Op Ed: Cutting social services won’t pay benefits
The following is an excellent Op-Ed published couple weeks ago in the Victoria Times Colonist. Sadly the 2010 Provincial budget presented March 3 promises exactly the sort of short-sighted, "penny wise, pound foolish" cuts that Ms Charlesworth warned against.
Cutting social services won't pay benefits
Slashing government programs will push up health-care costs
By Jennifer Charlesworth, Special to Times Colonist
February 17, 2010
An economist with one of Canada's big banks commented to media last month that health-care spending is the budgetary equivalent of Pac-Man, "eating everything else in people's budgets."
In B.C., health-care spending has risen almost 50 per cent in the last eight years and accounts for more than 40 per cent of all provincial expenditures. In Canada, the $128 billion a year spent on health care consumes 12 per cent of the national GDP.
Is that simply the price we have to pay for good health?
In a word, no. For many years, researchers have studied the factors in a person's life that determine good health. They concluded long ago that a good health-care system is by no means the only requirement -- in fact, it's just a quarter of the story. Read more
Update on MCFD restructuring & budget
The Ministry for Children & Families, which now has responsibility for managing and funding all out-of-school services and supports for children and youth with special needs, faces significant challenges in the year ahead.
Despite promises to protect the budgets for special needs, senior Ministry staff have confirmed that unfunded new costs and rising demands will further strain existing services. On top of this, the Ministry is in the midst of another major restructuring, which includes integrating special needs services with other children's services in a new regional management framework.
MOMS was invited to a meeting on February 15 for an update on Ministry plans and challenges. Our unofficial report on the discussion can be found here. We will continue to share any further information or updates as they reach us and welcome first-hand reports from families about how the restructuring and budget challenges may be affecting them personally.
BC Professionals condemn autism cuts, changes
As Victoria parents prepared for a candlelight vigil at the Legislature Monday Feb 1 to mourn the Province's closure of critical autism early intervention programs, the BC Association for Behaviour Analysis -- the equivalent of the BC Medical Association -- issued a lengthy position statement criticizing these and other recent autism policy changes.
The Association calls for significant increases to the current autism funding levels for preschoolers, for funding to be tied to individual need, and for restoration of the direct funding option for families. It also strongly condemned the lack of consultation over the controversial changes announced by Children's Minister Mary Polak last fall.
"Many people in the Autism community were shocked and disturbed by the closure of all of the EIBI programs and the funding structure changes," the BC ABA statement reads. "...Furthermore, discussions with stakeholders might have resulted in a more sound decision on how to achieve province-wide, equitable access to services for individuals with ASD."
The BC ABA joins parents, advocacy groups and other professionals who have universally panned the province's abrupt autism policy changes, stating that the new provincial funding formula for preschoolers with autism "is not sufficient to purchase intensive behavioural therapy at the level (25-40 hours per week) which research has shown to be effective." The Association cites the example of other Canadian provinces that fully fund the costs of early intervention, noting that "given the discrepancy between provincial funding and the actual costs of implementing an intensive ABA program, few children in British Columbia will likely receive the intensity of treatment that has been empirically shown to improve the core characteristics of Autism." (Emphasis added)
Feb. 1 Victoria Vigil for lost children’s programs
Next Monday Victoria families will hold a candlelight vigil at the Legislature to protest the closure of the province's critical early intervention programs for autism (see notice below).
Children's Minister Mary Polak stopped funding the province's EIBI programs last fall to save $1.5 million annually, despite the desperate pleas of families and many studies confirming that these programs are hugely effective, saving on average $3 - 5 million PER CHILD in net lifetime costs to society (for more details and sources, see our EIBI Facts).
As a result, at least 70 BC children per year will be denied the intensive early behaviour intervention that provided the only hope for these children and their families of a near-normal life, unless they can afford to privately pay tens of thousands annually to top up inadequate subsidies and susbstitute programs to replicate the benefits that only a full EIBI program can offer.
These children join thousands more in BC who are already being denied access to the early intervention supports and programs that they need, due to foolish and short-sighted policies that place enormous and unnecessary strains on other provincial services, such as education, health care, welfare, community living, social housing, justice, etc etc....
Minister Polak and her colleagues also ordered the closure of a series of other cirtical children's programs (which collectively don't put the tiniest dent in the current provincial deficit). These include the provincial Infant Development, Supported Child Care and Aboriginal Supported Child Care program, the Roots of Empathy program, FASD prevention, child and youth mental health and more - all of which will directly impact children and create significantly higher long-term costs than the meagre short-term budgetary savings.
These actions cruelly target the province's most vulnerable children and directly violate Premier Campbell's 2005 promise to build "the best system of supports in Canada for children with special needs."
Your support
We invite families outside of Victoria who can't make it to the vigil to show their support by signing and circulating our petition calling on Premier Campbell to honour his promises to BC's children with special needs and/or by writing their MLAs to remind them that BC families will not rest until these and other programs are restored, and that all children with special needs are able to get the basic help and support they need - in a timely manner and in a form that respects their individual needs and those of their families.
The petition can be accessed online here.
Find out more and support the ongoing FAIR campaign to restore EIBI programs on Facebook
Good news & bad news
Two great items in the BC media today:
- A terrific Vancouver Sun Op Ed marking Children's Day by the Representative for Children and Youth, Mary Ellen Turpel Lafond.
- An in-depth look at the cost benefits of investing in early intervention from The Tyee's Tom Sandborn.
The disturbing news arrived late on Friday afternoon via a BC Association for Community Living press release alerting the community & expressing well-deserved outrage at yet another stealth attack against families. The BC Liberals introduced and passed surprise legislation, despite the objections of the oppostion NDP, that eliminates the requirement to have family voices represented on the board that governs Community Living BC.
Leaked MCFD memo reveals planned cuts
Leaked MCFD documents obtained today by MOMS describe a process that has been underway since August 2009 to achieve "baseline funding reductions" for contracted agencies that deliver most of the Ministry's front-line services and supports - with a focus on cuts to community-based intervention and early intervention.
The "North Region STOB 80 Reduction Planning Process and Principals" (sic) document refers to a process for "cost recovery" for the current year and outlines planning, roles, principles and provincial direction guiding a second process that is also now underway to determine further reductions for 2010-11 in order to meet Ministry budget targets.
Another week, another rally?
Families were out in the streets protesting against provincial autism policies again last week, this time in front of Premier Campbell's Point Grey constituency office in Vancouver. The rally was organized by FEAT BC (Families for Early Autism Treatment) along with the group Medicare for Autism and the ABA Support Network.
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?
Nov 6 rally to save autism EIBI programs
When: Friday, November 6, 2009, starting at 9:30 am
Where: Mary Polak's Langley Constituency office, 20611 Fraser Highway, Langley
Please join parents from around the province who will be travelling to Langley on Friday for a protest action as they continue the fight to save autism intensive early intervention (EIBI) programs. Meet us outside Mary Polak's Langley office. We'll have signs and banners or bring your own.
Media coverage of campaign against cuts
In addition to shaking up the morning commute, people around the province called MLAs and the premier, sent emails and letters and delivered balloons. Here, sad-face balloons being delivered to Burnaby MLA Richard Lee.
Below is an updated list of media reports on the October 28 day of action and the continuing campaign against cuts to programs for children with special needs.
Print media:
24 Hours/The Tyee: Media...ignore cuts to vulnerable children
Langley Times: Parents keep up pressure over autism funding
Abbotsford News: Moms protest on autism issue
Georgia Straight: Mothers of special needs kids to protest program cuts across BC
Invermere Valley Echo: Moms speak out against cuts
Kamloops this Week: Honk for autism funding
Kelowna.com: Kelowna moms protest government cuts
Kelowna News: Protesters march on MLA's office