Alberta’s children’s advocate will get new powers and report directly to the legislature under new legislation introduced into the legislature this week.
Human Services Minister Dave Hancock, who introduced the bill, said the government wants the advocate to be a strong voice for children in provincial care.
“It is a pretty broad scope mandate to advocate on behalf of children and to investigate the death or serious injury of children in care.”
Among the advocate’s new powers is an ability to investigate the death of all children in care, in the search for more systemic issues. The advocate will not be required to investigate every death, but can investigate any case where a child died or was seriously injured.
To do that he or she will have the same powers as someone running a public inquiry, which means the advocate can compel people to talk and subpoena documents if needed.
Hancock said the government wants the person to have all the powers they would need to get to the bottom of the issue when it comes the death of children.
“It gives the children’s advocate the authority to address the death or serious injury of a child.”
The legislation also creates a new quality council for children’s services that will investigate the death of all children in provincial care. Similar to the Health Quality Council, it will be assigned to look into the system and make recommendations for improvement.
NDP critic Rachel Notley, who has called on the government for years to appoint an independent advocate, said the bill seems on target, but there are some worrying details.
She said while the advocate now reports to the legislature, the government hired the current advocate, Del Graff without the legislature’s approval.
She said she doesn’t know if Graff is the right man for this more robust job.
“He comes from within the bureaucracy in British Columbia,” she said. “He has no history of functioning in a role as an independent advocate.”
Notley also said she is concerned by the new council the government is creating. The council will report to the minister and Notley said given it has many similar roles to the advocate she is worried government will use it when they don’t want the attention and investigation from the advocate.
