Registration of Child Protection Social Workers - Letter to the Editor

This is a letter to the editor I wrote as a response the Winnipeg Free Press to their editorial about the silence around requiring child protection social workers in Manitoba to be registered coming out of the Phoenix Sinclair inquiry. 

We need to stop spending money on inquiries after tragedies happen to children and implement best practices in child welfare, train workers in them, and make sure regulatory bodies can help work with employers and government to clean up child protection practice across Canada. Where there is a will there is a way. 

Tracey Young, MSW, RSW

Social work standards                                                                                                                 

Young, T. (2013). Have your say. Winnipeg Free Press. 

As a former child protection social worker with the Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) and a current registered social worker with the B.C. College of Social Workers I concur wholeheartedly with your editorial (Require social work standards, Aug. 1) that child protection social workers should be registered members of regulatory bodies. Manitoba, however, is not "the lone holdout in Canada" where registration is concerned. B.C. also continues to escape professional accountability in terms of requiring mandatory registration of its child protection workers.

The situation in B.C. is particularly egregious in that back in November 2008 the Ministry of Children and Family Development enacted and updated the Social Work Act, exempting a number of classifications of social workers from having to be registered under the regulations. This included child protection social workers who are employed by MCFD, the very same ministry in charge of administering the act. If that is not a conflict of interest I don't know what is.

The B.C. College of Social Workers has worked diligently for the past five years to remove some exemptions of public service social workers. By September 2013 all social workers working in the health authorities will be required to become RSWs with the college. The B.C. government continues the exemptions on child protection social workers from being registered. This is to the detriment of the public, the children in its care and custody, and the families who are faced with inconsistent and variable practice, and at its worst serious professional misconduct, incompetence, and bad faith.

Tracey Young

Vancouver

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