User:DemiDragon/welfare prison pipeline

Indigenous Youth and the Child Welfare to Prison Pipeline in Canada
The child welfare to prison pipeline refers to the idea that Indigenous children involved in the child welfare system are more likely to end up in the justice system. Statistics show that Indigenous youth are represented in both the child welfare system and the justice system far more than white youth or adults. A report put out by the Ontario Human Rights Commission compared the child welfare system to a pipeline to the criminal justice system.

Following colonization, assimilation was a concern for politicians. There were many ways in which they tried to accomplish this, including Indian Pass System, the Reservations System, and the Indian Act. These tactics didn’t work as quickly as hoped, so the assumption was it would be easier to force assimilation through the children. Canada first attempted via Residential Schools, the Sixties Scoop , Child Welfare, and finally Prison. Looking at all of these systems together paint a picture of a pipeline especially for Indigenous youth from Child Welfare to Prison.

History
The attempt to force assimilation or banishment began with colonization. The more settlers that came to Canada, the more need for the land they had. And to get that land, they needed Indigenous people off of it.

When genocide didn’t work quickly or entirely enough, Canada shifted its attention to Indigenous children. It was believed to be easier to “take the Indian out of the child” than to assimilate adults. The solution became Residential Schools. The first school opened in 1894. Ultimately 150,000 children were taken from their families and forced into the schools. It is further approximated that up to 6,000 children died in these schools. While in the schools, children were not allowed to speak their language, practice their religion, or wear any of their clothing. If caught flouting any of the rules, there would be punishment, usually harsh. Parents were usually not allowed to visit, many being held back by the Indian Pass system. Many parents were also never told if their child had become sick, died, or ran away. It wasn’t until 1996 that the last school finally closed.

The next step in pushing for assimilation was the Sixties Scoop. Approximately 20,000 children were taken from their families under the guise of child welfare and adopted by non-Indigenous families. Though the laws that drove the Sixties Scoop officially ended in 1980. However, the number of children removed from their families did not slow down; it just morphed into what is now today’s child welfare system. Indigenous children are statistically more likely to be taken into care. Many of the reasons for the taking of children are poverty and inter-generational trauma, which can be traced back to colonization and the Indian Act. As of 2016, 52.2% of children under the age of 15 in foster care were Indigenous, while only counting 7.7% of the youth population.

The subjugation of Indigenous people in Canada has caused many issues for them. One of the problems that have been troublesome in a variety of ways is poverty. This poverty is made worse by living on reservations left in disrepair and neglect from the Canadian government. Poverty and the things that come out of that are often what are used as reasons for removing children from their homes.

Child Welfare Today
Child welfare has not always touched Indigenous communities. For better or worse, Indigenous people were left to fend for themselves, other than being forced to enroll their children in residential schools. It wasn’t until after the second World War that Indigenous children and their families became an interest to the Child Welfare system. Now that Indigenous people are involved, they’re involved in higher numbers than other families. In 2014, it was found that 71% of Indigenous children were currently in care compared to far fewer non-Indigenous children at 57.3%. Indigenous children also tended to have more placements and were taken into care earlier than non-Indigenous children. (policy issues).

For many provinces, Child Welfare had, and for some still have, Birth Alerts. Birth Alerts came about, so nurses or any other concerned people could report what they considered an unfit parent or family. If the report was made, Child Welfare would investigate and sometimes conclude with taking the child. One recent case in BC brought Birth Alerts to the attention of a much larger group of people. Since then, BC and Manitoba both have discontinued the use of Birth Alerts. Indigenous women were statistically more likely to be involved in a Birth Alert. Doing away with Birth Alerts was one of the recommendations of the MMIWG2S+ report that came out in June 2019:"“12.8 We call upon provincial and territorial governments and child welfare services for an immediate end to the practice of targeting and apprehending infants (hospital alerts or birth alerts) from Indigenous mothers right after they give birth .”"The Manitoba CFS Standards Manual states the requirements for issuing a birth alert included that the pregnant woman looked to be high-risk to her child. They defined high-risk as a parent likely to harmed or killed if left with the family. According to information received in the Freedom of Information Request on Birth Alerts, it was found that in 2018/2019 Manitoba received alerts from other provinces and territories, including Saskatchewan, Ontario and Quebec, among others. In that time, it was approximated that there were 500 birth alerts per year, with Indigenous women being over-represented in the alerts.

As of 2020, British Columbia, Manitoba, and Ontario have stopped this practice. Several provinces had no official birth alert written into law but have still practiced similar methods of taking children into care. Saskatchewan continues with using Birth Alerts.

There have been many conversations in Canada to discuss the overrepresentation of Indigenous children in care. In 2014, Premiers met with National Indigenous Leaders to discuss other ways to change the child welfare system. These premieres acknowledged that there was a problem. However, there seems to be little change in the number of children involved in care. The percentages range across the provinces, with the least being in Quebec, where Indigenous children make up 2% of the population and 8% of children in care; however, in Manitoba, the percentage of Indigenous children is 23% while making up 87% of the children in care. The 2011 National Household Survey shows the national numbers are Indigenous people making up 4.3% of Canada’s population and making up 48% of youth in care.

To complicate matters, no agency in Canada has the same definition for “child maltreatment”. This means there is no absolute guideline about what a good reason is to take a child into care. The definitions vary from severe physical harm to the possibility that significant injury could occur. This means that it could be left to anyone caseworker’s interpretation of whether the child is taken or not.

Regardless of how a child enters care, some of these children are moved from foster home to foster home, some ending up in motels or group homes. Many leave foster care before turning 18 because of the abuse they are subjected to. Those that stay until they are 18 and then age out of the system. Once children have aged out, many are left to their own devices. Some provinces have begun programs that offer the youth services to help them adjust to living on their own. However, many of the youth find it difficult to navigate the system to get the help they need. There are many stories of Indigenous youth who have struggled with their transition, some with happy endings and some with less than happy endings.

There are people who work both in the child welfare system and the criminal justice system that see a definite overlap between the two. They don’t yet, however, know the full extent of this cross over. Indigenous leaders have been talking about this for a long time, in 1991 Murray Sinclair wrote,"“Difficult transitions from care often result in a range of negative outcomes, such as homelessness, unemployment, lack of educational engagement and achievement, involvement in corrections, lack of skills and potentially, a life of poverty. Many young people who leave care fail to make the transition to independent living because of underdeveloped living skills, inadequate education, lower levels of physical and emotional well-being and lack of supports and resources that most young people rely on when moving into adulthood .”"

Transition From Care to Prison
The transition between being in care and living on their own is fraught with obstacles for the youth that age out of the system. Youth that leave care are under more stress than youth not raised in care and with fewer resources to help them on their way. These youth are at a greater risk for harmful outcomes, including involvement in the criminal justice system. According to a report on youth in transition, 68% of those enrolled in the study had been arrested at least once for a criminal offence. Another study out of British Columbia found that 36% of youth in care became involved in the justice system.

As with child welfare, Indigenous people are overrepresented in the prison system. According to the Office of the Correctional Investigator (OCI) in 2015-2016 40% of those incarcerated in federal prisons were Indigenous people. This overrepresentation has been growing, with Indigenous women’s numbers growing even faster, while overall numbers for the population of non-Indigenous men have gone down. In Saskatchewan, according to the 2017/2018 Adult and Youth Correctional Statistics, there was a 9% increase of Indigenous women who became incarcerated between 2015-2018. In that same time, Indigenous men incarcerated dropped by 1%, and in contrast, the numbers of non-Indigenous men went down by 8%.