In
2003 I obtained data on the number of deaths of children
in care after months of persistent effort to get an answer
to a freedom of information request. In
2004 I again submitted a freedom of information request
for updated numbers. When the answer came I discovered to
my dismay that they had revised the figures for earlier
years, making it look like they can't even accurately count
the number of children-in-care who die. At that time the
ministry published on its website the data they had provided
me; those data are now missing and have been replaced with
a new statistics section that fails to report on the number
of children-in-care. However, in response to allegations
from a social worker who recently retired, the ministry
published a "fact
sheet" which said "The number of children-in-care
is down 16 per cent - from 11,000 in 2001 to 9,000 in 2005."
The incidence of deaths of children in care would therefore
increase if the number of deaths did not also decrease by
16 per cent over that period. The number of deaths were
9 in 2001, 9 in 2002, 12 in 2003 and 14 in 2004; that's
definitely not a 16% reduction, it is an increase in both
absolute numbers and in the incidence (deaths per thousand
children-in-care). The ministry will likely argue that the
numbers are so small as not to be statistically significant,
but the issue is how significant are any of the deaths to
the government given its handling of investigations.
BC's
Chief Coroner recently said that he lacked the resources
and legislative authority to complete child death reviews
properly. That excuse sounds similar to what he said in
a 2002 letter in response to his office's ability to track
suicide deaths related to gambling. He wrote that it would
be desirable to track gambling related suicides but: "Unfortunately,
finite budgets and staffing levels demand that we make choices
among a variety of available options." That makes BC
stand alone
in not tracking gambling related deaths. On April 22,
2002, Patricia Cairns was beaten and strangled to death
by her husband who was enraged over her gambling away his
life's savings; however, the coroner's report on her death
doesn't mention one word about the gambling issue. The Judgment
of Inquiry on her death completely left out any investigative
findings even though guidelines for such reports suggest
they be included. Investigations into unnatural deaths are
of little use without the investigative findings.
According
to Public Accounts, the Coroners Service budget was $8.582
million in 2001-02, $8.009 million in 2002-03, $8.247 million
in 2003-04 and $8.315 million in 2004-05. The cut of $573,000
in 2002-03 was not yet fully restored by the fiscal year
ended March 31, 2005. Actual spending was $8.137 million
in 2000-01, $8.147 million in 2001-02, $7.516 million in
2002-03 and $7.869 million in 2003-04. The drop in actual
spending between 2001-02 and 2002-03 of $631,000 exceeded
the budgeted cut. Faced with questions about the cuts, the
Solicitor General weakly responded that the budget was under-spent
each year while not mentioning that it is a firing offense
for any bureaucrat to over-spend when ordered to cut.
On November
21st Opposition critic Adrian Dix asked Solicitor General
John Les about the death of Brandon James Seymour who was
two and a half years old when he died on June 27, 2003.
Dix asked:
"That
wheelchair was too big for him, and he occasionally slid
down in it. He was waiting for a replacement. On June 27,
2003, his caregiver found him in this wheelchair with the
restraint straps around his neck area. He had once again
slipped in his chair, and he was not breathing. Efforts
to resuscitate him failed. He died that morning. The coroner
on the case classified the death as undetermined and offered
no recommendations. When the Solicitor General said every
case is investigated, is this what he meant?"
In question
period this week the Campbell government appears to have
adopted a new strategy of hiding behind staff when fielding
questions about child deaths. Instead of being accountable
for the consequences of its cuts to services the government
either says that investigations are not yet complete, or
it attacks the Opposition for daring to question the integrity
of hardworking coroners and front-line social workers. It
is the Campbell government that reduced the number of staff
and gave those who remain fewer resources to do their job.
The job description for a regional coroner includes the
related qualification: "Ability to effectively resolve
difficult and politically sensitive problems." Does
that include editing reports of local coroners so as to
remove content that might embarrass the government? Civil
servants can't say and the government won't say.
The
Coroners Service provides local coroners with a "Guide
to Completing the Judgment of Inquiry". It emphasizes
that an individual's right to privacy does not end with
his/her death. As an example, in the case of a suicide,
it offers a guideline that "must be applied";
rather than detailing private information it instructs coroners
to summarize as follows:
How
can anyone analyze whether teenage suicides have a common
cause with reporting like that? How can BC assess whether
the expansion of gambling has resulted in increased suicides?
Perhaps the Coroner would develop a separate database if
he had the resources.
It is
time to shed some light on what happens when the experts
examine deaths, whether they are deaths of children or deaths
of adults. It is not a matter of blaming hard working, under-resourced
staff; it is a matter of holding a service-cutting government
to account for the consequences of its actions.
About
Me |
Mail Me | Links