Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. To the motion. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We agree with recommendation 18, and this work is currently in progress. The manual will be completed by October and further tools will be completed by December, so the manual is intended to be released in October.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. To the motion.

Question is being called. The motion is carried.

---Carried

Mr. Moses.

Madam Chair, I move that the Department of Health and Social Services complete revisions to the Child and Family Services Standards and Procedures Manual by December 2014.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. Your motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The department started developing the Child and Family Services Standards and Procedures Manual in 1998, and despite trying to complete this work, it has never ever been completed and has never kept pace with changes to the act or the best practices in child welfare. Just to note the absence of standardized procedures for all key responsibilities

is a significant deficiency. It represents a great failure to support child protection workers and this likely affects morale, staff turnover and, ultimately, the well-being of children when our workers are not supported nor have anything to go by. Committee strongly agrees that these need to be completed by December 2014.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. To the motion. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. To the motion.

Question is being called. The motion is carried.

---Carried

Mr. Moses.

Madam Chair, I move that the Department of Health and Social Services, in consultation with the health and social services authorities, develop a process for all parties involved in the delivery of child and family services to share information on best practices and challenges in delivery of these of these services.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. Your motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Moses.

Yes, just briefly, Madam Chair. Just speaking in terms of wraparound services and all those that are working with our child that is in care, I think it is almost common sense and with the Health Information Act that we’re working on that this might be something that we can move forward into where RCMP, teachers and anybody associated with the high-risk child or the child in service that some kind of plan of care of treatment is in place, so this is something that we’d like the department to work on.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. To the motion. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Within the system we have actually established the regular quarterly meetings of the directors of social programs to help provide a forum for this exchange. We have also made child and family services a standing agenda item at the Joint

Senior Management Committee meetings of CEOs and departmental senior staff that happen every second month. We will explore ways to expand these efforts to include other stakeholders.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. To the motion.

Question is being called. The motion is carried.

---Carried

Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move that the Department of Health and Social Services, in consultation with the health and social services authorities, provide training to all child protection workers for all key responsibilities required to carry out child and family services; and further, that the department assess whether the training provided is meeting the needs of child protection workers to deliver child and family services and make any necessary improvements as soon as possible.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. The motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Auditor General did indicate that when he was doing their questioning, some of the child protection workers did indicate that they did receive training, but the level of training that they did receive varied from child protection worker to child protection worker, and I feel that that is something that needs to be standardized and something that needs to be in place so that all children that are in child protection cases have the same equal service delivery and we provide that same service delivery. Thank you.