It’s a pleasure to join the debate on this important legislation this morning, on behalf of the residents of Simcoe–Grey.

Bill 188 is titled Supporting Children’s Futures Act. I ask this House, what can be more important to our collective future than the well-being of our children? This question encompasses all children, including those at risk of abuse and neglect—in fact, probably particularly those children. It is said that a society can be judged by how it treats the most vulnerable, and I think we can all agree that our children at risk are among our most vulnerable. I appreciate the comments that I have heard from both my colleagues from Ottawa and their support for this legislation. It is an ongoing and evolving sector, and this legislation is part of this government’s effort to continue to improve our services for our most vulnerable.

Protection services are mandated under the Child, Youth and Family Services Act, 2017, and these services are provided by children’s aid societies.

Licensed out-of-home care refers to the provision of care to a young person in a home or setting that is away from the home of their parent or guardian.

Children and youth are placed into out-of-home care for a range of reasons in addition to child protection concerns, including being in conflict with the law, human trafficking, complex special needs or mental health and/or addiction treatment needs.

Care may be provided in foster homes, children’s residences or staff-model homes. Most children placed in out-of-home care are cared for in foster care.

Children’s aid societies are also responsible for Ontario’s public adoption system, adoption planning, recruiting adoptive parents, training, matching, facilitative adoption placements and providing supports. Private and intercountry adoptions are managed by licensees under the CYFSA of the Intercountry Adoption Act.

Over 7,000 children and youth in care in Ontario are served by 424 licence holders, and 301 group homes serve approximately 1,680 children, and 4,038 foster homes serve approximately 5,700 children.

Speaker, our government has undertaken a comprehensive redesign of the child welfare system in Ontario, and we did this because every child and youth deserves a decent start in life and a safe and stable home, regardless of their circumstances. Through the redesign, this government has introduced new initiatives to improve the quality of care in out-of-home settings which include:

—developing a new framework for what out-of-home care looks like;

—increasing and enhancing oversight and accountability for out-of-home care;

—supporting that oversight by adding 20 new positions across the province to support the management, inspection and oversight of out-of-home care for children and youth; and

—launching the Ready, Set, Go program, which provides youth in the care of children’s aid societies with the life skills they need, starting at 13, and financial support when they leave care, up to the age of 23, so that they can focus on post-secondary education, including the skilled trades, or pursuing employment.

In addition, we’ve implemented these initiatives after consulting widely in the community and with these service providers to better serve children and youth and understand their needs; and bolstering customary care arrangements to focus on family-based options, like kinship and foster care, to ensure children, youth and families have a strong voice in decisions about their care.

We have worked extensively on improving the quality of the child welfare data to establish a baseline of common measures across children’s aid societies that can be reported publicly. We all know that data is important to measuring our evolution and our progress, and what gets measured gets accomplished. And along with that, we have developed an outcomes-based performance measurement framework.

Speaker, we have also updated the Child, Youth and Family Services Act to better protect youth in care from human trafficking. Through those changes, we have made the role of children’s aid societies clear so they can intervene in situations where a child is a victim of sex trafficking or is at risk of being trafficked—and we know this is an ever-present and ever-growing trend. We have allowed child protection workers and police to remove 16- and 17-year-old victims of child sex trafficking, to voluntarily access protective measures and supportive resources. And we have increased penalties for traffickers who interfere with or harbour children who are subject to an order of supervision or care by a children’s aid society. These changes have strengthened children’s aid societies’ ability to intervene in child sex trafficking, made the role of societies in these cases more clear, and promoted consistent responses across the province.

With the Supporting Children’s Futures Act, we are continuing this hard work to build on what our government has achieved, and moving forward towards an Ontario where no one is left behind.

Speaker, as part of the development of Bill 188, this government consulted across the child welfare sector to develop the measures contained in this bill. Ministry staff held over 30 virtual engagements with various stakeholder groups, including youth with lived experience. We have also engaged stakeholders through the Ontario Regulatory Registry, where we received over 35 written submissions on the proposed changes.

As a result of this consultation process, Bill 188, at its core, is about protecting children and youth in Ontario’s care today, through new measures for safety, service, oversight, accountability and privacy, and providing better opportunities for children and youth who are in care in Ontario today to thrive as the adults of tomorrow, as they grow.

Speaker, if passed, this bill will protect children and youth in care and provide them with a better future by strengthening oversight and enforcement tools for out-of-home care, protecting privacy of youth formerly in care, and updating the Child, Youth and Family Services Act with lessons learned since it became law. The proposed changes in this bill will improve safety and independence for children and youth in care and assist them in moving on from care. In the short term, these measures will ensure safer and more consistent services for children and youth who need to live away from home. In the longer term, these measures will ensure these children and youth will be better prepared for adulthood and for success in their lives.

We are strengthening oversight for a number of critical reasons. To make sure applicants are fit to provide quality care, this bill proposes a more thorough application process and new powers to refuse a licence on several grounds, most importantly in the public interest. To ensure all children and youth in care receive safe, high-quality services, this bill proposes to increase accountability for all operators. This includes requiring inspectors to take certain actions when they find non-compliance.

In addition, we are introducing a better range of penalties, including compliance orders, administrative monetary penalties, and enhanced charges with larger fines.

All members of this House have seen the shocking instances where some providers have failed to provide high-quality care. And our government has been very clear that there is no room in our province for these bad actors who do not operate in compliance with the law.

As a result, this bill proposes new, high impact enforcement tools to root out bad actors, such as:

—an order for funding to be returned where a licensee has failed to use funds in accordance with the terms of service agreement for a child;

—an order for new management for an out-of-home care setting; and

—restraining orders which would restrain individuals employed or otherwise engaged by the licensee to provide direct care to or supervise a child or a young person in a children’s residence where there are reasonable grounds to believe that there’s an imminent threat to the health, safety and welfare of any child or young person by that care setting.

We’ve also introduced a new type of order, compliance orders, which would instruct the licensee to do something or refrain from doing something to achieve compliance.

We are creating new provincial offences for people in the sector who violate a youth’s rights to be free from corporal punishment, physical and mechanical restraints, and detention.

And we are enhancing the penalties for provincial offences under the act to fines of up to $250,000, imposing imprisonment for a term not more than one year, or both; and for a corporation convicted of offence, fines of up to $250,000. We are also introducing new administrative monetary penalties of up to $100,000.

Bill 188 proposes a number of important procedural changes to existing processes which include the following:

—for inspectors to follow certain steps when they find instances of non-compliance during inspections;

—for inspectors to conduct an investigation with a warrant when there’s reason to believe an offence has been committed;

—changes to the appeal process for licensing decisions, conditions, suspensions and revocations, and ensuring that any appeals of these decisions will not automatically result in a stay of the decision; and

—changes to the appeal process to require the applicant or licensee to file more information with the ministry, to clarify what constitutes evidence before the tribunal, and to clarify the orders that the tribunal can make following an appeal.

These changes are crucial new tools to uphold service providers to the high standard of care that our children and youth deserve and our government expects. These new and enhanced penalties give ministry inspectors a more responsive and useful range of tools to use when they find a service provider that isn’t consistently complying with the requirements and providing the best care for their wards. The offences are new. The fines are new or enhanced. The amounts are raised by orders of magnitude sufficient to deter service providers from thinking they can profit by providing poor or dangerous care.

Speaker, this act also strengthens the privacy of the individual children and youth. To protect the privacy of the children and youth once they leave care, this bill restricts access to records held by the children’s aid societies about a child or youth once they are no longer in care. These changes aim to enhance the privacy of children and youth with a history in the child welfare system by restricting access by others to their child welfare records, through regulations to be developed.

This bill will also enable adults with a history of child protection involvement to publicly identify themselves and speak about their experiences.

These are important changes. It is important that children who grow up in these types of environments have the same rights as others to talk about their past, to talk about their experiences and to move forward in their lives. This change clarifies an ambiguity in the CYFSA that permitted the interpretation that former children and youth in care were breaching their own privacy by talking publicly about their past experiences in care. This clarification aims to better protect the privacy of adults who were former children and youth in care by restricting access to their records by others, while permitting them to speak freely about their lived experience, as can any of us in this House. This clarification gives former children and youth in care the same right to speak about their childhood as everyone else.

Through Bill 188, we are also updating the Child, Youth and Family Services Act to make it clear and consistent across the sector. Bill 188 proposes to establish clear and consistent practices in the Child, Youth and Family Services Act through a number of new measures. This bill has provisions that will permit information-sharing between children’s aid societies, the College of Early Childhood Educators and the Ontario College of Teachers, to enable timely action when there is an allegation of a risk to children involving a teacher or an early childhood educator. This information-sharing would support investigations or hearings by the professional colleges.

Speaker, this change will also expand the current list of professionals who can receive personal information from children’s aid societies, beyond regulated child professions, social workers and social service workers, to include teachers and ECEs.

If passed, this bill will clarify that ECEs are a profession with a duty to report children in need of protections. Currently, under our system, only ECEs working in designated roles have an explicit duty to report. This change will also mean that ECEs who fail to report a child in need of protection may be subject to penalties, like the other professionals who have this obligation.

The bill will also enable the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers to share information about its members with bodies that govern other professions and with others such as children’s aid societies. Currently, the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers is not permitted to inform other parties that an investigation against a member is under way unless the member consents or until the investigation concludes. The college itself has requested this change, to be more consistent with other health professionals whose professional colleges are able to disclose information in a timely manner to reduce or eliminate the risk of harm.

Another important aspect of Bill 188 is to clarify the circumstances when children and youth must be informed about their rights to complain to the office of the Ombudsman. Currently, the Ombudsman Act guides how and when children and youth in care are informed about the office and the role of the Ombudsman. Currently, service providers rely on the CYFSA and not the Ombudsman Act to determine their responsibility to children and youth in care, and this creates a gap so that not all service providers, let alone children and youth, are aware of their right to contact the Ombudsman. We believe that by clarifying these obligations in the CYFSA in Bill 188, we are ensuring that all licensees will be aware of their obligations and able to utilize them if necessary.

Bill 188 will enhance transparency in reporting by allowing sector workers to file enabling offence declarations, to ensure that everyone who needs to provide a police record check as a condition of their employment is able to notify their employer if there is any change in their record between the required updates.

Speaker, there are also a number of actions that are not in this bill but that are contained in recently filed regulation changes. Our government has been clear that Bill 188 is an important step in the child welfare design process. That is why, in tandem with introducing this bill, we filed two regulations—namely, O. Reg 155 and O. Reg 156—that will come into force on January 1, 2025, containing a number of new measures, including the following:

—mandating information-sharing between children’s aid societies and the ministry about specific health and safety risks to children in licensed out-of-home care settings;

—requiring information-sharing between different children’s aid societies, as needed, to support service planning of children placed by one children’s aid society into the jurisdiction of another;

—requiring children’s aid societies to visit children in their care placed in out-of-home care more frequently, so every 30 days instead of every 90 days;

—requiring unannounced in-person visits by children’s aid societies in certain circumstances; for example, if a visit cannot be scheduled because the society was unable to contact the child or the caregivers, or if there are concerns related to the well-being of the child; and

—clarifying and enhancing rules prohibiting certain methods of discipline in licensed settings, like rules prohibiting the use of derogatory or racist language directed at or even used in the presence of the child;

—requiring licensees, their staff, and others to report to the ministry where there are reasonable grounds to suspect the use of prohibited methods of discipline in a licensed setting;

—requiring that licensees ensure that staff and foster parents providing out-of-home care do so in accordance with the licensee’s program description set out in their application;

—enhancing rules for record-keeping of financial arrangements with respect to the provision of licenced out-of-home care for the child;

—requiring bedrooms in children’s residences to have doors, to provide a reasonable degree of privacy;

—requiring bedrooms in a foster care home to have a physical or visual barrier, to provide foster care children with reasonable privacy;

—providing clarity in cases where there is a conflict between the regulations applicable to licensees and recommendations made by the local medical officer of health;

—enhancing rules on financial reporting to be prepared by licensees;

—clarifying the rules governing the use of physical and mechanical restraints by foster parents; and

—adding new provisions to set out offences for contravention of rules specific to the use of physical and mechanical restraints, prohibited methods of discipline and intervention that may be used in licensed out-of-home care settings, and nutrition and food to be made available to residents in licensed children’s residences.

Speaker, these are all changes that are part of our evolution ensuring that all children in this province have the best start to set them up for a successful and prosperous future—and from the conversations we’ve had this morning, we all can agree that is of critical importance.

I’d like to end my comments today with a quotation from Diana Frances, a former foster child who wrote to express her support for this legislation: “I am writing to express my support of Bill 188: supporting the futures of children and youth act, that is currently before the Ontario government. Speaking from my life experience, I believe with all my heart that these improvements to the safety, well-being and privacy of children and youth in care are of vital importance. Many important changes have been made to the system since I was adopted, given up again at 13 and placed with another family as a ward of the province. However, more issues need to be updated and amended as our social structure changes and social media poses new risks to privacy and safety.”

I want to thank Diana for sharing her lived experience. It’s part of the evolution, and this government is committed to—

Thank you to the member opposite for the question.

As we heard in earlier discussion, from the member for Ottawa Centre, these types of issues become very difficult. We know that parenting is not an easy thing and there are many stressors—mental health, addictions, financial—that often compromise families’ abilities to care for their child, so this government is working on supports, through mental health funding in our schools, working on funding other support services.

But ultimately, in the case where a child needs protection and needs be put in foster care, this legislation is designed to ensure that we have a fulsome and robust system.

This is a very critical piece of this legislation. It is enhancing protections of privacy for children who grew up in foster care, while at the same time permitting them the freedom to speak about their lived experience in the system, which is a critical part—and it’s a right that all of us enjoy. So at the same time, we’re increasing the protections to make sure that only those who are authorized have access to records in specific circumstances, while allowing the individual to speak about their lived experience in the system.

I would refer back to the comments of Diana Frances, who was talking about changes in our society through social media and other pressures.

We know in this House that things like human trafficking and sexual exploitation are growing concerns. This government passed all-House legislation to make sure that those suffering, who have been exploited and have been trafficked, are able to have debt released so that they are no longer controlled by the offender, and we have expanded the Victims’ Bill of Rights to allow those to pursue their traffickers. And we are working, through a number of mechanisms, through the Associate Minister of Mental Health, through the Minister of Education, to ensure that there are supports to help those who are at risk deal with their issues, before having to be transitioned into this system.

As I indicated, in parallel with this legislation, we have introduced two new regulations, O. Reg. 155 and O. Reg. 156, that are enhancing these protections and making sure that we are putting in place better application processes to vet those who are applying to be foster parents, that we are better monitoring their actions. And through enhanced inspection procedures through this bill, if passed, we will be making sure that we’re inspecting homes every 30 days, as opposed to every 90, and that we continue to work to monitor.

As has been indicated, while putting these kinds of provisions in place is a good start, without the corollary of enforcement to make sure that people abide by those new measures—we have enhanced penalties significantly to make sure that youth are protected and served properly.

We know, in our past, that those situations were not handled well.

And I know that, currently, the Indigenous children’s aid societies make their own placement decisions without interference from the province, and that the law requires children’s aid societies to place children in safe and culturally appropriate settings.

In response to the question, I can indicate to the member opposite that the Minister of Children, Community and Social Services has indicated that he has been in discussion with chiefs and that they are working on those very issues.

The aspects of this legislation are very far-reaching in terms of—yes, as I indicated—the O. Reg. changes, making sure that the applicants are vetted so that the homes are appropriate and the care that they’re going to receive is constantly monitored, and increasing inspections and increasing the number of inspectors across the province. We’re also enhancing our fines to make sure that there is punishment and consequences for the bad actors. We’ve enhanced the penalties significantly, and we’ve changed the appeal process. So this legislation is doing things right across the spectrum, from vetting applicants, to the care that the child receives while in foster care, as well as making sure that there are enhancements to penalties to punish those bad actors.

I rise this morning to salute and pay tribute to a distinguished resident of Simcoe–Grey, Chad Bark, who passed away this month at the age of 99. Chad was a true member of our greatest generation; he was a gentleman, an accomplished athlete, a decorated World War II veteran, a devoted husband and father, and a friend.

Chad; his wife, Lyn; and their four children, Barbara, Susan, John and Don, were family friends and our neighbours in the Toronto neighbourhood that I grew up in.

In 1944, at the age of 18, Chad enlisted, hoping to be a pilot. However, he was deemed ineligible because he was colour-blind, and he joined the army corps. He was shipped to England in the spring of 1944, arriving on May 6, one month before the D-Day invasion.

Chad was assigned to the signal corps and the cipher group, where his job was to create and decipher codes to ensure communications were secure on the front lines.

After celebrating VE day in Manchester, England, he returned home to work in his father’s business, marry his sweetheart, Lyn, and raise four children.

A proud Canadian, Chad was a candidate in the 1974 federal election, running as a Progressive Conservative under the leadership of Robert Stanfield—the best Prime Minister we never had. I am so proud to say that I worked in his campaign, putting up Chad Bark signs. It was my first foray into politics and, clearly, it made an impression. I had the great fortune to reconnect with Chad 48 years later, when campaigning in the last provincial election. He was a constituent living in Alliston, and he returned the favour by campaigning vigorously in his seniors’ home, where he organized a meet and greet.

Speaker, my condolences to the Bark family on the passing of this remarkable man.

Farewell and Godspeed, Chad.