Weak oversight of N.S. youth homes increases risk of improper child care: auditor

HALIFAX — Vulnerable Nova Scotia children are at risk of receiving inadequate care because of weak oversight within the province’s youth home and temporary care network, says the province’s auditor general.

Kim Adair told a news conference Tuesday the most concerning finding from her new report is the lack of regular contact between children and social workers, which she said impacts the staff’s ability to produce proper care plans.

“In almost half of our samples, social workers did not meet the contact standards for meeting with children in child and youth care homes or in the temporary emergency arrangements,” the auditor general told reporters. “In one instance, a child was not contacted for over three months.”

Adair’s report, released Tuesday, also says some children’s needs are not being met because their care plans are outdated or missing. As well, it criticized the agreements between the Department of Community Services and care providers, saying they lack mechanisms to hold people accountable.

It also highlighted that there were 1,900 “critical incidents or serious occurrences” between 2021 and 2023 that could have impacted the health and safety of children in child and youth care homes, but no analysis was done into the causes or severity of these events. Adair declined to give an example of a critical incident but noted that one government-run home accounted for about 37 per cent of serious occurrences over the two-year audit period.

“We would have expected to see a thorough analysis by the department to determine why one home accounted for such a high percentage of serious occurrences — averaging almost one per day — as well as to understand the nature and cause of these incidents,” she said in the report.

Adair said she was also concerned to learn the department did not know how many allegations of child abuse or neglect were reported by children living in child and youth care homes. 

Tuesday’s audit came with 20 recommendations, “among the highest made by my office in the past decade,” Adair said. 

In response, Community Services Minister Brendan Maguire said Tuesday he has accepted all 20 recommendations. “To all families and young people in care, your well-being is my utmost concern,” he said. 

“Being a former child in care myself, I empathize with your experiences and pledge to tirelessly advocate for you.”

Alec Stratford, registrar with the Nova Scotia College of Social Workers, said in an interview Tuesday he was disappointed the report failed to address the outdated case load standards for child welfare workers, which have been in place for more than 30 years and “don’t match the complexities of modern families.”

Social workers are under pressure because of the incredibly stressful nature of the work and “the major recruitment and retention issues,” which he said leave social workers overworked.

Stratford said he’s worried some of Adair’s recommendations that require additional documentation of interactions with children or families will add to the administrative burden on social workers, further reducing the time they can spend providing care.

Maguire said he has told Adair about his concerns with staffing and retention challenges, adding that he wants to implement the recommendations while simultaneously reducing paperwork.

“This is … I would argue, the most difficult job in government,” Maguire said of child welfare social workers. 

“The things they deal with day after day is quite frankly heroic … my job is to support them in their job supporting vulnerable youth, and one of the things we need to do is reduce the burden of administration and paperwork they do to get them doing what they do best.” 

Another problem noted in Adair’s report is the growing reliance on temporary emergency arrangements. Between 2021 and 2023, there were 271 Nova Scotia children placed in child and youth care homes and 227 children in temporary housing.

In many cases children are staying in temporary arrangements for far longer than the recommended four days, Adair said, with some children staying for more than eight months.

Temporary housing is run by service providers, with staff on the premises to provide 24-hour care, Adair said. But unlike child and youth care homes, these types of housing are not licensed or inspected by the Department of Community Services. 

Adair said the department explained that the rise in temporary care is due to there being fewer foster families, an increase in the needs of the children in care, and the fact some care homes don’t accept new placements.

Maguire said the province needs to work on incentivizing more Nova Scotians to get involved as foster families. 

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 7, 2024.

Lyndsay Armstrong, The Canadian Press