrow for Black and Indigenous children"

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"Building a better tomorrow for Black and Indigenous children"

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Black and Indigenous children in Ontario are over-represented in Care, or let us rephrase it to children from these communities are ‘still’ over-represented in Care. It’s bitter but true, that for generations Black and Indigenous people have been often marginalized and they face discrimination in countries' legal systems, leaving children of these communities even more vulnerable to violence and abuse. Separating children from their families leads to detrimental effects on their physical and mental health and the long-term damage caused is undeniable. The underlying social issues that result in the over-representation of Indigenous and Black children in care are multi-faceted and need a multi-pronged approach. There are many organizations, child advocates, and Black and Indigenous people themselves who are challenging the systems and attitudes that have perpetuated their oppression to realize their full rights and achieve equality. The objective is to change the face of Ontario's child welfare system; support Black and Indigenous children to grow up living with their families, and adopt a more community-based, high-quality, culturally appropriate and responsive vision, with a focus on prevention and early intervention.

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The Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC) undertook public interest research in 2016 on Indigenous and racialized children and youth participation in the child welfare system. They used their authority under Section 31 of the Ontario Human Rights Act to obtain information from children's charities (CASs) about their procedures regarding the collecting of racial data and how they track children and families in their care.

The purpose of this study was to determine if Indigenous and Black children were overrepresented in CASs, specifically in care admissions. They were concerned that racial disproportion and systemic racism could be indicators of systemic racial discrimination.

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The Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC) published a report in February 2018 titled, "Interrupted Childhoods: Over-representation of Indigenous and Black children in Ontario child welfare."

This began in 2016 when the OHRC wanted to examine the proportion of Indigenous and racialized children and youth in the child welfare system.

The OHRC began by using their ability under section 31 of the Ontario Human Rights Code to request information from children's aid societies (CASs) on their race-based data collection practices. The goal was to see if Indigenous and Black children are over-represented at CASs, specifically when being admitted into care.

Here are some statistics that were gathered:

Indigenous children were over-represented in admissions into care at 93% of agencies we looked at (25 of 27), with many CASs showing extreme levels of disproportionality.  Overall, the proportion of Indigenous children admitted into care was 2.6 times higher than their proportion in the child population.

Black children were over-represented in admissions into care at 30% of agencies (8 of 27). Overall, the proportion of Black children admitted into care was 2.2 times higher than their proportion in the child population.

At more than half of the 27 CASs, White children were underrepresented among children admitted into care (15 of 27 agencies or 56%).

OHRC looked at 38 mainstream CASs’ data collection practices. These CASs’ human rights-based (particularly race-based) data collection practices are widely inconsistent with each other and vary even within many individual agencies.

More than 40% of CASs did not know the racial backgrounds or Indigenous identities of more than one in five children served by their agency, when considering referrals, cases opened for investigation, and admissions of children into care.

For most CASs, these gaps and inconsistences make it statistically difficult to assess if racial disparities exist across different service decisions (such as placing children into care), which makes it difficult to assess whether systemic racial discrimination may be happening.

In February of 2018, the OHRC learned that the government is planning to introduce a directive requiring CASs to begin to systematically collect human rights-based data. As part of its mandate to address systemic discrimination, Ontario’s Anti-Racism Directorate is also developing standards and guidelines on collecting race-based data.

So... has any progress been made?

On August 11th, 2021 Jane McKenna, Associate Minister of Children and Women's Issues released a statement regarding the steps that have been taken to modernize Ontario's child welfare system.

"Over the past 12 months we have worked closely with sector partners and stakeholders to shift investments from protection services to community-based prevention that better supports the unique needs of diverse kids and their families including Indigenous, Black, racialized and LGBTQ2S children and youth and those with special needs. We are continuing to work with First Nations, Inuit and Métis and urban Indigenous partners to support their families and expand access to care that better reflects their customs, heritages and traditions. This year we invested $5 million to enhance access to customary care so children and youth can remain closely connected to their culture and community."

The investments include:

$6 million to support First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples to develop and begin implementing their own Indigenous-led models for child and family services.

This year the province designated Niijaansinaanik Child and Families Services as the 13th Indigenous children’s aid society in Ontario, meaning that more Indigenous children and families will have access to culturally specific prevention and child protection services.

$5.4 million to expand the Family Well-Being program designed to end violence against Indigenous women, reduce the overrepresentation of Indigenous children and youth in child welfare and youth justice systems, and improve the overall health and well-being of Indigenous communities.

$800,000 annually in One Vision One Voice, a community-led initiative with a focus on anti-Black racism, to support the delivery of safe and suitable services for African Canadian and Black children, youth and families.

An additional $1.5 million in the Education Liaison program to improve educational outcomes for children and youth in care by supporting a full-time liaison in every children’s aid society.

An extension of the moratorium on youth aging out of care until September 2022, including an investment of more than $8 million to better support youth who continue to receive service as a result of the moratorium.

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Current status (how things are going in 2021/2022)

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Current status (how things are going in 2021/2022)

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Black Canadians constitute 8.5% of the population, but 40% of the children are in care.

Indigenous children are only 4.1% of the Ontario under age 15 population but are approximately 30% of foster children.

Despite the different initiatives, and the resources the government and other institutions have put into solving the problem, the over representation of indigenous and black children in the care system is still a fact.

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Why overrepresentation of indigenous and black children in care needs to change?

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Why overrepresentation of indigenous and black children in care needs to change?

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The need to advocate for change within society of the over- representation of indigenous and black children and youth being admitted into the care system is imperative to help combat the traumatic and other negative effects being faced in their lives. Many children and youth are unfortunately not given the opportunity to reach their fullest potential to become valuable member of society.  Instead, they become part of a cycle of being institutionalized where in many instances they are seen as just another black or indigenous child, who face discrimination and oftentimes end up being criminalized.

It is shown that children who are placed in care can become associated with the criminal juvenile justice system, have a higher rate of homelessness, low income, unemployment, lower levels of post- secondary education and more prone to be affected by chronic health problems, in comparison to youth in general. It is also important to note that black and indigenous children are the most affected in comparison to other children and youth in society.

On many occasions families who are unable to provide for their children because of poverty or who may be struggling with other conditions such as mental or psychological problems, could be seen as negligence, and labeled as being incapable of caring for their children, therefore prompting onlookers to report what looks like neglect and abandonment, thereby causing the Children Aid Society to get involved. (Ontario Human Right Commission, [OHRC], n.d.).

It is important that more is done to advocate for change against societal customs and acceptance of having black and indigenous youth subjected to being removed from their families and communities and placed in the care system.

The need for change to support and help families of black and indigenous children to be resilient and fine ways to promote togetherness and sustainability is important. This could be accomplished by providing opportunities and the right tools for Families to provide for their children, which could help prevent them from being removed from their homes. The need for change, is also to remove the stigma attached to black and indigenous caregivers of being incapable of caring and providing for their children. The need for change is to help mitigate the generational trends of extreme trauma that is present in the lives of blacks, indigenous and other marginalized children, and their families. The institutionalization of racialized caregivers needs to be “nip in the bud”, so that more of them are available to care for their children. Another reason why change is needed, is for black and indigenous people to build trust in the governmental and social system in showing fairness, authenticity and equality toward ever socioeconomic class, race, and culture in society.

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Indigenous and Black families and youth have faced systemic, racial discrimination when it comes to the child welfare system for many years. Whenever a child is placed into the welfare system, their life is changed and impacted forever.  We are asking the Provincial and Federal government along with the Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services to take expeditious action. Children's Aid Societies (CASs) should have policies and rules in place so that workers who interact with youth and families must always take into consideration their culture and background.