The ministry is required to evaluate the child鈥檚 鈥渂est interest鈥� in making decisions. But while this is legally the ministry鈥檚 decision, it is morally our decision.
A B.C. couple wants to adopt the 2 1脷2-year-old M茅tis girl they have fostered since birth, but the ministry wants to send her to a couple in Ontario who are raising her older siblings. The officials say that living with her blood relatives is in her best interest, while the foster parents say it鈥檚 in her best interest to leave her with them 鈥� the only family she has ever known.
Justice Mary Newbury of the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled Friday that the toddler should remain with her foster parents in B.C. until appeals in the case are decided. It鈥檚 a reprieve for the family, but the ordeal is not over.
As a society, how do we decide what 鈥渂est interest鈥� means? Surely it must mean that our decision will have the best long-term outcome for the child, but how do we define a best outcome, even if we could predict the future?
Is it better to send a youngster to a prosperous family that will keep her from a lifetime of poverty? To well-educated parents who will ensure she gets a good start in life? To a family from her own cultural background? To her blood relatives? To a family who will love her wholeheartedly, regardless of wealth, education, culture or blood?
The little girl has never met her siblings or the new parents. To suggest, as the ministry does, that she will soon forget the foster parents and suffer no long-term ill effects flies in the face of much evidence about the importance of early bonding.
To make matters worse, the government argues the foster parents are merely 鈥減aid caregivers鈥� with no claim to be 鈥渄e facto parents.鈥� They are more like nannies, the government lawyer said.
The foster parents have bonded with the little girl, to the point where they want to take her into their family. To dismiss them and all foster parents as little more than babysitters is callous.
Child-welfare workers across Canada are too often tossed about by the winds of changing priorities. For years, they will be ordered to keep families together at all costs. Then a child will be injured or even killed by a family member and the pendulum will swing toward protecting children by removing them from the home at the slightest hint of danger.
In adoptions, there are similar changing messages.
For aboriginal children, the priority is to keep them within their own culture, which is one of the strange aspects of the current case. The girl is M茅tis, as is the foster mother; the new parents are not M茅tis.
Tim Dickson, a lawyer for the Public Guardian and Trustee of British Columbia, said the decision is difficult because there are 鈥渢wo good options,鈥� but the biological ties are the most important.
Why? The goal should be to try to ensure she has a happy life. Without a crystal ball, we have to gamble on the right decision. Are the odds more favourable to a loving, bonded family of her own culture, or with siblings she doesn鈥檛 know?
The ministry officials who take this gamble on our behalf are well-intentioned; they want what is best for the girl. All of us should take a hard look at how we want them to judge that gamble.
We are betting with her life.
