'We actually don't want children to die': Feehan defends NDP record on child welfare

Indigenous RelationsMinister Richard Feehan mounted a blazing defence of child care workers during a rare emergency debate onthe child interventionsystem in the Alberta legislature Monday.

Feehan, a social worker for 34 years who worked with sexually abused children, said he was sick of hearing people say that front-line workers don't care.

"I do care. And if I get told one more time that I don't care, I am going to ask that person how much they have done over the last 34 years," Feehan shouted at the opposition.

• Girl's death in kinship care prompts call for emergency debate in Alberta legislature
• New calls for change follow two more deaths of Alberta children who received government care

"How many kids they have seen who came in their door when they were six years old who were sexually abused because they lived in a house with 12 people and there were bedrooms only for six?

"What do they do about the housing on reserves? What do they do about the fact we don't have water on reserves? What do they do about the fact teachers on reserves are underfunded compared to teachers off reserves?"

The debate was prompted by the case of Serenity, a four-year-old Indigenous girlwho was emaciated, bruised and suffering from hypothermia when she died from a brain injury in September 2014. She also showed injuries that suggested she had been sexually assaulted.

Feehan's passionate response was prompted by comments from Wildrose MLA Angela Pitt.

Pitt said Child and Youth Advocate Del Graff has given the government the same recommendations over and over again but nothing has changed. She suggested the government doesn't care.

"I'm sick and tired of hearing, 'We are just going to fund this' and everything is going to befine," Pitt said, her voice rising with emotion.

"There are reports here that clearly define problems in this system and nobody is doing a thing about it. These are children."

Feehan spoke about how he and thousands of others protested the cuts made in the 1990s by the Progressive Conservative government of Ralph Klein.

He said right-wing ideology means politicians will focus on individual cases but won't provide funding for programs to stop the causes of child abuse such as poverty anda lack of housing and social supports on reserves.

He said the government is funding education, social services and health care.

"Because we actually don't want children to die," Feehansaid. "That's why we do it."

Kinship care questions

Serenity's case places renewed focus on the kinship care model, in which a child in government care is placed with members of their family so they can remain within their cultural group.

Serenity and her two siblings were moved from foster care to the care of relatives about a yearbefore her death.

After five months, the relatives were granted permanent guardianship, even though case workers had been called to investigate after their mother noticed the children had bruising and were losing weight.

The complaints were dismissed because the children didn't disclose any neglect or abuse.

The province ended its involvement with the girl and no one checked on her in the eight months before she died.

Pitt said said kinship care works for some families but ideology and political correctness shouldn't take precedence over a child's safety.

"Some of these children were removed from loving homes, but for ideology's sake we move them somewhere else? " she asked.

In his report last week, Graff outlined most of the severe injuries sustained by the child, who he identified as Marie. However, he did not include details from a medical report that said the girl had signs of trauma on her genitals.

The government is not releasing the report from the medical examiner to Graff or the public at the request of the RCMP, who fear it could compromise an ongoing criminal investigation.

Graff said he is not bothered that he didn't have that information available because he had enough informationto recommend changes to the kinship care system.

"Given that we didn't know how long the medical examiner's report would take and we'd already had a substantial time frame go by, we made a decision to release the report we did, with the recommendations that we did," Graff said.

"At the end of the day, I believe these recommendations, if they're acted on, would make a difference for children. That's the reason why we released when we did