Yesterday I posted a piece about how it takes a village to
raise a child and how the village that we all live in had failed a teenager
named Alex. In that piece I somewhat excused the social service system. In light of the most recent news as reported by
the CBC,
I was wrong to do so.
The CBC reported late in the day that the B.C. Ministry of
Child and Family Development knew where the young man's family had moved to in
Alberta. The worker from that Ministry testified
in court that they did not notify social services in Alberta as to their
concerns or the address because "It's not part of our procedure"( CBC).
While it appears as if policies have changed and now BC
Ministry staff are required to exchange critical information with their
counterparts in other jurisdictions, "It's not part of our procedure"
is quite simply not a good enough excuse. In the midst of complex procedures
and policies, the filing out of countless forms, the relentless scrutiny from a
sometimes angry public - those in social services need to be reminded that their
primary concern is to protect those who are vulnerable. "Not my job"
is never a valid excuse to avoid doing the morally right thing.
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