Director of Youth Protection

Robert-Baldwin MNA leads fight in DPJ head resignation

By Chelsey St-Pierre
The Suburban

The Director of Youth Protection (DPJ) Catherine Lemay resigned following reports of sexual abuse allegations by educators towards detainees at a juvenile detention and rehabilitation facility. Social Services Minister Lionel Carmant appointed former Laurent Commission member Lesley Hill as her replacement.

Robert-Baldwin MNA Brigitte Garceau, the official opposition critic on Youth Protection, had led the fight for Lemay’s resignation. She says she hopes Hill, also an assistant deputy minister because of the position, will have the independence she needs to make the necessary reforms.

The Liberal House Leader, Nelligan MNA Monsef Derraji, asked for an emergency debate on the DPJ after Lemay’s resignation. National Assembly Speaker Nathalie Roy — a CAQ MNA — granted it. It was the first emergency debate granted in four years, underlining the importance of the issue.

Garceau openly questions Carmant’s ability and fortitude to making the necessary changes to respond to the dire need for a “system clean up”.

The position of Commissioner for Children’s Welfare and Rights created by Bill 37, remains vacant since its inception last May. “Ultimately, once you’re in your seventh year of governance, if it hasn’t changed at the DPJ level, (then) it is the responsibility (that falls) on the government and the minister,” Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon stated at a news conference.

According to the report, nine female employees formerly employed at the Cité-des-Prairies centre allegedly had sexual relations with five minor detainees. It is also alleged that one of the employees had a baby with a detainee.

The facility is one of the last resorts for teens with limited or no other recourse towards rehabilitation, prior to reaching adulthood. Some of the detainees are awaiting transfer to prison for adults once they reach the age of majority. Some of the province’s most severe cases of juvenile misconduct, convicted criminals and teens in last resort situations reside at this facility.

Garceau has issued criticisms regularly about the failures of the youth protection system since being elected. She has demanded immediate attention to the problematic issues and particularly the in-house culture of protecting the system to the detriment of children’s rights. Garceau says she will carry on after the Lemay resignation until real resolutions are not only established but implemented in the system. n

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Robert-Baldwin MNA demands an investigation of DPJ cases

By Chelsey St-Pierre

Concerned by recent disturbing revelations about mothers who are victims of conjugal violence and who have lost custody of their children amid accusations of parental alienation, Brigitte Garceau, Liberal MNA for Robert-Baldwin and official opposition spokesperson for youth protection, presented a motion to the National Assembly, calling for an investigation into these cases. The motion was supported by the entire opposition including the Liberals, QS, the PQ and the independent MNA for Vaudreuil.

Garceau demanded that Lionel Carmant, the Minister responsible for Social Services, launch an investigation into reported cases where children were entrusted to violent fathers under the pretext that the mothers were initiating parental alienation, a concept poorly understood by stakeholders of the Director of Youth Protection (DPJ), due to lack of adequate training.

Studies have shown that a child’s risk of abuse increases after a perpetrator of intimate partner violence separates from a domestic partner, even when the perpetrator has not previously directly abused the child.

Garceau says that Minister Carmant’s inaction on ensuring adequate training on conjugal violence for those employed by the DPJ system, is causing disastrous situations for too many mothers who are victims of conjugal violence.

“Mothers are completely broken and torn by the current situation. The lack of training of DPJ workers on conjugal violence, which includes parental alienation and coercive control, is one of the significant problems at the heart of the issues. Despite this, Minister Carmant still refuses to impose a mandatory four-day training, which would allow them to better understand the issue and to make proper evaluations where conjugal violence is at play,” Garceau stated. n

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