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Wednesday, November 1, 9:00am - Noon

Introduction The meeting of the Ministerial Panel on Child Intervention was held at the Capital View Room, 2nd floor Federal Building in , on traditional Treaty 6 territory and Métis homeland. Elder Russel Auger offered a blessing to start the meeting on November 1, 2017.

The Chair acknowledged those members of the public present and thanked them for their attendance. The meeting was supported through an audio livestream and the archive is available on the panel website, childinterventionpanel..ca.

Panel Members Present: Debbie Jabbour, Chair, MLA for Peace River Maria Fitzpatrick, MLA for Lethbridge-East , MLA for Edmonton-Castle Downs Graham Sucha, MLA for -Shaw , United Conservative Party caucus, MLA for Chestermere-Rocky View, for MLA Ric McIver, United Conservative Party caucus, MLA for Calgary-Hays Dr. David Swann, Alberta Liberal caucus, MLA for Calgary-Mountain View Greg Clark, , MLA for Calgary-Elbow Dr. Peter Choate, MSW, PhD, Mount Royal University Bruce MacLaurin, MSW, University of Calgary Dr. Patti LaBoucane-Benson, PhD, Native Counselling Services of Alberta

Regrets: Heather Sweet, MLA for Edmonton-Manning Cameron Westhead, MLA for Banff-Cochrane Tyler White, CEO, Siksika Health Services

Presentations

London School of Economics and Political Science: Dr. Eileen Munro, Professor, followed up on her presentation of October 30 by providing more information on her review of the child protection system in England and considerations for the Alberta system. She discussed how the Signs of Safety model for child intervention was introduced in England, covering the following

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areas: goals, design, implementation, leadership, organizational alignment, measurement and monitoring.

Damien Traverse, a facilitator from Community Development, then led the Panel through a discussion of its learnings. Specifically, he asked the Panel “What is valuable as the Panel deliberates on meaningful recommendations to improve the system?” The Panel broke into three groups and responded as follows:

System Drivers

There is a necessity to review the overall culture of the CI system, so we have:

 Workplace well-being.  Collaborative decision making.  Engagement with First Nations.  Legislation that encourages cross-agency coordination.  A change in the definition of family in legislation to be more inclusive.  Acknowledgement of social determinants of health (e.g., poverty) as a system driver.  Increased focus on prevention and early intervention as opposed to system reaction.  A workforce that reflects the populations being served.

Learnings

Recommendations should focus on:

 The need for consensus and commitment to system change that occurs over the long- term and beyond the next news story.  Fostering a safe organization that can withstand the winds of change.  A system that is equitable – too often our thoughts may be with the visible majority (the Calgary-Edmonton corridor) rather than the remote regions of the provinces.  What is required rather than what is in the budget.  What can be changed within the current legislation and what additional legislation may be needed.

Additional Recommendations

A third group focused on two ideas:

(i) The tension involved in what motivates good work – if we are looking at key performance indicators (KPIs), it generally means competitive work environments, bonuses for good work, punishment for underachievement and opportunity for

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upward mobility. However, if you have intrinsic factors that require meaning in work (e.g., seeing change in clients), this requires a caring environment and respectful and ethical leadership. If you want to create a good environment, how do KPIs really help? (ii) The array of services provided and entering those services at different levels: universal services; universal services with no threshold; family support to flourish with no stigma; and intervention services that recognize strengths and challenges. Each step becomes more invasive with the final step becoming incredibly expensive.

Next Steps

The next Panel meeting will be November 8 from 9:00am-noon in the Federal Building in Edmonton. It will look at cross-jurisdictional perspectives related to cultural connectedness, legal permanency and involving Indigenous children and families with presenters:

 Gordon Phaneuf, Chief Executive Officer, Child Welfare League of Canada;  Dr. Mike DeGagné, President, Vice-Chancellor, Nipissing University; and  Dr. Jeannine Carriere, Professor, School of Social Work, University of Victoria

The website, childinterventionpanel.alberta.ca, and e-mail, [email protected], continue to be available for the public to get information and/or make submissions to the Panel.

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