Social Services Committee — Department of Human Resources and Employment — 29 April 1997

1997-04-29

Newfoundland and Labrador — Committees

April 29, 1997

SOCIAL SERVICES ESTIMATES COMMITTEE

The Committee met at 9:00 a.m. in Room 5083.

CHAIR (Mercer): Order, please!

If we could get started, I would just like to

welcome everyone here this morning to the Estimates of the Department of Human

Resources and Employment. I have that right, have I?

WITNESS: Yes.

CHAIR: The new language is hard to get used to

at the beginning.

Just to start, I would like to introduce the

members of the Committee, starting with Mary.

MS M. HODDER: Mary Hodder, MHA for Burin -

Placentia West.

MR. G. REID: Gerry Reid, MHA for Twillingate &

Fogo.

MR. H. HODDER: Harvey Hodder, MHA for Waterford

Valley.

MR. WHELAN: Don Whelan, MHA for Harbour Main -

Whitbourne.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: John Ottenheimer, MHA for St.

John's East.

CHAIR: I'm Bob Mercer, MHA for Humber East.

In a moment I will call upon the minister to

introduce her staff, but I would just like to lay down a few of the procedures

that we are going to follow. Very simply, we would ask anyone who is speaking,

any of the officials, to identify themselves for the purposes of the gentleman

here who is obtaining records for Hansard, so I would ask you to do that. If

anyone in the back has occasion to speak, would they please come forward to one

of the mikes.

What we will do is simply ask the Clerk to call the

first head, then the discussion will start and I would anticipate that the

entire budget Estimates will be discussed under that one single head. The

gentleman to the right, the Vice-Chair of the Committee, will start, and we will

then proceed to ask questions, as I said last night, until all the questions

have been exhausted, or we and you have been exhausted. We hope to have a full,

free and frank discussion.

MR. H. HODDER: (Inaudible).

CHAIR: Well, lunch will kind of intervene.

With that little bit of an introduction, minister,

you are on. You may introduce your officials.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you. I would like to

thank you as well for the opportunity to meet here this morning and answer your

questions. We look forward to your exhaustive list, or until we become

exhausted, whichever comes first.

I would like to introduce my staff. I would ask if

you would introduce yourselves.

MR. LEWIS: Dave Lewis, Director of Income

Support.

MR. SKINNER: George Skinner, Assistant Deputy

Minister of Programs and Client Services.

MR. STRONG: Jim Strong, Director of Finance.

MS DAWE: Joan Dawe, Deputy Minister.

MR. ROBERTS: Dave Roberts, ADM of Financial

Employment and Support Services.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We also have a couple of extra

support people with us today.

MR. FRANEY: Ray Franey, Director of Labour

Market Development.

MR. GALLANT: I'm Don Gallant, I'm the Director

of Family and Rehabilitative Services.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you very much.

Would you like me to do an introduction to the

budget process?

CHAIR: If you would do an introductory

statement, then I will ask the Clerk to call the first head and we can start the

debate.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Fine. First of all, this is a

very interesting year for all of us, because in addition to Program Review we

had a number of other challenges to meet as we moved forward to try to do some

long-term planning. I guess the evidence of our Program Review is here today in

our new department, the Department of Human Resources and Employment.

I guess for explanation purposes, the new

department includes all of the Department of Social Services, and in addition

the labour market component of the Department of Development and Rural Renewal.

That means that in addition to all the existing programs and services of Social

Services, we have all the labour market programs, and particularly, I guess, as

you have heard, the summer program is what we are working on right now, the

Student Work and Services Program. In addition to that there are a number of

other responsibilities added in under the department as it relates to skills

training in the job market in particular.

Also, this has been a very interesting year for us

because, as you know, it was announced in the Budget that a significant portion

of the service component of this department will be moving over under the

Department of Health. We have a task force in place which has just really gotten

off the ground with most of our, I guess, planning put in place to make that

transition over the next year. We will be moving out all our child welfare

services and programs, as well as our family and rehabilitative services and

programs, under the new department of health and community services, as of April

1, 1998. It is quite a busy year from that perspective.

The intention is that we are trying to eliminate

many of the gaps and disincentives in government departments by streamlining

services, trying to find a single entry system for clients and focusing more on

prevention and early intervention. Through the Social Policy Advisory Committee

consultations, as if we didn't know already, it became more and more obvious

that there is a very fine line between social services and health with respect

to the needs of clients. We are really trying to realign that department.

Other initiatives: This year we will also be, under

the auspices of my department, with me as lead minister, putting forward the

Social Strategic Plan for the Province. What we are doing this year as a

transition, of course, is very important because we will be realigning the

department to help offset and address many of the issues and concerns that were

raised through that process.

For the purposes of the Budget, I think what I will

do is say that there are a number of areas in this year's Budget that we never

had before, obviously, with the labour market component, and I would be happy to

address those questions specifically as you ask them. I think it is worth

knowing this year that we still have fifty offices in place. We did not lay off

any of our front-line staff. As a matter of fact, we increased our positions by,

I think it is, 5.5 to address the increase in the adoptions, the post-adoptions

issue that was announced in the Budget.

Throughout the year, I think it is fair to say that

as we work to realign our services and work more closely with health, we do not

anticipate having fifty offices at the end of the day, but again that would be a

planning process and that will happen over the course of the next year or so

when we put those types of initiatives in place. We have, again, a task force in

place as we move forward, looking at those types of issues and how we can best

serve clients, and try to meet the needs particularly by de-stigmatizing social

services and moving more in alignment with the health needs of the Province.

I think, from my perspective, that is what I would

like to say, and I would invite you to ask the questions that I am sure you

would like to ask of me.

CHAIR: Thank you, Madam Minister.

CLERK (E. MURPHY): Head 1.1.01

CHAIR: John, would you like to start the day.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

What we have done in the past, and as we did last

night in the Health Estimates, was basically, in random fashion, members of the

committee asking questions representing their concerns. There is no formal

style, I guess; we just ask questions arbitrarily.

I would like to begin, as Vice-Chair, by asking a

question of the minister which will probably be followed up particularly by Mr.

Hodder whom, as you are aware, is the critic for this particular department.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I am aware of that, yes.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: You are aware of that, yes. He

may have a number of specific questions and perhaps is much more in tune with

many of the -

MR. H. HODDER: Sure, be complimentary there

now.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: - specifics and intricacies of

the department.

My first question, Madam Minister, has to do with

your beginning statement in terms of the re-designation of the department, now

being referred to as Human Resources and Employment. I am just wondering: This

integration process presumably had some budgetary consequences, maybe not to any

significant extent but, obviously, any integration or amalgamation has a cost

associated with it, and I am just wondering, could you perhaps give us some idea

of what was involved and what those cost factors or cost consequences may have

been as a result of this recent integration?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: First of all, call me what you

like but don't call me Mr. Minister.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Oh, I am sorry, Madam

Minister! My apologies! That happened in the House yesterday, didn't it? Was it

you?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: It did, yes. Bob French called

Julie Bettney Mr. Minister twice yesterday.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Madam Minister. My apologies!

MR. H. HODDER: I have to have some sensitivity

training, as the House Leader, for my caucus.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Exactly. We have ours in

training as well.

Obviously you are right, there is quite a

combination of people and services. I think the main issue was, that we wanted

to realign many of our social assistance recipients whom we would consider

employable, to have more direct access and less disincentives and gaps in the

services. What we have attempted to do is bring - again, the various programs

are in the department but we are still at a point where we are trying to shift

the culture, I guess, of our front-line workers, because, as you know, many of

our front-line workers, when they meet with clients, say, allocate cheques. Now

we are trying, over the next number of months, to focus on not only asking what

their needs are but also if they are employable and if they need training and

skills in trying to shift that process.

We did have a significant change in the programs

that came over. We had an additional, I believe it was, twenty staff come over

from the labour market which brings our total staff in the department up to

about 1,173. That includes all our staff in the various departments of social

services as it previously existed, plus our new people who came over. Most of

our people are here in head office. We have recently hired five new people in

the regional offices to serve as the front-line people to assist with the jobs

and the transition from the two programs, trying to get the integration moving.

Particularly, they are focusing right now on the summer programs, the SWASP in

particular.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: So would all of the additional

workers you mentioned, the twenty new staff, have been related to the labour

market component?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes. We didn't involve the

economic component of it at all. The people who came over, as I said, are mostly

operating out of our office, are labour market specifically.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Could you give us some sense,

Madam Minister, of their particular responsibilities? If we have twenty new

people to the department representing the labour market component, what

specifically would be their responsibilities?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Many of their responsibilities

are the same as they were with the Department of Development and Rural Renewal.

I think what is more important is the realignment of the strategic and economic

component of our department, trying to match the whole concept of determinants

of health and recognizing that a person's economic status and income status has

a big overall impact on their social status. So their roles and responsibilities

have not changed, in that they will be implementing the new labour market

development agreement, over $300 million, over the next three years.

I understand it will probably be increased to five

years, because there was a `me too' clause added to the labour market

development agreement, in that if another province was to negotiate successfully

a longer period of time, then any and all of the provinces that wanted that

extended agreement could get it. From my recent knowledge, as of last week the

Quebec labour market development agreement was increased to a five year period,

so we will have access to that five year period. That is one of the main

initiatives they will be undertaking.

Of course, under the labour market development

agreement, there are a number of initiatives like the wage subsidy programs,

employer subsidy programs, those sorts of issues. Part of that will be allocated

out under the Department of Education. They will do the skills, loans and grants

component of that. In addition to that, they will work with other issues as it

relates to employment, for example, issues surrounding liaison work with the

federal government on EI and TAGS issues, issues with respect to older workers

as it relates to the mining industries or other resource based industries, those

sorts of initiatives.

The same job descriptions, the same overall work,

that was outlined last year is there. In addition, we have a new labour market

development agreement to work with and we also have the transitional jobs fund,

and they are the same initiatives. Except now we are trying to work much more

closely with the social sector, and recognizing the interdependence of both.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Was the primary reason or

philosophy behind the integration, in your view, to, I guess, send a message to

the public that there is much more to what traditionally has been referred to as

the Social Services department, and really there was a need to expose to the

public, really, a broader picture of what social services entails? Was that,

philosophically, essentially behind the integration?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: It was, yes. That is a good

point; philosophically it was. I think what is more important is that that was

the message that came from the public. The public has asked government to start

working more collaboratively among departments, to try to decrease the

disincentives and the run around that people currently get. We talked about that

here last year.

In addition, in the Social Policy Advisory

Committee, one of its main recommendations was to try to realign social and

economic development. I think this is sort of a beginning step. We had an

economic plan. We are working on a social plan. We saw our department as really

a bridge to government helping people move from where they are to the employment

and the skills training sector. So it is a philosophical decision in one way,

but it is very much supported.

When we actually did a research project with our

own front-line and management staff, in two pilot areas last year, on the West

Coast and in St. John's, which covered over half of our total employees, one of

the main issues they raised with us was the ability to recognize the economic

needs of people as well as the social needs, to work more closely with health

and to try to focus more on prevention and early intervention. All of this is

part of that strategy to work more closely.

I think it goes back even further than that.

Because if you look at some of the initiatives that were done, if you look at

Steve Neary's contribution, you know, taking away the food stamps and giving

people an option to buy their own food, if you look at what we are trying to do

now to de-stigmatize social services so that when you come in for a service you

could be coming in for employment opportunities counselling, you could be coming

in for health services, you could be coming in for nutritional counselling or

you could be coming in to see a financial assistance officer to get

income-support payment - so, the de-stigmatization was also a big part of it.

CHAIR: Harvey.

MR. H. HODDER: Let me just first of all say,

that many of the initiatives that are taking place are consistent with the

directions that I heard when I was part of the team which did the Children's

Interest study, and particularly the integration of the Department of Health. In

some provinces it is advancing. I am happy to say that we are probably as far

along as most, and further than some others. I say that in a very positive way

because I happen to believe that the further we can integrate services and have

them client-based and focused is a positive thing. I think it is something that

I certainly shared with the deputy minister on a number of occasions and shared

with the minister as well. In getting to that, though, of course there is

obviously going to be some transition and there are going to be some

difficulties.

I want to go back to the last comment here and then

I will get back to other comments in a moment. When we talk about

de-stigmatizing access to social services, one of the things that I have

mentioned on a number of occasions before is, de-stigmatizing access to the

purchase of school text books by teenagers. As you know, it is very difficult to

disguise the fact that in a junior high school or a high-school setting - you

can implement all kinds of elaborate ways to not make it obvious but you cannot

disguise it. You can try to get around it any way you can. I have been an

advocate for some time of trying to de-stigmatize that and quoting the fact that

we should be - as Steve Neary would say: Do away with food stamps. We stopped

paying the rents directly to the landlords in most cases, and now I think it is

time to say to parents: Here is your money to get your children ready for

school.

A big fear some people have is that some people

might not spend that money where it is supposed to be spent. I think that is

hogwash. Yes, there will be exceptions, there will be need to monitor it, but I

do think that we cannot say it won't work unless we have tried it. Why should

those people who are trying to do the best they can to raise their children,

very straightforward and honest people who just happen to be on social services,

why should their children have to be stigmatized by the approach we now use? Are

you going to do anything about it?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I was going to say: Speech!

Speech! Speech! What is your question?

As you know, last year it came up as an issue close

to the end of the year. Actually our department raised it with the Department of

Education. It was quite late in the year and I think it was not an appropriate

time to implement it.

I think what we are doing - and I think it was an

issue that you raised last year, the concept of why we were providing books to

social assistance students and letting them keep the books, and then at the

beginning of the next year re-issuing books all over again. That initiative is

one that we are following up, and that is we are now in the process of having a

letter sent out to all the parents whose children are receiving text books under

the program whereby they are provided by the Province, and ask that these books

be returned to help offset the costs so that there will be more money available

for other books and resources in the schools, if that is how they choose to use

the money. That was an issue that you raised last year, in particular, why, in

fact, are we paying for books for social assistance students and then letting

them keep them. They go and sell the books and then we have to issue new ones.

So, that is something we will be implementing this year, asking students to

return the books and we will be recycling them to other students.

With respect to providing the money, that has not

been an initiative that we have spoken about, allocating a set amount for books.

I think the initiative is something that I could raise with my colleague in the

Department of Education but, quite frankly, we have never heard that issue. What

we have heard is: Why are these students not asked to bring back their books to

recycle and re-use, rather than have them sold at a second-hand store and then

have to issue new books again?

I have never ever been asked that question with

respect to, why not just give everybody the money they need to buy the books.

Quite frankly, I could certainly raise it with my colleague, but it is not

anything that has ever been raised with me before. As I said, the only issue

that has come up to me is: Why don't we try to recycle and re-use the books in a

more effective way, by asking parents and students to cooperate by returning

them at the end of the school year? That is the initiative we will be following

this year.

MR. H. HODDER: There are two aspects to it. One

is, of course, the issue that you raise, which I raised last year, the issue of

people who are on social assistance getting their books and then they get new

books every year. They don't necessarily transfer them down to their younger

siblings. That is one part of it, and that was certainly brought out in several

of the consultations that I was part of.

The other aspect is the one that says, as we

progress to make people who are on social assistance more self-actualizing, more

independent, more responsible for their own decision making, should we not be

moving to the point of saying to them: We believe we will assess your needs. You

can do that quite easily, you know what is needed to subsidize school textbooks.

In some provinces they are talking about doing a school preparation fund,

because it isn't just school textbooks. Let's say the parent is given $100 for a

Grade IX student. They can then choose to buy new textbooks or they can go and

buy second-hand textbooks, but it is their decision. They may choose, after

having bought the books as a priority, that it might be that the child needs a

new pair of sneakers or something like that. Therefore by doing that we are

letting the parents have more control and more participation, and we are also

teaching the children more responsibility for the disposal of funds and that

kind of thing.

I wonder if the minister could take that further

program, as we did years ago with people getting food stamps. Some people said:

It won't work. In fact, it probably won't cost you any more money in total

budgetary dollars between the two departments, because there is shared money

here with Education, as you know. Take that as a further suggestion. It would

really make the lives of some of the teenagers out there a lot more comfortable

when it comes to accessing school textbooks; and they are very sensitive. A

fifteen-year old doesn't want anybody to know that he or she is living on social

services. It is nobody's business, including the school principal. The teachers

don't need to know, unless there is a demonstrated need to know, that a child is

on social services. If there is a need, yes. But as a general rule, there

shouldn't be a list of people in anybody's office saying: These people in my

class are on social services and these are the ones who aren't. From an

educational point of view, I think it is important.

You spoke, in your comments, again about the new

ministry and listening to others. I just want to refer back to a comment that is

on page 17 of what the people said in the Report of the Strategic Social

Planning Public Dialogue Newfoundland and Labrador . It talked about the

difficulty some employees are having. I will just read you the paragraph and get

a reaction to it. It says:

"In rural areas especially, some government

employees describe the widening distance between themselves and the senior

people within their departments. They believe their concerns are not given due

consideration by upper management, that they are not asked for their opinions

and they are not listened to. They express concern that they frequently cannot

meet the needs of the people they are expected to serve because of a lack of

resources, high caseloads, and constant pressure to tighten service delivery.

Many operate on a reactive basis and have little latitude for early intervention

in addressing social problems."

So on and so forth. On that issue, obviously in the

consultations that Penny Rowe and her group did, there must have been a concern

by some of the front-line workers in the different parts of the Province that

the upper echelon, maybe not exclusively in Confederation Building, but there is

a perception of a widening gap. How are you addressing that, particularly as we

try to address that, plus try to amalgamate and integrate the two Departments of

Human Resources and Employment and Health and bring a client-centred approach?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, I think there are two

issues. The first issue is that, I think this particular comment is probably

covering a number of areas, departments and centres?

MR. H. HODDER: Oh, yes.

MS J.M. AYLWARD:

Whereas, if you are asking me

specifically about our department, I just referenced a previous cultural

research process that we had completed which finished last October, which had

addressed all of our staff, from front-line right up to management in St. John's

and in the Western Region, covering over half of our staff. What we found was

somewhat dissimilar from what is in here, in a lot of ways.

They encouraged us to move with the other

departments. They encouraged us that in many cases there is too much management

and in other cases that they wanted to have, I guess, more decision-making on

the front-line. You have to look at: Historically, in the Department of Social

Services, we have as many as five layers of management. So when you try to

reduce any of those layers, there is a perception and a reality that there is

less management because there really is. What we have been trying to do is

maintain our front-line workers, which we have. We have been trying to, I guess,

flatten our management structure which we have. I think that the reality of it

is, that in many cases some of those in management are not as accessible as they

were before.

We have tried to stabilize our offices by putting a

direct supervisor in there, either with respect to income-support issues or

child welfare issues, whatever sort of needs there would be in that particular

area. I think, in many cases, that has helped a lot, because last year was a

very de-stabilizing year, because we have taken out a lot of our management and

replaced a lot of our distant managers with more front-line supervision. I think

that has helped.

I do not necessarily agree that this comment is

specifically about our department, because remember Penny Rowe covered all the

departments, Health, Education, Social Services, Municipalities, Women's Policy,

a number of them.

Our research, which is what we are using and which

came from our front-line staff, and which we are using now in the task force

that we have in place to implement these changes, is that front-line staff want

more decision-making ability and they want access to more information on how to

do that. We recognize there is a need for increased training to do those kinds

of things. We have not, for the most part, had that type of comment about not

enough management in the system. That is not a common complaint from our

front-line supervisors.

MR. H. HODDER: So, I can ask the Minister of

Health and he will tell me that, you know, it must be the other department we

are talking about. Right?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No, no. I can tell you

specifically what our staff said, because it was done specifically only with

social services employees, it was not done with any other sector. We have

incorporated that into what we have fed back out to the system and into our task

force plans, and that was specifically why we asked to have it done. It is done

by region, it is done by age group, it is done by issues, so it is very

specific.

MR. H. HODDER: However, turfism and

protectionism, of course, are well-recognized as issues within the bureaucracy.

I mean, any literature you read, in the philosophy of it - it does not matter

what government level you are at - there will always be a certain amount of

turfism and protectionism that will be there. That is human nature.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, you can hear it in the

media even when people talk about it. I mean, we heard from you, we heard from

our social policy, that we need to work more closely, we need to bring our

departments together and we need to decrease disincentives and gaps. What do you

hear? That people feel that we should not change, we should do this, we should

do that. Change is always stressful and there is a certain degree of turfism or

turfdom, whatever you want to call it. I think we have tried to work very

closely with our other departments and I think this department is a good example

of inter-departmental collaboration, because we have a number of initiatives and

pilot projects, not only with Health and Social Services, but with Justice,

Education and Women's Policy. We are really trying to work through many of those

perceived and existing problems that are out there in the bureaucracy.

MR. H. HODDER: As we proceed - and again I say

to you that I applaud the direction - there are obviously going to be

frustrations, frustrations within the system and frustrations that are going to

be at the client level as well. As we proceed, and before we have this thing put

into final preparation, will there be adequate time and further consultation

with the service providers to make sure that there is again some flexibility,

some time for both the bureaucracy and the clientele that we serve to become

totally familiar with it so that we don't end up with a de facto document that

says: Here it is, and this is what is going to happen.

How are we going to make sure that, as we do move

along within the whole bureaucracy, which is across the government, because I am

talking to you and you, obviously, as a member of Cabinet, would have some ideas

there, particularly since it directly affects your department and you are

considered to be the lead minister for this particular integration, how are we

going to make sure that we don't get the process stifled by unnecessary

obstacles that result from lack of communication?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think communication is

always a challenge, and there is always room for improvement, but I think if

anybody has been around in the system - and I have been around from the health

care system for close to twenty years - for many of the people we have spoken

with, particularly the community health boards and the service providers, this

is a dream come true for those to try to realign health and social services and

put it closer to the community, put a community development focus on it. When we

mentioned this in our feedback, when we met with all of the CEOs of the

community health boards, I guess way back - when was it, the week before the

budget maybe - and threw it out as a possibility of where we would like to go,

we had a lot of positive feedback, because people see this as the obvious way to

go.

How are we going to improve and communicate and

keep it open? Well, the first thing we have done is put a steering committee in

place. You know that when this initiative was brought forward it was very clear

from the direction from Cabinet that we needed a time to do this right, and I

think the fact that we have been given a year to make the transition is a sign

of the time that we do need. We have put together a health and community

services steering committee with representatives from social work, from the

university, from health, from the community boards, from government, from other

departments, and also from consumers; and we are planning to follow up on the

many recommendations. I guess, to quote you, in many ways we have consulted

quite a bit on this one and maybe it is just time that we move forward with it.

We heard from the Select Committee on Children's

Interests that we should go in this direction. We have heard it from the Social

Policy Advisory Committee, and the Ministerial Council for Federal/Provincial

Relations. We have heard about it from the Provincial Strategy On Violence for

the Province. We have heard about moving and integrating, so we are moving and

integrating. I think your point is well taken, we do need to continue to

communicate, we do need to share information, and we also feel that we have some

fairly good information from our front-line workers on how they want us to do

that, and that is what we are using as our main guide.

MR. H. HODDER: I have just one more question.

It won't be long. I want to comment on your post-adoption program.

I support what you have done in adding the extra

staff, but we still have not addressed the whole issue of the rights of adoptees

to access to information. In my opinion, we have not gone far enough. I believe

that we should be looking at the European model. We should be looking at British

Columbia. We still have a ways to go in terms of our giving adoptees the same

right to information about their birth families as all of us who grew up with

our parents. I am wondering if you intend, as the minister to - what we have

done now is really speed up the backlog, which does not address the fundamental,

philosophical issue. I wanted to get your comments on what you feel about the

viewpoint I would have, which is more like the British Columbia experience,

which is not being copied extensively across Canada, but I think that it is

recognizing the rights of adoptees and treating them like everybody else. They

didn't decide to be adopted. Are there any new directions coming? Are we going

to change the adoption act?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, there are two issues.

The first issue is the backlog, which is obvious and quite extensive, and one

about which we, as well, were quite concerned. That is why we made the

recommendation, which was approved, that we hire the extra staff to clear away

the backlog. As you know, we are hoping to have that done within the year. I

think that is long overdue, and we are also quite pleased to be able to do that.

That is the first issue.

The second issue is what to do in the long term. In

order to address many of the issues and concerns with respect to open adoptions,

rights of the adoptee, we have to change the legislation. In order to change the

legislation we have to, I guess, have some sort of framework or discussion Green

Paper on what we would like to do. We are hoping to move in that direction

probably for the fall, to have that Green Paper out there with a discussion,

because there are a number of varied views.

We have the rights of the adoptive parents who are

very panicky when it comes to revealing that type of information that would

allow the adopted children to have access to all of the information. They become

very concerned about that. They figure, and they are right, that they are the

parents and that the biological parents have no rights; they gave up their

rights.

Then you have the rights of - I have had a number

of very sad inquiries where we have had people who are actually dying and have

had a child out of wedlock and want to see this child, but because the adoptee

has not registered then I cannot give that biological birth parent the name of

that person, because that is the way the legislation is written. I don't even

have it, to be quite honest, and maybe there would be something we could do if

we had it.

So there are a lot of glitches and errors. It is

old legislation, just like our child welfare legislation, and we recognize that.

We are looking at all of the models right across the country, and also some of

the European models and some of the American models, and we will be putting

forward a discussion paper in the fall to begin to address that issue.

MR. H. HODDER: I am glad to hear that, because

I think that we have to give people the right to choose. Today, with

computerization, with the ability to be able to access information a lot faster,

then certainly if we get the right kind of programs in place - and I mean

informational programs - we can make certain decisions very quickly.

As you know, of the 50,000 adoptions from British

Columbia between 1924 and 1996, the number of adoptive parents who choose to

deny access to information was something like 1,200, which shows that 97 or 98

per cent of the people who are involved support the opening up of the

information. They went through the same processes and had their Green Papers, or

whatever you call it, if you are NDP out there. I don't know the colours in

British Columbia.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I am just getting it figured

out myself. The White Paper is an information one and the Green Paper is a

discussion one. I am just following the lingo, that is all.

MR. H. HODDER: But it is a case of where I

think that is the right direction to go. There will be open dialogue, and there

will have to be protections built in, but it is a direction I would commend to

you; that direction.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you. I take your

commendation.

I think there is another point, though, that I

would just like to add to that, and that is while right now we are in a very

sort of important time because we have a group of baby boomers who went through

the post-war era and there were a lot of children born out of wedlock - that was

sort of a very common trend - what we are finding now is that the number of

adoptions have decreased, so it will probably end up taking care of itself. We

have so few adoptions right across the country, with a declining birth rate and

more and more people choosing to keep their children even when they do have them

out of wedlock, because the stigma is not there like it used to be, that it will

probably end up taking care of itself. It is important to address that, because

the issues are happening now, but I think in another twenty years that will not

be an issue because a lot of these people will either have given up on searching

out their children or the parents would have died.

MR. H. HODDER: Just to (inaudible) my point. On

my desk out there now there was a call from Sarnia. Again, it is a young lady

who went to the school system where I was teaching in Mount Pearl. She ended up

in Sarnia and now, of course, she is looking for information, that kind of

thing. So with the public dialogue we probably are going to get more enquiries

in the short term.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We get hundreds ourselves,

yes.

MR. H. HODDER: Hundreds, yes.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

CHAIR: Mr. Whelan.

MR. WHELAN: Minister, a number of different

things have happened in your department of late, and one of them, I believe, is

the wage subsidization for students. I think a lot of the responsibilities that

HRD had are now with the Department of Human Resources and Employment, is that

correct?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Are you talking about SWASP?

MR. WHELAN: Not necessarily. The SWASP -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: The labour market agreement is

what you are talking about.

MR. WHELAN: Pardon?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: The labour market agreement.

MR. WHELAN: Yes.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: The employer subsidy and wage

subsidy, yes.

MR. WHELAN: Yes. I had a constituent call me

shortly after the Budget Speech. She was having some problem negotiating an

agreement with HRD for her training allowance. They wanted to give her x number

of dollars for babysitting. She figured she didn't need it. They could have put

it into a different slot so that she could have used it for tuition or

something. She was having problems along those lines. I suggested she call the

Department of Human Resources and Employment.

She enquired about this particular problem she was

having, without having said that she had gone to HRD, and they said: Why don't

you go to HRD and they can give you all the information, because that is exactly

what we are doing? I wonder if it was just taken as a composite unit and taken

from the federal Department of Human Resource Development and put into your

department, or has it been changed somewhat and your own mark put on it? What is

the situation?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think a lot of people are

getting confused by the names of the departments, because they are somewhat

similar. We have not taken over all the roles and responsibilities of the

federal government's programs. We co-design many of the programs to try to meet

sort of the needs of the community or the Province, as opposed to a few years

ago when all the programs were developed in Ontario and we all had to fit into

them. We have had a lot more activity in terms of designing them, but they are

managed, and I guess delivered, by HRD. They aren't delivered out of our office.

MR. WHELAN: That leaves me even a little bit

more confused now, because I understand that you took on the responsibility,

your department, of providing training allowances for people who at one point or

another decided to go back to school. Not necessarily a young student who has

gone from high school into college or university and looking for a summer job,

but people who have been out of school for quite a while and want to get back

into the job market and want to be retrained and that type of thing.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: With the new labour market

development agreement that we signed about three weeks ago we do have the four

components that are outlined, or the four tools, wage subsidies and those kinds

of things. I would ask Ray, if you want to speak to that specifically Ray, on

his question. I don't know if he has an issue there with respect to the

constituent.

MR. WHELAN: There is no particular issue. I was

just wondering if you had evolved - If it was only a few days after the

announcement of Human Resources and Employment, then I could understand the

individual in your department referring her to HRD at that particular point in

time, within a day or two. I was wondering if there had been any further

development with regard to your own program and policy and your own mark on the

particular program, so to speak, since then.

MR. FRANEY: The labour market development

agreement was signed to come into effect April 1. Essentially we who were

formerly in D2R2, the Department of Development and Rural Renewal, moved around

the same week into the new department. There was a package of information that

was sent across the Island, to people like yourself, that explained what the

labour market development agreement was. It was given out in the House.

Essentially, the labour market development

agreement is an agreement that allows the Province to have a say in what before

was controlled entirely by the federal government. So we, through the labour

market development agreement, will have a say in joint management and joint

design of federal programs, but the federal group of Human Resource Development

Canada will still administer that particular program. Their programs look like

some types of program that we have also delivered in the Province: Wage subsidy,

wage supplementation, job creation partnerships, a training component which is

under Development and several support measures of which different groups could

avail.

It is fairly complicated, information counselling

and that kind of thing, but essentially it is a program that we will now embark

on. We are just fresh into this, a process of having our say in what the federal

government is doing in Newfoundland. So we are hoping that we will shape the

approach to Newfoundland, building on our aspirations, our priorities, our

growth agenda and saying: this is how we would like or how we would like to see

you operate in Newfoundland.

MR. WHELAN: How is it developing? What do you

feel the priorities are and what changes (inaudible).

MR. FRANEY: It is moving fairly fast. The

management committee has been structured. Again we are talking about an

agreement that was just signed for April 1. The Secretariat spoke to the

management committee which is a group of federal and provincial officials who

are currently working out rules and procedures and orientation for these

committees. The regional committees will be formed very soon and they will be

responsible for developing a business plan for the four HRCC regions in the

Province.

The business plan talks about how we will spend the

money in that particular region. They, in doing that, will build on the zone

strategic plans and will build on their knowledge of that particular region.

That will be signed off by the management committee, and the management

committee, in signing off that plan and in the formulation of the plan, will be

aware of what programs we have in the Province and what the new department is

mandated to do. Hopefully, all that will tie together in one, overall, strategic

plan for the Province. The programs themselves, under the Labour Market

Development Agreement, are for EI eligible clients and will be delivered by

HRDC.

MS DAWE: I co-chair the Labour Management

Committee with HRD and we are currently in the process of putting the

infrastructure in place to co-design and identify the needs of our Province. We

will be doing that in consultation with many stakeholders: the employers

council, for example, and the new council on economy. We will be going to

various groups, including the regional zone boards, and asking them to identify

their needs in the community for training. Then we will develop the training

programs to fit the needs of the Province. As the minister said, formerly, the

programs were designed in Ottawa and we had to fit into that niche. We will be

designing the programs ourselves.

While the funding is there, the programs are being

delivered by HRDC now and they will for the next year, until we are able to

properly design what is required in this Province. That is the process we will

be going through over the next five to six months, with much input from various

stakeholders.

MR. WHELAN: So basically, you will going to the

grass roots for information and the information will filter back to you again?

MS DAWE: Right. We will be designing the

programs around what is needed in this Province to help support people get into

the workforce.

MR. WHELAN: And eventually you will be

administering it too, I would say.

MS DAWE: No, we won't. The money for these

programs will be co-managed by HRDC and the Province, but will actually be

delivered by the HRD system, by the federal employees who are all across the

Island. The benefit of this, is that we will have a chance to say how these

programs should be structured to meet the needs of people in this Province. We

are going through quite an extensive consultation process to get input from

various groups now around the design.

MR. WHELAN: Okay, thank you.

You mentioned, Mr. Minister, in your introductory

remarks, something about a single-entry system for clients.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: `Mr. Minister', that is what

they are laughing at.

MR. H. HODDER: I am sure, Madam Minister, there

will be a Ministerial Statement on this subject.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: You never know.

MR. WHELAN: My apologies!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: You are going to have to start

again, Don.

MR. WHELAN: You mentioned the single-entry

system, Madam Minister, and I am wondering if you could probably expound on

that. What exactly does that entail?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Okay. What that means, I

guess, is it is one way to address a number of gaps and departmental nightmares

that you go through. A good example to use is the Central Newfoundland community

board system where they try to put in place a way to address the long waiting

lists for people who are trying to access long-term care facilities in nursing

homes. The way it used to work years ago: If you knew someone here, you could

get your mother in, or if you knew someone there then you could get your mother

in.

What they did was that they developed a single

entry list, so that when your name went on the list you were called and you went

here or there. Now, you mightn't want to go over there, and you could refuse to

go, that is fine, but you couldn't be number fifty on the list and get in over

there. That is one example of a single entry system.

The example that we are hoping to use is that when

you go in to the Department of Health, for example, and you have a child in your

family on social assistance, and you need various programs and services, instead

of saying: You go on over to the Department of Social Services and they will

take care of you over there, because you happen to be on social services and you

can't access these programs because these are not for people on social services,

what we are hoping to say is: You go in to your social worker and they will be

able to look at your needs. Then, because everybody will be working out of an

integrated system, you will be sent to the occupational health and safety

worker, the behaviour management specialist, the community health nurse,

referral to a paediatrician or whatever. It will be that type of a system,

instead of going back and forth, and that is what we mean by single entry.

We have, in many cases, a group from Social

Services doing a full assessment, another group from Health doing a full

assessment, and if you have community services the crowd out in community health

are doing it. We are trying to minimise all of that and work people through the

system a lot more effectively.

MR. WHELAN: Something like the banking system.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No, we aren't going to

automatic tellers.

MR. WHELAN: There is a problem or a concern

that I have had, and I think every time I get an opportunity I bring it up. I

suppose other members as well, and most social workers, realize that there are

certain people in society who, though they aren't necessarily mentally or

physically handicapped, they are somewhat slower mentally and physically than

the average individual, and they have a problem competing in the job force. As a

consequence, I guess they are perpetually attached to the social services

department. It is a constant source of frustration for a lot of these people,

and in some ways a constant source of frustration for politicians, because they

are quite often coming to us looking for jobs, and it isn't very easy to find a

job for a person in that particular niche, I suppose.

I was wondering if there is any particular program

that may be addressed to these individuals. We have them in every community.

There are a number of people in each and every community who fall into that

category. I was wondering, as I mentioned before, is there anything there that

would address that problem in your department?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes. We often address the

people whom you have described as socially disabled. In many ways, as you said,

they are probably suffering from a minor disability, or they may not have a

visible disability but they have a learning disability and they aren't able to

compete.

MR. WHELAN: Just a bit slower than other

people.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes. I think what you would

find is that it is just like the whole issue of workfare and that whole debate.

When you have a burgeoning economy you find that there are a lot more jobs

available through other types of markets and resources for a lot of these

people. It becomes more and more difficult, like it does for everybody else in

this economy, when there is such high competition.

In our department we do have the STEP which we have

used to assist people, often times on social assistance. Well, in our department

it has been specifically for people on social assistance. In the past we have

kept that part of the program separate from the other programs that Ray just

spoke about in the Department of Development and Rural Renewal, because we knew

if these people had to compete for jobs with everybody else they wouldn't get a

job. That is how we have worked with them.

We have had a number of initiatives like the

silviculture program, as you know about, and other initiatives that we have held

through the New Beginnings. We have had people assessed through the SAT Centre,

and we try to work them in. In many ways we have supportive employment programs

where we will pay a part of the subsidy for people to work. In some cases we

have paid all the subsidy.

We are trying to work more into meaningful jobs

where people will, even if we pay a subsidy, at the end of the day either have

an attachment to the workforce or they will have a permanent job. Yes, we do

have some programs, and we will still have those programs in our department.

MR. WHELAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

CHAIR: Thank you, Don.

Mr. Ottenheimer.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Madam Minister, there are obviously a lot of

changes taking place within the department, and certainly the impression one

gets is that they are for the better, and there are a lot of positive

initiatives taking place which, I think we agree on this Committee, are

certainly for the betterment of our people and are moving in the right

direction.

However, because of the nature of the department

there are still a number of frustrations. I find it, I guess, as an MHA when I

get a call from a constituent who perhaps may be looking for something like a

fridge, or there may be a situation whereby emergency housing is required, you

know, these sorts of immediate crisis situations which come up, and which

obviously the officials in your department deal with on a regular basis, and we

as MHAs deal with certainly on a weekly if not daily basis.

The impression one gets is that the direct

representative of the department, in most cases the social worker, who is really

the one-to-one contact that that client has, and really represents the

department very often, often we, acting as mediators in dealing with that

individual or social worker, feel the response time is not perhaps what it

should be. That may be a result of the nature of the type of business we are in.

I mean, it is a very high-stress, high frustration level. People want answers

immediately, and, you know, it is just not possible very often.

I'm wondering, in terms of the social workers who

are out there and the numbers that we have, is it at a level, in terms of the

numbers of people, that you feel is acceptable? If not, what recommendations are

you making as minister to see to it that we have a greater number of individuals

on behalf of the department who can work in conjunction with the many thousands

of people who are out there and who need assistance on a regular basis?

I guess my question in a nutshell is: Do we have

the staff, and if not, what recommendations or suggestions do you feel may be

appropriate to give us what we need to do as a response to these concerns?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: First of all, when you make

the reference about the fridge, for example, it is hard to answer in a

generalized question, the specifics of it, because there is a whole

philosophical debate around a lot of the policies and procedures. Just like our

child welfare legislation is over twenty-two years old, our income support

legislation is quite old. It was done at a time when many of the initiatives

that we had in place were put there to meet the federal government requirements

under the Canada Assistance Program. Obviously we have to change those as well,

and that will be forthcoming.

In terms of how do you meet them, I think one of

the things that we have found, or I have found since I have been here in this

year, is that a lot of people in the Province are experiencing some very

difficult times. I think what we also have done, rightly or wrongly, is we have

increased expectations quite a bit. Many of the people who we serve have a

number of other, I guess, bills and requirements that we have no capacity to

pay. I would say that well over 70 per cent of all the people on social

assistance have cable bills, which we have no ability to pay. We have a number

of them who have cars, which means you have to pay insurance. I know I myself

pay $1,100 insurance a year. You have the upkeep of your car and all those other

types of expenses which we have no ability, and never ever had any intention of

paying for.

They have those types of requirements, and rightly

or wrongly they have the same expectations as if somebody was out working and

having to make all those types of payments. That is one issue, and maybe that is

a philosophical debate. Maybe it is right and maybe it is wrong, but they are

the expectations. People come in and say: I owe $50 on my Visa, I have my cable

bill, I have my car payment, I have my gas, I have my food, my rent and

everything else. We don't have those types of arrangements because that is not

what a system of last resort is based upon. That is one issue.

With respect to the contact, I think that for

information purposes it is important to note that most people do not speak to a

social worker when they come into the department. They speak to a financial

assistance officer, and then, based on their needs and requirements, they may or

may not be referred to a social worker.

You are asking if we have enough staff. Our staff

is broken down into a number of categories, as you know from the

classifications. We have financial assistance officers, we have social workers,

we have child protection workers, we have community services workers, we have

various specialists within the system, and then we have supervisors and other

layers all the way up through.

If you are asking what the average workload is for

a social worker with respect to child protection cases, it is an average of

twenty-two cases. As we know, with every twenty-two cases some are active and

some are inactive. Some might have higher than that, but the average is

twenty-two and not all of them are active at one time.

When you have over 70,000 clients, which we have,

35,000 cases, you have to obviously expect that there is some turnaround time.

We admit that there is always room for improvement, and there is always a better

way to work more collaboratively with other departments, and we are learning

from that as we go.

You are right; we deal on a regular basis. Many of

the complaints and issues that we get are issues we are able to address, and

many of them are issues that we are not able to address, for some of the reasons

that I gave. We cannot make car payments for people; we cannot pay Visa bills

for people; we cannot pay cable bills; and we don't pay lights and phone. They

make their own arrangements for that part of this new system of independence.

I would say there is always room for improvement.

We do the best we can, but we have over 1,100 staff and over 70,000 clients. So

I guess it is sort of a function of division there. Some people we never from

and some people, I am sure as you can attest to - you have 5 per cent of your

constituents that you hear from 90 per cent of the time, and in some cases, in

some regions, that is the way it is as well.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: What is the ratio? You

mentioned, I think, for child protection it is one to twenty-two, I believe. Is

that correct?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes, an average of twenty-two

cases.

MR. OTTENHEIMER: What would it be for the adult

clientele, just the regular social assistance recipient and his or her social

worker? What sort of numbers would we be...

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That would depend, you see,

because any one person might be meeting with - for example, you would have your

first interaction with the financial assistance officer. You might be referred

one time to the social worker; you might be referred to a behaviour modification

specialist; or you might be referred to a child protection worker. It is very

difficult to say, because you might have four particular people dealing with the

one family because of special needs, and that might be it; they might never have

any follow-up needs. They might go off the system.

The other thing that makes it difficult is that

many of our cases are on and off the system sometimes as high as three times a

year, so we have about 50,000 clients in the run of a year, but when you average

them out it works out to about 35,000 cases because many of them are the same.

So it is very difficult to come up with those statistics. It is much easier when

you have a client set of needs and a client to find out what the ratios are. If

you are asking me what the turnover is to a financial assistance officer, in

some communities they have all of the referrals done because everybody who is

going to be on social assistance is on social assistance.

If you look at some place like Davis Inlet, you

would expect all of them to be on social assistance. Very few of them are on

social assistance. However, they do have a high child protection caseload; one

of the highest. So it is very difficult to outline the exact worker ratio.

CHAIR: Perhaps with the committee's indulgence

we could take a short break for coffee downstairs in the common room, the

government caucus room.

WITNESS: That is fine with me.

CHAIR: Okay, so we will take a break for about

fifteen minutes, and when you return the Vice-Chair will be in the chair. I have

to be elsewhere. I apologize for that, but sometimes constituency matters do

take precedence.

Thank you very much.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you.

Recess

CHAIR (J.Ottenheimer): Order, please!

Thank you everyone for returning.

In the absence of the Chairman, I have been asked, as

Vice-Chair, to continue until the conclusion of our committee meeting this

morning. We will continue with any further questions by committee members.

Ms Hodder, I do not know if you have any questions of

the minister or any of her officials?

MS M. HODDER: I think I took advantage of the

break to have my questions answered, but there is just one. I was just

wondering: On the environmental support service for persons with developmental

disabilities, I guess there has to come a point in time when these people can

function independently, when they have gone through those programs for such a

length of time. What has been the success rate?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Okay. That is a really good

question because we are, right now, in the process. We had commissioned a report

to be done, I guess it was last summer, called the Gosse Gilroy Report and it

looked at all of these disabled programs and services that we offer in the

Province. It was an outside group, and they actually assessed the outcome of a

number of those programs and services. Right now, we have a committee of all

those stakeholders working with our department as the chief service provider, to

identify the ones that are successful and those that are not successful.

For example, there is a growing trend towards whether

we should be running sheltered workshops, as they are called - for example, the

Vera Perlin Centre - and some families have mixed feelings. Some people feel:

Look, it is a place for my son or daughter to go every day, it is a place where

they can socialize, it is a place where they can often do, you know, repetitive

types of functions; and for some people that is helpful. There is another school

of thought that says: You know, we should not be putting people in these types

of environments, we should be training them or assisting them to become

gainfully employed, but that is not necessarily always a realistic goal for some

of the people affected.

We are right in the process now of working with the

groups. We have the task force in place and we are trying to, I guess, identify

some of the growing needs that we have. We have a lot of these people who are

getting older and have a different set of requirements than they had before. We

still have most of the children living at home with their parents but we have a

growing number who want to have some sort of a program.

Some of our successes are very clear. I think people

will say that the Vera Perlin Centre has been quite a success. There is another

school of thought, however, that says there should be more integration, instead

of having all these people come together in a place, they should be more

integrated into society.

I guess, over the next six months, we are hoping to

come up with a happy medium, that we will be able to provide some choices for

people. If they want to be integrated into the community, that will be an

option; if they want to have access to some day programs, that will be an

option. That is what we are working towards right now. So we are working with

all the stakeholders in the Province on that one particular issue.

CHAIR: Mr. Reid?

MR. G. REID: It looks like your total Budget has

increased by $10 million. You say that is the result of the combining of

divisions of the other department with yours?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That is a combination of the

Department of Development and Rural Renewal, I guess, releasing the labour

market component. I guess we have access to a lot more money than is currently

in here because of our labour market agreement. We have over $300 million that

we can have access to over the next three to five years. That is what it meant

by moving the services together, but we will have a lot more monies that we will

have access to through that federal-provincial agreement.

CHAIR: Mr. Hodder?

MR. H. HODDER: Oh, I have (inaudible) of

questions.

I wanted to talk about the imbalance that occurs

sometimes between the supports that we give to natural families as opposed to

what we give to foster parents. I will give an example. If we have a case where

a mother who is on social services has to bring a child, say, to the Janeway

from out of town and they are housed at the hostel down there, they are given

very low - the last time I checked it was seven dollars a day for food, which is

very, very minimal. I don't know how anybody can ever live on seven dollars a

day.

However, when we have a foster mother who has to bring

her children to St. John's, they sometimes are housed in hotels or other

accommodations. Then you have a mother who would say: How can I be expected to

be able to welcome this child back to my family when this child is getting much

more support in the foster parent arrangement where they have access to

everything that is better? In terms of trying to integrate children back with

their natural parents, it has to be the approach and the philosophy. That is the

direction we should be all trying to head in, is reintegration. How can we

justify this great divergence in support?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think it is very difficult to

justify it, quite frankly. That is one of the reasons why we are trying, over

the next year or so when we look at our child welfare changes that are coming

forward, to focus more on early intervention and prevention that will try to

change that. I look forward to your support when we announce those types of

initiatives, where we will in fact be offering to shift how we provide those

supports.

I mean, it is very clear that a child can go to a

foster home and get new jeans and a new jean jacket and new shoes, and they come

home and they realize they don't have that access, and it is better in a foster

home than it is at home. I think that is a very severe message to be sending to

natural families that are trying to do the best they can. I think a lot of the

children in the system are very aware of it and become quite aware of it very

early, how the system works.

Our plan is that we will be moving more towards

providing more supports to natural families. We are hoping to take advantage of

the national child benefit, to have those monies to do those types of programs,

to help people work through their problems rather than take children from their

homes.

We felt that with programs such as the early

intervention programs - we have some of them now in the department that we have

had a freeze on for a number of years. Just recently with the Budget

announcement we have been able to, I think, meet all the demands for the people

on the waiting lists for some of these services that are preventative services,

particularly for children who we are seeing more and more of with ADDH. They are

requiring more and more counselling and support services which we haven't been

able to provide; not just those on social services, either, but many low income

families are also suffering. As we know, low income families are just as

susceptible to problems with respect to child rearing as social assistance

families. It is a very fine line there as well.

I agree, it is very difficult when a foster family has

access to clothing, a clothing allowance, an entertainment allowance, and a

travel allowance, and that natural families don't have that. I think we have to

shift our priorities and look at how we are providing supports. That is

certainly one of the things that we will be looking at as we look at revamping

our whole child welfare legislation and implementing some of the programs of the

national child benefit.

MR. H. HODDER: Just to follow up to that: Are you

suggesting that within the next year or so we may see some redirection of that

particular issue? Because this is a very significant issue, it runs counter to

the philosophy we all share. If we identify the problem, we know that it isn't

the fault of the foster parents. I mean, they take the children in. It is hard

enough to get foster parents any time, and you know -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: For a particular age group.

MR. H. HODDER: For a particular age group. Younger

children are much easier than teenagers, and that has its own problems as you

know. In terms of trying to, for example, say to a mother whose child is at the

Janeway - I just had an experience a few days ago of a baby that the mother had

to bring in there. Of course, she wished to stay in the hospital because she is

breast-feeding. She is on social assistance and, of course, was essentially told

that her daily allowance is $7, which is ludicrous. This is something that you

might want to look at as an interim measure, particularly as it applies to

mothers and the Janeway itself. It is an issue that I've been aware of, but I've

never addressed directly to you before. It is something we might want to do

something about, it is very important.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: As you know, on a case-by-case

basis, we would have to look at the individual. I mean, if a family is here and

they have other alternative supports, that is something we consider. We have

done lots of things that are above and beyond what the rules are, based on the

individual needs, and quite frankly I wouldn't implement a program now until we

go through the process of trying to identify the programs we want.

We know now that we are very interested in providing

support systems to children, particularly at the earliest age possible, to do

better assessments and more follow up and supports to try to keep children with

their families rather than re-apprehend. Because when you apprehend and

re-apprehend, the goal still remains - and the courts support this - the

reintegration model, whether it is right or wrong. Our view is that if you can

prevent the apprehension and provide the supports, in the long run you are

better off because you don't have that whole withdrawal and reintegration and

all the problems that it brings.

We will want to build the child care initiative that

we announced in the Budget this year. We do want to provide some preventative

programs, build on parenting programs, like with the Brighter Futures. We in our

own minds have some ideas. The Social Policy Committee has given us some ideas.

In terms of having it all outlined yet, we don't, because we are still going to

be consulting with some of the groups to find out what it is they think we

should focus on.

I think we know what we would like to do with it. We

would certainly like to provide more education for foster families. We would try

to strengthen the prenatal program for low income families, as well, similar to

the CLSC model in Quebec, the milk, eggs and orange juice programs that they

have. We have a number of ideas and we would like to do it, but we hope that by

July of next year - that is the latest implementation date for the national

child benefit - we will have programs well up and ready to run when that

transition occurs.

MR. H. HODDER: On another issue dealing with

housing, as you know you just adopted a new policy where if people are being

paid out of social assistance dollars, or anything from family members, the

maximum that you will pay is $100, I think it is, something like that, for rent.

In the case where somebody is renting the basement or whatever, and it could be

the mother; Are these being assessed on an individual basis?

Let me draw you a scenario. You can have a situation

where a mother has raised her children in a home, and then, when that home is

sold by Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, a son who was living out of town

decides that this was his mother's home and he buys that home; not for her, but

essentially he rents it to her. Social assistance continues to pay the rent at

$433 a month, whatever it is. She is now told that after raising your five

children in this home, which was for years owned by Newfoundland and Labrador

Housing, that now she is going to be able to only pay $100 a month. She is told

as well that if she would swap houses with the lady across the street, who is in

a similar circumstance, we can move them all of 130 feet and then they qualify.

In other words, you just simply say: You move over here, because another lady

across the street is in the same situation. Is there any room here for

individual circumstances like that?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: When we went through Program

Review and had identified some money-saving initiatives which we had to do in

our department, that was one of the ones that was brought forward. We felt that

a lot of families are collecting from us the full market value of rentals which

we are paying. There is no doubt about it, in many cases in many of the rural

areas of the Province we are setting the market value rates. In places like

Botwood we have paid as high as $700 a month for rent. We are setting the bench

mark. I think that was one of the initiatives that was brought forward to us and

we tried to look at a fair approach.

We believe a lot of families will allow this

transition to happen, because they are there anyway and they aren't going to ask

their families to leave. It isn't our intention - and it has come to my

attention that people will move across the street - to do that, because then you

would be paying the rental across the street instead of paying it there. We will

be looking at it and seeing how it is working out.

The intention was to lower those kinds of rates so

that we would be paying a fairer rate and, I guess, an initiative as well to ask

families to assist. Because if my mother is living with me, to think that the

government is going to pay me because she happens to be living in my basement -

after the relationship that most people have with their mothers or fathers, to

me, it is a bit of an unreal situation.

You talk about the European model that you put up as a

goal, this is the European model, that people take care of their families and

provide the support without government intervention. That was one of the

initiatives that we put forward; and yes, we will have to look at it. The reason

we put it forward was to avoid things like cutting back on child welfare monies

and staffing monies, which is what we have been able to do, and to look at some

of these initiatives without causing undue stress and harm.

MR. H. HODDER: In the actual example that I put,

and it is a St. John's example, this mother raised five children, none of whom

live in St. John's and none of whom live on that street. Therefore, the lady who

is involved has extremely high levels of anxiety and does not know what is going

to happen to her. She is in her sixties and raised a very successful family but,

like most families today, they are scattered all across the country, and she now

finds herself under great stress. Certainly the intention is not that she could

just move across the street with her friend and they could swap houses. What

would that achieve? It achieves nothing, but technically it would meet the

requirements of the direction that she was given from her front-line worker. I

am not saying that the front-line worker said: Do this. I am saying that when

she asked the question, if she would meet the criteria by moving across the

street, she was told she would.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, I can see Dave has been

taking copious notes as you have been talking, and if you want to actually tell

him, we can look into it specifically; we would be happy to do that.

MR. H. HODDER: I believe David may already be

somewhat familiar with the general circumstances.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: But I am talking about the

specific. It is always easier to deal with the specific case than make a

generalization.

MR. H. HODDER: Yes, and I will share with him the

particulars of it.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: By all means.

Mr. Vice-Chair, if I might: I was wondering if it

would appropriate; I would like to ask a question. Is that an appropriate

opportunity, or would you...

CHAIR: It may be unusual, but I don't think

inappropriate.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Okay, well I think it is an

opportunity just to ask a question.

I would like to ask both you and Harvey, and also my

other colleagues as well, what your views are on a situation, I guess, that has

been brought to our attention over the last number of years. I don't know if

everybody is familiar with it, but in many cases - and it is not isolated to

rural Newfoundland; it is also common in St. John's - you have a family who goes

out and builds a house, or buys a house, gets a mortgage, and for one reason or

another loses their job or whatever and goes on social assistance. We end up, as

a government, paying off the mortgage for these particular families. At the end

of the day they have the deed to their mortgage in their hand and they carry on,

they sell their house and move on or whatever. We have had a couple of instances

in particular. I guess, the way it was brought forward to me was from the next

door neighbour who has been out working and slugging away for twenty years,

still paying on the mortgage, and cannot do all of the same types of repairs and

what-not. I would like your views on what you think of that situation, if you

believe government, as we are all responsible for, has any sort of

responsibility in addressing that type of situation.

MR. H. HODDER: I am familiar with the situation,

and the answer for you is found in your own philosophy, to be consistent with

your approach. In other words, if you are going to claw back income tax returns

from people, if you are going to claw back the child tax benefits that are going

to come in -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We are not clawing them back.

MR. H. HODDER: No, but there was some comment that

has been made relative to the new program.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Not by me. You are talking about

my philosophy. Let's get to the answer here.

MR. H. HODDER: So when you look at the various

ways in which we have said, you have said as a government, that those people who

have extra income - when they are, shall we say, able to get additional income,

whether it is from EI or whatever, as you know, you have to repay if you access

social services. If you have EI benefits that come later on, you have to repay

that under the system. I think before you adopt an approach to it, you have to

say, to be consistent, that when people sold their houses, in other words when

they got into difficulty, they then, shall we say, had to access social services

- if, when they sold their houses they were to make a profit or a capital gain

or something like that, then to be consistent you would have to treat them in

that kind of a way. Because in essence, if you pay off the mortgage and there is

a capital gain which comes as a consequence of that, then I think the taxpayers

of the Province may be owed something.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Okay. John, what do you think?

CHAIR: Well, as Vice-Chair, of course, I am not in

a position to either ask questions or respond to questions.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Oh, come on, it is just an

opinion.

CHAIR: In all seriousness, I share the view of Mr.

Hodder. The state cannot be called upon to contribute to a beneficial interest

of an individual, which essentially means that if, upon the disposition of a

property, a benefit is derived to an individual, clearly it is not the taxpayers

responsibility to contribute to that benefit.

Having said that, I guess there is a requirement of

the state which is really the rationale for social assistance, to assist a

person who is in need, if a person on an interim basis requires interim

assistance because of one's circumstances, to perhaps for a six-month period, a

twelve-month period, an eighteen-month period or whatever the case might be, to

assist that person during that interim because of the difficult times that

person is experiencing. But, at the end of the day, if a profit has been derived

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well if you have your mortgage in

your hands, whether you sell it or not, whether you dispose of it or not, it is

certainly an asset.

CHAIR: Yes, and if a person has received a

benefit, a monetary benefit above and beyond what ordinarily would have been

derived, there may be an obligation to reimburse the state.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well if you are in Newfoundland

and Labrador Housing, you have a place to stay but you do not own the unit at

the end of the time.

Whereas, if you are having your mortgage paid for you, at

the end of the day you get your deed. So, it is a capital asset, that you would

not ordinarily have.

CHAIR: I guess it is a debate you can argue either

way. I mean, a person who receives social assistance because of one's

circumstance - a person may have a full-time job, for example, and temporarily

be out of work, obviously then that person -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think temporary versus

long-term is an issue.

CHAIR: Yes, and that is the debate.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I am talking about somebody

building a house over the course of fifteen or twenty years and then having the

deed in their hand, and the next person is there. I think that is the issue that

was raised with me specifically.

CHAIR: Sure.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Does anybody else want to

comment?

MR. H. HODDER: In the municipalities, Madam

Minister - just a comment - do you find in municipalities that they have a

practice, and it is not necessarily followed by all of them, that when people

who are not able to pay their municipal taxes because of circumstances - and

this was particularly before social services used to pay them automatically -

when there are liabilities to the municipality, the municipality may carry these

for years and years and years as contingent liabilities. Then when the property

is sold, or it is inherited, the municipality will then collect the benefits

that have been given to that property by the municipality. In other words, you

could have, for example, a true case of a person who might be -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That is in an estate though,

isn't it?

MR. H. HODDER: Pardon?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That is usually in the case of an

estate though, isn't it?

MR. H. HODDER: Well, it could be either. It could

be at the point of inheritance, it could be at the point of sale -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Right.

MR. H. HODDER: - and it does not necessarily have

to be part of the estate. I mean, someone might decide to sell the property and

the property taxes may not have been paid for, I have known cases of twenty-five

years. At that point, then the municipality will not give the tax certificate

which is required until the contingent liability has been met. If you go to any

municipal office you will find that these houses have been what we call red

circled, which means that any action on it will cause something to happen. There

are examples out there and I am sure that the people involved would be very

concerned about it, but I think in terms of protecting the interest of the

state, you have to look at the range of options that one might have.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I don't know if anybody else

would like to comment.

MR. H. HODDER: I am sorry for butting in there; I

think Gerry was going to make a comment.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Gerry or Don, I believe.

MR. G. REID: No. I want to get back to what Harvey

talked about earlier, a child buying a parent's house. In that case, after you

paid off the mortgage, there is nothing preventing that person from selling the

house to the child and then renting it back to him again.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We have already heard that on the

media, a few weeks ago. That is exactly the case.

MR. G. REID: That is a bit much.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. WHELAN: Common sense should prevail in all

this, you know. If, for example, the Department of Social Services pays off 10

per cent or 20 per cent or 30 per cent of a house, at the time of a sale, then

it would seem to be the common-sense thing to do, to take back 10, 20 or 30 per

cent, or whatever percentage of the house that you paid, back as repayment. You

know, I found in some cases - and I suppose there are as many cases as there are

people out there almost. I have seen people who have gotten a house through

Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, worked at construction work and may have made

$60,000 one year. Now, that determines the price of your house, or the monthly

payment on your house. The next year they may make $10,000 and they find that

they lose their house; and what happens? A social service recipient walks in

there. There seems to be some sort of an injustice there.

I have talked to people about it before and they say

that they try to work with the people, but I have seen some cases where justice

does not seem to be done. That is the point I am making.

I guess I have made my comment on the question that

you had.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you.

MS M. HODDER: I certainly feel that there should

be a lien on the property to the extent of what social services contributed to

it, to come into effect at the time of change of ownership.

CHAIR: Mr. Hodder, any further questions?

MR. H. HODDER: Yes. On the dental plan: There was

a case there a while ago, and I know that there are some provisions to overcome

this problem - a person, for example, who had been employed and then ended up

being unemployed and on social services, develops certain major dental problems

and the person is at an age where the employment prospects are not all that

good, we are not going to say to them: Yes, if you get your teeth straightened

out, then you will be able to get a job, that kind of thing. When the person,

however, goes to talk to social services, they will pay for extractions and pay

for the dental visit, but the huge cavities might mean that the person should

have further services.

I had a case where the person involved was actually

taking all kinds of medications for gum disease and all the rest of it. The

total cost to the taxpayer was probably five times what it would have cost if we

had been proactive up front in terms of dental care. It is a general case where

we should have gone into the system and looked at the thing in a comprehensive

way; that is one of the areas. Are we getting a little more sensitive to this

particular problem, and are the strategies in place to overcome it?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Of course we are getting more

sensitive to it.

MR. H. HODDER: Yes, well, things are getting worse

too.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We have had some discussions with

Health about it, because it is six of one and half a dozen of the other. I agree

with you, when you start accessing the health care system to access the pain

medications, it becomes really quite ridiculous at some point in time.

MR. H. HODDER: Yes.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: As you know, from our

perspective, what everybody has come to see - the old Department of Social

Services is the catch-all for everything. We have seen that recently in the case

in the media where an elderly gentleman was in trouble with his home. Who do

they come to? Our department; when this person never had any affiliation at all.

We are involved now in a coordinating role. All the various players are

involved. It is like this issue here.

We are working with the Department of Health, and I

think that as we move more towards an early intervention model it makes perfect

sense we do that. There was never even a line item in our department for dental

work until about three years ago when a previous minister put in a set amount of

money for dentures, and it was all used up in one region within six weeks. It is

a big issue, and it is an issue that we are concerned about. I think that if you

are taking on a position and a philosophy of early intervention and prevention

you have to deal with these kinds of issues. We have been working with Health to

try to deal with it, but it isn't always as simple as that.

Does it mean: Are you going to give a billing number

to dentists? Are you going to give a flat rate? Are you going to hire dentists

to work for government? There are all those other sorts of issues that are

involved. That is the sort of thing we are working with right now.

MR. H. HODDER: Certainly we don't want dentists to

feel that a new program might become a new cash cow, you know, they could just

move in there. It bothers me that people who are - I don't know if this is the

right forum to say this or not - in prison get absolutely fabulous dental care.

Across the country, I'm talking about, the federal system in particular. There

is something wrong with that, when we can't extend the same kind of care to -

not that we shouldn't do it for people in prison, but we don't extend it in the

same kind of way to ordinary people who are law abiding. Sometimes it is just to

make their lives bearable. I've had discussions with the dental association on

this as well, and, of course, they would fully support a new program.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Of course they do.

MR. H. HODDER: Why wouldn't they?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Exactly. But the issue is, if you

put that in place, unless we have new money we have to take it from somewhere

else. The issue is that we have as many requests for dentures as we have for

fillings and that kind of thing. Frankly, I would sooner go with the prevention

and go with the fillings. We have even had meetings with denturists who say: I

can give a full set of teeth for half the price that such-and-such is giving a

top plate for. So they are the kinds of discussions we are trying to have too.

There is a very realistic component to it, and that is the financial end.

MR. H. HODDER: One other question - I can go on

for a long time yet. Talking about children of poorer families and their access

to post-secondary education, you know, given the fact that more children in poor

families don't complete high school, they drop out for various reasons, given

the cost of tuition and travel and affordable housing, all of the reductions in

grants and bursaries and scholarships, difficulty in obtaining loans and

everything else, from your employment ministry, are we going to be able to do

anything to really make the concept of universal access to post-secondary

education more equitable for poor children?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think that is a question you

could very easily ask of the Minister of Education as well, if you happen to be

on that Estimates Committee.

From our perspective, we believe with the new labour

market development agreement and with the SWASP we have just implemented,

anybody who has had access to the job market within the last two years, and

maternity leave within the last five years, can have access to the programs and

services that are offered under the labour market development agreement. There

are a lot of skills and training options there. We have come out publicly and

said to employers that if you have skills and services that you want us to

offer, we will do that in an effort to meet your needs. That is one issue.

With the SWASP program that we are offering, I think

that is a very solid foundation and a good initiative that has been evaluated.

It is one of those initiatives that are very rare, where you actually have an

analysis and an evaluation guide so that it is an effective program. That is why

we have offered such a large program this year. One is a tuition voucher

component and the other is a for pay component, and we have about $4.5 million

that we will be offering. In addition, we are doing a special pilot project with

Memorial University to help them, for them to help us work with the students to

offset some of their special needs that they would have while going through

post-secondary education. That should be finalized within the next few days, but

we are hoping that it will be ready to go for September.

Then we also have - not from my department but I think

it would be an initiative you could ask Minister Grimes about - the skills,

loans and grants components of the labour market development agreement that they

are offering under their part of that department; so there are a number of

initiatives under way.

MR. H. HODDER: One of the fears I have, of course,

is that as young people in the school system look out across the horizons of

their future they realize the prospects for employment for those people who have

gone through post-secondary education. Then, of course, their inability to be

able to access it, shall we say, to have the money to go through post-secondary,

becomes a further disincentive for them to want to get ahead with their lives.

Yet we know that if they don't then we may simply be perpetuating the cycle of

poverty that we all want to break. We want to give people some kind of an equal

opportunity.

I have a couple of other things here. Your computer

program: You have been working with this now for a couple of years and I expect,

with the information technology and all of that, you spent a fortune of the

taxpayers' dollars in the last few years bringing that in. What is the status of

it, how integrated is it, and can we now have the assurance that everything in

the Department of Social Services, from Nain to Trepassey, is now on a fully

integrated delivery system?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, as you know, we did not

bring in a system. That is why that money was withdrawn. I think you are asking

a question based on the Auditor General's comments, perhaps, and that was raised

last year.

MR. H. HODDER: No, no.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That whole initiative was

withdrawn and what we have moved forward with is a new integrated approach to

how we are delivering services, integrated on a number of levels. We are in the

process of an integrated system with the Department of Health, as we announced a

few months ago, and that is where our emphasis is because again it works very

closely with the realignments of our two departments and it also has the ability

to track the use of services throughout the system.

In addition to that, we are working with the federal

government in a number of interfaces, as you know. We are also now working with

HRD; they have a lot of technology that we will be using to assist people with

jobs training and the skills component of it, because they already have systems

set up. Of course, in addition to that, the money that we have spent we have

used for putting equipment and training throughout all the system.

We certainly have a need to improve our system,

particularly as it relates to the issuing of social assistance cheques; and now

as we move to a more regional approach I am sure that will require some more

changes in the system. We are focusing more on software and developing the

software that will meet our needs over and above sort of getting into a massive

project. Our intentions are to partner, as I have said, with HRD, with the

Department of Health in particular, and also with the federal government in any

other way we can.

MR. H. HODDER: When you are speaking with your

federal counterpart maybe you could, at some point, ask him or her, the federal

person anyway: Why does it take so long from the time, for example, that the

group in Corner Brook dealing with income support - it can take up to six months

for the computer program that they are using to be fairly integrated with, let

us say, the employee. Let me draw an example: Let us say that you have a court

order issued in St. John's, let us say the person in this case works with - I

will use a federal department - the Coast Guard which is a federal agency, and

there are some adjustments. Of course, the spouse in most cases is the female.

The income support people in Corner Brook are trying to get the money to be

brought in on a regular basis. There are some glitches that occur to it and I am

told that it can take up to six months for this system to adjust. There is

something wrong. I checked this, in this case with the federal agency here,

touching with Corner Brook, and they say before they can put this re-adjustment

into the federal system it can take up to six months. That does not seem

sensible.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, a lot of that was because

we had no agreements with them to share information, and now we have just gone

through a number of processes where we have gotten agreements and contracts

where we are able to share information. A lot of it was based on confidentiality

and no federal-provincial agreements, and we have gotten a number of those. We

have not gotten all of them, we certainly have not gotten some of the more

intricate, income tax for example, but we do have federal-provincial agreements

on CPP, on EI, TAGS and our own social assistance. So, you know, there are

agreements and things are happening quicker.

With respect to answering on their behalf, it is not

for me to do that, right?

MR. H. HODDER: I guess, my asking you is to ask

you, when you are dealing with your federal counterparts to try to address the

issue.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: But logistically there is an

agreement.

MR. H. HODDER: Because this is not the provincial

bureaucracy which is causing the trouble here, this is the federal bureaucracy,

and it is not acceptable to take six months to do a simple adjustment.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think, if you have read, that

the federal government has come across with some initiatives on child

enforcement and federal protection and that kind of thing, and many of the

provinces will be trying to work closely to shadow their same legislation, to

minimize the levels and the glitches in the system. I think there is more of a

sense that we work closer together. It is like us: Why would we want to

redevelop new systems of inputting, if we are working with HRD and they have it

all? I mean, it makes sense. Why re-invent the wheel in the name of turfism?

MR. H. HODDER: Sixteen to eighteen-year olds -

obviously, we are expected to ask that question again - and the new Child

Welfare Act: When are we going to see initiatives on these particular issues?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, I think they are both

related. The sixteen to eighteen-year olds, and other initiatives related to the

Select Committee that have not been addressed by now, will be addressed when we

put forward the new child welfare legislation. Our plans have not changed. We

are hoping that we will have that ready for the fall and bring it forward. There

is major revision because it is over twenty-five years old. We have done a lot

of consultations. We have gone across the country, we have consulted across the

Province, we have consulted with our groups and we are still consulting, but

that is the plan, that we will be putting forward the legislation in the fall.

MR. H. HODDER: I see people looking at me. It is

two minutes to twelve.

The number of social workers who interact with

children: Last year you were giving commitments that you were going to address

that and try to minimise it in a couple of cases. One of the difficulties is the

occasion where bumping occurs. In child protection we tend to have a fairly high

turnover, and very often, not always, it is the entry system into the social

work department.

How are we doing now in terms of minimizing the number

of social workers, trying to work with the groups, agencies, unions and whatever

to try and reduce the impact that of bumping, when that occurs, so we don't have

multiple changes? In once case we know of, a child was exposed to four social

workers in a six-month period; that kind of thing.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I think there are a number of

issues around that question. One is that the government has not engaged in any

active negotiations with any group, with the exception of the NLTA as it relates

to its pension plan, which was done separately from its collective agreement;

and we all know about that. There are no other negotiations that are ongoing

right now. I think notice has been sent out and I'm sure they will be starting

soon.

This is a collective bargaining issue. It is one that

we are very concerned about as well because of the continuity in delivering

services, particularly to children. It is a collective agreement issue. I think

that having the right to bump, for many employees is paramount. I would ask you,

as well, to call on the unions to ask them to exclude front-line social workers,

if that is what you believe they want based on your conversation with the social

workers. My understanding as to what the social workers want is to have the same

rights and benefits as every other employee.

As an employer we are very concerned because it is an

issue with respect to children, in this particular case. We don't say: You leave

and go over there. It is part of the bumping system. There is a turnover, and it

is a very stressful job. I think with any type of front-line work, particularly

in this case with respect to your question, child protection work, there is a

turnover. There always has been a turnover because it is a very stressful job.

You ask any lawyer who is practising family law and they will tell you that it

is a very stressful job. There aren't too many lawyers who will stay in the

whole area of family law because it is so stressful.

You talk to social workers and they say they love

child protection, but often times they will leave it for a while and then come

back. Then there are the normal situations around any type of collective

agreement. You have maternity leave, people leaving, people going back to

education, taking educational leave. The question is: Do you say that you are

excluded from bumping in this system? Do you say that you must stay here for two

years, or you must maintain a caseload? It is a very difficult one to call.

MR. H. HODDER: Mr. Vice-Chair, I have all kinds of

yellow marks here, page after page after page, to ask questions.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We are able and ready if you want

to ask them. Go for it.

MR. H. HODDER: I have notes galore. The choice,

however, is that it being noon I can either review these later on with the

minister or we can reconvene. I'm sure the minister would say: Do that again. I

will answer any questions later on.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No. I would be happy to

reconvene, or I would be even more happy right now, if you want to go through

and ask them. I would be happy to do it. Whatever is your choice?

MR. H. HODDER: I just have a few questions

relevant to the actual document itself.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Sure, go for it.

MR. H. HODDER: I mean, these are the Estimates.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes, by all means.

MR. H. HODDER: If I could just quickly run through

page after page. We can start on page -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: I was wondering when you were

going to get to the questions on the budget.

MR. H. HODDER: Page 213. I came prepared. Under

Executive Support you have an increase from $392,400 in your revised budget to

$458,800. I was wondering: Is this purely the reflection in Executive Support

because of the change in the Ministry, or have you added additional persons to

your staff over there?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Last year, when we re-organized

our department, we re-organized from three ADMs to two ADMs. Now, with the

labour market re-organization, we have an ADM position there. So that accounts

for the change.

MR. H. HODDER: Okay, if you want to go to the next

page, Administrative Support, we see that the salaries there again have gone

from $2,064,000 to $2,342,000, for about $275,000 or $280,000 in variance there.

What has caused that to happen?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We have had a computer support

specialist transferred from client services; we have had a computer analyst

programmer from the Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs; and we have

had some new initiative funding. We have been able to hire two accounts

receivable collections staff, as was outlined as one of our needs from the

Auditor General; we are very weak in collecting accounts receivable.

We have also, because of the impact of bumping and the

redundancy, had to do upscale hiring; you know, the red circling associated with

redundancy. So that accounts for those changes.

MR. H. HODDER: In that same listing there,

Property, Furnishings and Equipment went from $8,000 up to $55,000; $47,000

dollars in a time of restraint. What rationale do you have for that?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, you have to remember that

covers the whole - we have fifty offices.

MR. H. HODDER: Okay.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: And we have the need for fax

machines; we have the need for all kinds of, you know -

MR. H. HODDER: Why would it be only $8,000 last

year and then make a six times - seven times really - jump this year.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: One of the main reasons is

because we have had to purchase a software program for labour market development

at a cost of $22,000. So that accounts for a significant portion of that right

there.

MR. H. HODDER: Okay.

In Information Technology there, I notice that one has

gone down by about $130,000. Is that because you bought the equipment last year

and don't have to buy it this year?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No, because of the shared

co-ordination with health.

MR. H. HODDER: The shared co-ordination with

health.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: The initiatives that we are doing

with health with respect to their information system.

MR. H. HODDER: In Professional Services, in the

same category, number 05, you went up by about $30,000. What kind of

professional services are we talking about here? Why would there be an increase?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: That is the Social Services

Appeal Board, the increased demand and the increase in -

MR. H. HODDER: Increased demand and the caseload.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. H. HODDER: And so on and so forth.

In the next category, Program Development and

Planning, again Professional Services have gone from $49,200 to $179,200. What

is the rationale for that one?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, we have had a couple of

initiatives on the go with respect to program review. We also will be engaging

in the evaluation of the co-location project in Gander, the federal/provincial

co-location of EO and income support; so, that accounts for that.

MR. H. HODDER: So really you are looking here at

about an extra $130,000 for -

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes, for the evaluation and also

social and strategic planning that we had used for the program review

initiatives.

MR. H. HODDER: In that same category, in Salaries,

last year, if you look at the budget and the revised budget, there is a

difference there of about $225,000, from $2.7 million to $2.9 million. That was

last year, and this year you are back again to $2.6 million. Why did we bump it

up - what is that, about $225,000? Then we dropped it down again. Why the

up-and-down movement there in salaries?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Is that a transfer to the federal

government?

MR. STRONG: There were some staff hired with

labour market services, and under the new agreement they have been transferred

to the federal government.

MR. H. HODDER: They had a short stay in your

department?

MR. STRONG: Yes.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Moving on up.

CHAIR: Mr. Hodder, before you continue, I am going

to make a suggestion. I know there are a number of people who have different

commitments. I could propose one of two things: We could perhaps reconvene if

you feel that is necessary or, if you feel we could clue this up in the next few

minutes; whatever your preference is.

MR. H. HODDER: Let's set a time limit. I have

seven-and-a-half minutes after twelve, we will close at 12:15 p.m.?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Whatever, it is your call.

MR. H. HODDER: Is that agreeable?

CHAIR: As I said, I know there are a number of

people here who have other commitments and this was scheduled to go from nine to

twelve. We can go to 12:15 p.m. - I will leave it to the committee - or we can

reconvene at some other date with Elizabeth's help.

MR. H. HODDER: Finish it now.

CHAIR: Finish it now?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Yes.

CHAIR: Okay. Go ahead, Mr. Hodder.

MR. H. HODDER: Thank you very much.

I have all kinds of notes here. Over to page 217, I

guess, in the Support To Family-Related Organizations, appropriations for the

payment of grants to various community-based organizations and various

counselling diversion services to designated groups, I noticed that you were at

$148,400, you went up to $161,300 and now you are back to $132,400. What grants

did you pay last year that we are not paying this year, and who are the people

who will be crossed from the list you might say?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, what we did, in an effort

to again try to re-align our department and sort of make obvious connections

between some community groups and other departments, we re-aligned and

transferred to Education, a number of initiatives for which we were paying

grants and subsidies from our department. For example: Big Brothers and Big

Sisters has gone to Education; the Boys and Girls Club; the school lunch

programs in St. John's; and Newfoundland and Labrador School Lunch Foundation.

So that would account for about $275,000 transferred over.

In addition to that, we had one agency that no longer

receives any funding from us and that was, you know, something that was worked

out with that particular organization over a number of years.

MR. H. HODDER: Okay. Page 219, The Right Future:

We notice that Transportation and Communications have been reduced by nearly

$8,000. Have there been significant changes in the formula that you are using or

are you simply not providing as much as you were?

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Well, as you know, we are at the

point of closing the whole initiative. The pilot project will end this year, so

many of the needs for transportation of staff and communication is no longer

required because, as of June this year, we are hoping to have the project

completed as it currently exists. So that is part of the wind-up process that we

have put in place and negotiated with the federal government, and that is why

you are seeing those types of decreases in that allocation.

MR. H. HODDER: Then we will go down to

Pre-Vocational Training Centre, under Allowances and Assistance: Last year you

budgeted $34,000 and revised it to $9,000, and now you have it up to $34,000

again. What is happening? The commitment was there last year and was not spent,

but you put it back in there again. This is on page 219, Allowances and

Assistance.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Just let me find that note there

for a second. Don is going to answer that one for us.

MR. GALLANT: Just to give you a bit of a backdrop

to the pre-vocational centre: As our minister indicated earlier, the Gosse

Gilroy Report has been recently tabled, if that is the right word, and we are

going to spend the next six to eight months redesigning and re-discussing the

whole provision of daytime activities, vocational, pre-vocational services to

persons, adults with disabilities. The pre-vocational training centre will be a

significant part of that whole debate and discussion.

So what we have done here, really, is re-profile for

1997-'98 our original budget for 1996-'97 to give us some ability to make

changes, introduce changes, as the discussions occur.

Specific to Allowances and Assistance, the $34,000

originally profiled was for allowances for young adults who would be engaged in

work-term activities. What happened in 1996-'97 is that many of those

individuals actually left the pre-vocational centre so we did not spend as much

money in that category as we would have originally, and we are anticipating in

1997-'98 that we will re-establish that, more people will go to work and we will

be able to provide wage subsidies, training allowances, those kinds of things.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Don.

MR. H. HODDER: I think, Mr. Chair, I can be

content now, and I will ask that you call the heads. I could stay here for

another hour, but (inaudible).

On motion, subheads 1.1.01 through 6.1.07 inclusive

carried.

On motion, Department of Human Resources and

Employment, total heads, carried.

CHAIR: I would like, on behalf of our Committee,

to thank Madam Minister and her officials for participating in a lengthy

Estimates Committee hearing this morning, and to each of you for making

yourselves available in answering the questions and inquiries that have been

made of you. On behalf of the Committee, thanks to each and every one of you.

Our Committee meeting is adjourned.

The Committee now stands adjourned.

Document details

Collection	Newfoundland and Labrador — Committees
Citation	1997-04-29
Type	committee
Volume / chapter	committees_standingcommittees_socialservices_ga43session2_1997-04-29_ssc-hre_.htm
Language	en
Format	html
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	6eff4fc7def3f19546b65d52b6ad0767217a8cad

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