My heart sank, and I’m sure yours did too, when I read my colleagues’ report on the living conditions within the walls of the Cartier youth center in Laval.1. In one year, there was a 72% increase in the use of withdrawal and control measures among young people, a sign that there is something wrong with this resource. Or while reading, in The sunthe absolutely tragic story of a teenager who is making her fifth suicide attempt at the Huberdeau youth center.
Last year, it was the Mont Saint-Antoine youth center, in eastern Montreal, which made the headlines for its pitiful conditions (water infiltration, tarpaulins installed on the ceiling, etc.).
“More than a fifth of the facilities housing children under youth protection in Quebec are in a state of significant dilapidation,” recently recalled my colleagues who had obtained an assessment from the Ministry of Health and Social Services (MSSS)2.
PHOTO PAUL CHIASSON, CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
Régine Laurent chaired the Special Commission on the Rights of Children and Youth Protection.
The Special Commission on the Rights of Children and Youth Protection, chaired by Régine Laurent, had accomplished extraordinary work to highlight the dysfunctions of the system and propose concrete solutions. Three years after submitting its report, the system still suffers from a deficit of benevolence.
Would we accept our children living in such conditions? However, we are talking about the daily living environment of the young people we are supposed to help.
Every time I read a report that reveals unacceptable conditions for children in youth centers or under the protection of the DPJ, the same question comes to me: but who speaks on their behalf? Who protests loudly when their rights are not respected? When they do not receive the services they are owed?
My question will undoubtedly seem naive to families and professionals who work in the youth protection sector, but I know that I am not the only one to ask it.
1. Read the file “Tannants withdrawn in cells”, by Ariane Lacoursière and Caroline Touzin
2. Read the article “More than one in five installations is obsolete”, by Ariane Lacoursière and Katia Gagnon
Read the column “Punished for her suicide attempts”, by Mylène Moisan, from Sun