'It's shocking': Opposition asks why children are still living in Serenity foster home

Editor's note: On Jan. 4, 2023, a justice of the Alberta Court of King's Bench released her report into Serenity's death. In that report, Justice Renee Cochard reviewed information, including the results of subsequent investigations, and outlined various "misconceptions" about the girl's condition at the time she was admitted to hospital. The report includes findings that there was no sexual abuse, and that an interpretation of a nurse's note which read "?0 hymen observed during catheter insertion" indicated her hymen was missing is incorrect.

Evidence that children are still living in the home where a little Alberta girl suffered fatal injuries is proof the provincial child welfare system is dangerously broken, says the official opposition.

"It's shocking, the idea that there still could be children in a situation where another childpaidthe most extreme consequence, and has lost their life," said Jason Nixon, theWildroseOpposition representative on an Alberta child intervention panel charged with addressing internal problems with child welfare.

"As a father, it just breaks my heart."

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Nixon said since the all-party child task force was formed last year,the NDP government has stonewalled any attempts by opposition and panel members to ask hard questions about the circumstances surrounding the death of four-year-old Serenity.

"If children are in that same home, that same environment, it's the government's responsibility to make sure they're safe," he said. "And if something happens to those children right now, I think it's the government's fault."

'What is the point of her panel?'

Nixon said it's difficult see how useful it is for the panel to spend months talking about the issue when the government is clearly failing in its duty to keep children safe.

"That's what I intend on asking the minister," he said. "What is the point of her panel if we can't get to the bottom of something as tragic as what happened to Serenity, and ensure other children aren't being hurt in the same way?"

The political debate around the now-infamous case was re-ignited Monday when CBC News reported that underage relatives of Serenity's one-time foster parents still live in the family home.

The children includetwo infants, two young children in elementary schooland two teenagers under 18.

Serenity was living in a kinship care arrangement on a central Alberta reserve when she was admitted to Edmonton hospital in September 2014 with horrific injuries.

She weighed only 18 pounds. Her skull was fractured and her body was covered in lacerations and purple contusions. There were signs of sexual assault.

Hypothermic and suffering from a horrific brain injury, Serenity was putinto a coma, and a week later was taken off life-support.

The little girl and her two siblings were apprehended from the home, but the other children were not, several community and family members say.

• Serenity's death prompts government to set up all-party task force

The all-party panel was created after it was revealed there had been little action in the case, despite repeated complaints from Serenity's birth mother that her child was being abused.

Until the details of Serenity's death are revealed, and a gag order on fatality cases is lifted, Nixon said he fears that other children will fall through the cracks.

• Gag order frustrates opposition members on Alberta panel examining child welfare

Children's Services Minister Danielle Larivee has declined to comment directly on the case, citing privacy laws and the ongoing RCMP investigation. The case has been in the hands of Crown prosecutors since last year.

'The state makes a pretty lousy parent'

A sworn affidavit from a child welfare worker, filed in provincial court in September 2014, said significant evidence of abuse was found in the kinship home. Serenity's siblings reported being beaten with coat hangers, and said they were regularly denied food.

The welfare worker recommended custody of Serenity and her siblings be transferred immediately back to their biological mother, but made no mention of the other children's welfare.

A failure to protect Serenity and her siblingsis proof of a chronically under-funded system that disproportionately fails, and discriminates against, Indigenous children, said Cindy Blackstock, executive director of First Nations Child and Family Caring Society.

• Canada discriminates against children on reserves, tribunal rules

In a landmark ruling last year, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal concluded that the federal government discriminates against First Nation children on reserves by failing to provide the same level of child welfare services that exist elsewhere.

Blackstock acknowledged the disturbing nature of Serenity's death and the need for a thorough review of the foster family home. But she noted that apprehending children from their biological families should be a last resort.

'Tragedy after tragedy'

"I've talked to thousands of kids who have grown up in child welfare," Blackstock said. "The state makes a pretty lousy parent.

"There is this public idea that we remove these kids from their families and we put them somewhere better, and that should be the contract. When we remove a child from their family we should offer them a chance at a better life, but too often we continue to see these tragedies unfold."

Blackstock said the work of child welfare panels and fatality inquiriesis important but too often their recommendations do not lead to changes.

"On its face, it seems to represent many of the sad situations that I've seen happen in the pastand across the country, where an under-funded child welfare system becomes overwhelmed," she said.

"We see these same recommendations being recycled tragedy after tragedy, and at some point the child welfare system, and the federal government, needs to be held accountable."