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The law no longer seeks to maintain children in their family homes or with extended family
(LifeSiteNews) – Parents in Quebec are expressing their concern over a recently passed child protection bill which allows the state to override the principle of parental primacy and natural ties.
Bill 15 was first introduced by Quebec’s health minister Lionel Carmant in December 2021. It was adopted unanimously last Thursday in the Canadian provinces’ National Assembly: 115 votes in favor and none against.
According to Canada’s CTV news, the new law aims at “prioritizing the interests of children over all other considerations, including the interests of the parents,” and brings a number of changes to youth protection regulations in Quebec with a view to facilitating the placing of children in foster homes in alleged cases of neglect or abuse.
Quebec’s Youth Protection Act (1977) had hitherto recognised that the state should “tend to maintain” a child at risk “in his or her family environment.” This was the principle of parental primacy, that is, that parents have the primary responsibility of their children.
If it were impossible, or not in their best interests, for children to stay in their family homes, then the child protection authorities sought to place the children with members of their own extended families. Only after that avenue had failed would children be placed in foster homes.
Mainstream Canadian news outlets have described the new law as an “acknowledgment that keeping a neglected or abused child within their biological family at all costs” should no longer be “an absolute priority,” and that “ensuring the child is provided with a stable environment as quickly as possible” should be “the government’s priority.”
full story at https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/quebec-passes-law-changing-child-protection-regulations-setting-aside-natural-family-ties/