Child supervision orders raise ministry resource questions

A provincial court judge calls the situation "nothing short of extraordinary."

A tearful mother shows up in court, asking for a supervision order for the father of her child, based on nothing more than an ominous call from a social worker, who is dealing with the man's new family.

For privacy reasons, the social worker can't say what the problem is; but advises the woman to go to court as soon a possible. Frustrated, but bound to protect the child, the judge gives the order, which says all the man's parenting visits from that point on must be supervised by the social worker.

But then, two months later, the social worker and the director of Child, Family and Community Service make their own application to the same judge — to have the order dropped.

One of the reasons being that forcing a social worker to supervise the visits would interfere with the department's ability to "allocate its limited resources." 

Conflicting messages

The judge has refused for now. But the lawyer for the woman says the case is not the only one in which conflicting messages from the Ministry of Children and Families have left single mothers feeling vulnerable.

"They phone mothers and they encourage them or pressure them to go to court and get these orders, but then they're hands off afterwards," says Neha Deol.

"A director of the ministry has said that it's a policy issue, meaning that there's funding issues with the ministry. So due to funding issues, they're not able to provide supervised access, even though the child is potentially at harm."

Deol says she has three similar cases.

Her concerns are echoed by Carol Metz Murray, executive director of Tri-City Transitions, a Port Coquitlam agency dedicated to helping women dealing with abuse. She says she has heard the same story from some of her clients.

"Why would you say it was needed in the first place?" she says.

"They're already in high anxiety and high stress because they're dealing with issues related to domestic violence. So I understand that fear because quite often, they don't know which way to turn."

'Wholly atypical' situation

The mother Deol represents is known as KAF in the decision posted by the provincial court last month. The father is called GDLR and the child S. The social worker is called S.B.

The order against GDLR was made ex parte, meaning without him being in the court to represent himself at the time.

Judge Thomas Woods takes pains to emphasize how "wholly atypical" it is for a mother to show up without having a clue about why an order is needed.

And even more so to have the social worker who raised the issue in the first place ask to drop the order.

"It must not be forgotten that if I were to give effect to the motion now brought by the the director and social worker-SB to delete the supervisions provisions ... the situation would revert to the way it was before," he writes.

"I repeat that I still have nothing before me from social worker SB that speaks to his 'significant concerns' about Child-S being in possible jeopardy if her parenting time with GDLR is not supervised."

'It is definitely disappointing'

The ministry won't comment on specific cases, but says social workers are bound to work with families to protect children at risk.

In a statement, the ministry notes that supervision orders under the Family Law Act are different from ones under the Child, Family and Community Services Act. In the former, a judge can order supervision by a third party, like a grandparent, without the ministry being involved.

The ministry is supposed to be there to protect children- lawyer Neha Deol

But under the Child, Family and Community Services Act, the director of child welfare can apply to the court for an order to protect a child.

KAF and GDLR's case involves both laws. In fact, in arguing to drop the supervision order, the ministry argued the judge lacked jurisdiction in what started out as a Family Law matter. 

But Woods said the social worker invoked the Child, Family and Community Services Act by sending KAF to get the order.

The lawyer then argued the ministry doesn't have the resources to supervise GDLR's parenting time. But Woods said "that argument is simply unmaintainable."

Deol says her cases involve women with little resources who are naturally worried about the safety of their children.

"The ministry is supposed to be there to protect children, and even though they're saying there's a concern, they're not putting in the resources to protect these children," Deol says. "It is definitely disappointing."

Metz Murray says the Liberals' 'Families First' agenda should require the government to find resources.

Woods concluded his decision by making the Director of Child, Family and Community Service a party to the proceedings involving KAF and GDLR. The matters is expected to come up for further hearings in the coming months.