Re: Joint Submissions in response to MCFD’s Social Work Oversight Engagement

Apart from acknowledging and addressing the roots of social work practice as a pillar of colonialism, the laws and policies that empower and guide social workers must go further to facilitate and support Indigenous self-determination and Indigenous Peoples’ inherent jurisdiction over the well-being of their children and families. [...] MCFD implement Call to Justice 12.12 of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls that all child and family service agencies engage in recruitment efforts to hire and promote Indigenous staff, as well as to promote the intensive and ongoing training of social workers with respect to the following: • The history of the child-welfare system in the oppression and genoc. [...] Upholding family and parental rights and recognizing that the maintenance of family and cultural ties is essential to the well-being of children Social work practice standards must uphold and advance the individual and collective rights of Indigenous Peoples as enshrined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and pursuant to BC’s enactment of DRIPA , which r. [...] Require social workers to demonstrate what prevention services and supports were available to parents and families and what steps were taken to provide and facilitate access to these services, including remedial services and rehabilitative programs designed to prevent the breakup of the child’s family. [...] When fault is found, the remedies must include steps that the social worker will take to prevent errors from happening again and acknowledgement of errors.27 ▪ The complaint process must be effective and timely, giving importance to the urgency of addressing and reversing social workers decisions with respect to the removal of children and decisions that impact the bond between the child and its p.