'Not progressive changes': Critics say amendments to N.W.T. child welfare laws don't cut it

A former family lawyer with legal aid in the Northwest Territories says proposed changes to the territory's child welfare legislation don't meaningfully address the driving forces behind the over-representation of Indigenous children in care.

"These amendments — they're not revolutionary at all. They're not amendments that seek to disrupt or change the system," said Sukham Dhindsa. 

"They're amendments that will continue the system as it already exists." 

In March, a Legislative Assembly committee released a report on the Child and Family Services Act.

The report says that while 57 per cent of children and youth in the N.W.T. are Indigenous, Indigenous children and youth account for more than 98 per cent of the young people in care. 

It attributes this gross disproportion to colonization, Canada's history of genocide, residential schools and the Sixties Scoop, and calls the situation a "territorial crisis."

In an effort to remedy the ailing child welfare system, the territorial government has proposed nearly two dozen amendments to its Child and Family Services Act. It's now asking for the public's feedback on those changes.

But Dhindsa, who represented families involved with the territory's child welfare system for three years up until March 1, says the whole system needs an overhaul, and the changes on the table now don't come close to doing that.

"The proposed amendments are not progressive changes," she said. "[They] just kind of rephrase what was already in the act."

The child and family services division's main concern is the best interests of the child, says a discussion paper on the proposed amendments. It says the division strives to keep families together and maintain children's connections to their communities.

The paper's authors also recognize that "systemic issues" contribute to the overrepresentation of Indigenous children in care. The proposed amendments, they say, are part of the territory's greater mission to reform its child welfare system.

The paper says the amendments recognize the federal Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families, which came into force two years ago, as well as "the inherent right of self-government in relation to child and family services."  

Both the federal and territorial acts lay out factors to consider when assessing the best interests of the child, including the child's cultural and linguistic background, the child's relationship to their parent, and the child's safety. One proposed amendment would add a reference to the best interests of the child under the federal act. 

Other changes state that poverty, or inadequate housing, shouldn't be the sole reason a child is removed from their family, and that support services (like counselling, parenting programs and help with housing) should be prioritized over apprehension, insofar as doing so is in the child's best interest.