Straight thoughts 95

August 6th, 2002

The number of Ontario children in foster care is growing rapidly!

In the last seven years of "Progressive Conservative" government in Ontario the number of children removed from their parents and placed in foster care or group homes increased by 70% (from approximately 10,000 in 1995 to the current figure of approximately 17,000).
It increased by 20% since March 2001, when there were 14,200 children in foster care. (See our newsletter IMPACT - Fall 2001).

Has this government contributed to the breakdown of the family and the increase in child abuse?

Or has this government unnecessarily removed too many children from their parents?
In my opinion they did both.

On the one side they have played no part in protecting the traditional family and those parents who want to educate their children in a family environment. They have instead paid for abortions, promoted daycare and early kindergarten for kids, and changed 68 pieces of legislation re-defining a family as any two people living together.

On the other side, they have lowered the criteria for the Children's Aid Society to remove children from their parents (Bill 6 – Family Services Act – year 2000), creating several cases of illegitimate intervention.

The result is a crisis of foster care (with many cases of abusive foster parents), more bureaucracy, more tax money spent to "fix" the resulting problems, more families abused by the system, more litigations in the courts and generally more unhappy children and parents.
This is a perfect example of socially "progressive" thinking with catastrophic results.

Families abused by the system are too many to mention. You can see some example on our web Library.

As the provincial elections are getting closer, please help us protect Ontario's families by taking an active role with our party.