Moms on the Move
11 Nov/09 1

BC Children’s Budget debate

The BC Legislature debated the Ministry for Children & Family Development's revised 2009-10 budget on Nov 4-5. Below, an extract of Opposition Critic Maurine Karagianis questioning Minister Mary Polak about autism cuts:

"M. Karagianis: When we look at things like the EIBI program…. Let's talk about that very specifically — the financial implications, which the minister has said is really the sole issue here around why this program was cut. Why did the government not make an attempt to sit down with program providers and families and try and find a way to provide what is very admittedly an exceptional program with exceptional outcomes to more families, rather than saying, "Because we can only reach 70 families at a time, we're cutting the whole program," and rather than actually finding a way to make that very effective program available to, perhaps, more people?

I've talked to program providers, and at no time did the government sit down with any of the program providers and say that "$70,000 per child" — if that is, in fact, the real number — "is not acceptable, and can we find a way to provide this program more cost-effectively?" No program provider was ever approached.

In fact, the government, by their own documentation, has said that because only 70 families at a time were able to take advantage of that program, we're doing away with it completely. The substitute for that, for all families now, is perhaps another hour a week in the kinds of therapies that $20,000 and $22,000 will buy. I'm sure that the minister and the government generally are getting the kind of enormous pressure from families that is very evident to members of the opposition.

I have attended numerous rallies. I have got truckloads of e-mail, as I'm sure has the minister. I have been cc'd on all of the correspondence that has gone to the government on this.

In the case where the outcome for children is so markedly improved and the support systems going forward for children into the future are so much more cost-effective by providing this kind of early and intensive behavioural intervention, why has the government not chosen a path of trying to reach the best possible outcomes, best practice — if we can use those terms?

I know the ministry talks about best practice in everything they do. Yet when I look at this, and many other cuts, it would seem to me that we've gone from best practice to lowest common denominator. Perhaps the minister could just say whether, in the business sense of taking the outcome for these children forward for the rest of their lives where they're not dependent on government funding or support or teaching assistance or anything else as an outcome of this….

It would seem to me that the savings are millions of dollars in the lifetime of a child versus a fairly modest investment at the front end. Why has that not been the criteria? Or would the government consider making that the next step — to try and find a way to work with families and service providers to take advantage of what is a very effective program? To see this thing disappear altogether — except for the wealthy, who might be able to afford it — seems a tragic decision to make and certainly not a good business decision for the ministry to make.

Hon. M. Polak: In fact, that is exactly what we are doing. It is incorrect to say that we are eliminating the EIBI program. We are eliminating the $70,000-per-child support..."

View the rest of the debate here and here and here .

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  1. She’s doing it again! Trying to claim that EIBI isn’t going anywhere:
    “In fact, that is exactly what we are doing. It is incorrect to say that we are eliminating the EIBI program.”

    Yes, you are! When you cut the funding, the program goes with it. Does she still not understand that, or is she just lying? I really cannot decide.


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