Re: CMRL - Using Child Protection Files to Screen People

[Gary <gdumbril@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 02:04 PM 30/05/98 +1000, you wrote:
>Which states in the United States
>(or any other country) use 
>child protection files to assess
>whether a person should be a 
>foster parent, child protection
>worker or child care assistant or 
>otherwise have unsupervised
>contact with children.

     
Ontario: Canada

I am not able to answer full, but I will do what I can.

In Ontario, police checks are undertaken on child protection social workers
and foster parent as a part of the hiring/recruitment process (not sure if
this is done for childcare assistants and others, but I suspect it is).  To
conduct such checks, the consent of the person being hired/recruited is
needed (if they did not consent they would probably not be employed).  This
type of check of course, only reveals criminal convictions.

As far as I know, child protection record checks are not completed on
anyone other than foster parents and those who volunteer for child
protection agencies.  At the moment this system is not very effective, as
Ontario is covered by 55 separate child protection agencies that do not
have an effective information sharing system and outside abuse
investigations, privacy legislation prevents the easy sharing of
information.  Even when conducting an abuse investigation, the lack of a
central information system means that investigators may not know of the
existence of child protection records in another jurisdiction.  When record
checks are done on foster parents, only the jurisdictions they say they
have lived in are checked (leaving ample opportunity for things to be
hidden).  Ontario is in the process of remedying this problem with a
central information system.

Ontario does have a central child abuse register that theoretically, all
verified perpetrators of child abuse are listed on.  This register is
checked when initiating a routine abuse investigation, but my experience
has been that it cannot be accessed for screening purposes even with the
consent of the person being screened.  Those placed on this register are
informed about their registration in writing and are entitled to call for
an  expungement hearing if they feel registration is unjust.

If you are looking for further Canadian contacts, they can be accessed
through the "Child Welfare Research" site at the University of Toronto,
Faculty of Social Work, address:

cwr.utoronto.ca

(go to the "Organizations" page and follow the links to "CAS/CPS" and you
will find your way to links to child protection agencies in all of Canada's
Provinces and Territories).

Hope this is helpful.

Gary Dumbrill
gary.dumbrill@utoronto.ca