TV Show about Parental Alienation
W5 investigates: Children on the frontlines of divorce
The world of divorce is scary for any child. But when a divorce becomes especially toxic, children can become the target of an unrelenting crusade by one parent to destroy the child's relationship with the other. Experts call it parental alienation. more..
Parental Alienation: A Mental Diagnosis?
Some experts say the extreme hatred some kids feel toward a parent in a divorce is a mental illness
U.S. News & World Report
October 29, 2009
From an early age, Anne was taught by her mother to fear her father. Behind his back, her mom warned that he was unpredictable and dangerous; any time he'd invite her to do anything—a walk in the woods, a trip to the art store—she would craft an excuse not to go. "I was under the impression that he was crazy, that at any moment he could just pop and do something violent to hurt me," says Anne, who prefers that only her middle name be used to guard her family's privacy. Typical of a phenomenon some mental-health experts now label "parental alienation," her view of him became so negative, she says, that her mother persuaded her to lie during a custody hearing when the couple divorced. Then 14, she told the judge that her dad was physically abusive. Was he? "No," she says. "But I was convinced that he would [be]." After her mother won custody, Anne all but severed contact with her father for years.
If a growing faction of the mental-health community has its way, Anne's experience will one day soon be an actual diagnosis. The concept of parental alienation, which is highly controversial, is being described as one in which children strongly attach to one parent and reject the other in the false belief that he or she is bad or dangerous. "It's heartbreaking," says William Bernet, a child and adolescent psychiatrist and professor at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, "to have your 10-year-old suddenly, in a matter of weeks, go from loving you and hiking with you...to saying you're a horrible, ugly person." These aren't kids who simply prefer one parent over the other, he says. That's normal. These kids doggedly resist contact with a parent, sometimes permanently, out of an irrational hate or fear. More..
Affair led to mother murdering her own kids
Days after buying another woman Valentine's Day flowers, a Sydney father came home to find a trail of blood leading him to the bodies of his two young children lying next to their mother, a court has been told.
Australian Associated Press
Aug 24 2009
The woman had given the couple's three-year-old daughter and four-year-old son rat poison and an unidentified pink liquid before smothering them and killing them, court papers said.
She then tried to take her own life, the NSW Supreme Court was told.
Doctors agree the mother, from Canley Heights in Sydney's west, was suffering from "major depression" when she poisoned her children on February 19 last year.
She has pleaded not guilty to the two murders by reason of mental illness.
As her judge-alone trial began, the mother's lawyer told Justice Clifton Hoeben his client didn't think life was worth living after learning about her husband's affair. More..
15 Year Old Girl has Sex with 12 year old boy
Baby-faced boy Alfie Patten is father at 13
The Sun, UK
13 Feb 2009
Baby-faced Alfie, who is 13 but looks more like eight, became a father four days ago when his girlfriend Chantelle Steadman gave birth to 7lb 3oz Maisie Roxanne.
He told how he, at 12 years old, and Chantelle, 15, decided against an abortion after discovering she was pregnant. More..
Paternity Fraud
Spain Supreme Court
Adulterous woman ordered to pay husband £177,000 in 'moral damages'
The Daily Mail, UK
18th February 2009
An adulterous Spanish woman who conceived three children with her lover has been ordered to pay £177,000 in 'moral damages' to her husband.
The cuckolded man had believed that the three children were his until a DNA test eventually proved they were fathered by another man.
The husband, who along with the other man cannot be named for legal reasons to protect the children's identities, suspected his second wife may have been unfaithful in 2001. More..
3 in 4 B.C. boys on street sexually exploited by women
VANCOUVER - Canada's largest study into the sexual exploitation of street kids and runaways has shattered some myths about who the abusers might be - with the most surprising finding being that many are women seeking sex with young males.
"Some youth in each gender were exploited by women with more than three out of four (79 per cent) sexually exploited males reporting exchanging sex for money or goods with a female," said Elizabeth Saewyc, associate professor of nursing at the University of British Columbia and principal investigator for the study conducted by Vancouver's McCreary Centre Society.
"I must admit it wasn't something we were expecting." More..
The Men's Project
"Men
of Courage"
1st Ontario Provincial Conference on Male Sexual Victimizations.
It was held March 17-18, 2008
Sheraton Centre Hotel
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
The Men's Project, an Ottawa / Cornwall registered charitable service provider with the assistance of a grant from the Ministry of the Attorney General, hosted this conference.
About The Men's Project
From what was initially a volunteer run initiative, The Men's Project has
grown to become one of Canada's leading counselling and educational agencies
for men and their families, and in particular for all male survivors of
sexual abuse committed by males and females.
The Men's Project has witnessed incredible expansion of their funded services, their fee-for-service programs, and their training and consultation services.
Their mandate is "helping men and their families build better lives". More ..
Probation for mother who power-washed child
Associated Press, U.S.A.
September 23, 2008
ORLANDO, Fla. U.S.A. –A mother who was videotaped spraying her young daughter with a high-pressure water hose at an Orlando car wash has pleaded no contest to assault.
A judge sentenced Niurka (Nicki) Ramirez to one year supervised probation on Monday.
Prosecutors had dropped the more serious charges – felony child abuse and culpable negligence – from the February incident. More..
Parenting style can change child behaviour
CTV.ca News Staff
February 21, 2005
Parents who are more punitive tend to have aggressive children. But a new survey suggests that when parenting practices change, a child's behaviour also changes.
The results of the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY) suggests children show higher levels of aggression, are more anxious and less altruistic when parents have a more punitive parenting style. More..
Committee to Repeal Section 43 of the Criminal Code of Canada
The Repeal 43 Committee is a national, voluntary committee of lawyers, paediatricians, social workers and educators formed in 1994 to advocate repeal of section 43 of the Criminal Code of Canada.
It is an offence under our Criminal Code to use force against anyone without their consent. This right to personal security is the most fundamental of all human rights. It is a protection against assault that all adults take for granted.
Children do not have the full benefit of this protection because section 43 of the Criminal Code justifies hitting children for disciplinary or "correction" reasons. This violates a child's right to the equal protection and benefit of the law guaranteed by our Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
It contravenes the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the
Child. It violates a child's dignity and shows a lack of respect. It
can lead to serious physical and emotional harm.
www.Repeal43.org
Signed, Sealed But Not Delivered
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child popular, but hard to enforce
Embassy, By Sarah McGregor, April 13th, 2005
The construction of a legal framework required to fully satisfy obligations under a United Nations convention to protect children will be an ongoing process in Canada, Justice Minister Irwin Cotler told the Senate Human Rights Committee on Monday.
Mr. Cotler said that each new law or regulation passed by Parliament will continue to obey the rules of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, as with all international norms. However, he stopped short of endorsing complete compliance with each one of the Convention's elements, some of which have provoked controversy since its UN approval over 15 years ago. More ..
Canadian appointed U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights
Louise Arbour took up her duties on July 1, 2004 as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Her term in office ended in June 2008.
Mrs. Arbour was a member of the Supreme Court of Canada immediately preceding her appointment to the UN as Commissioner for Human Rights.
Louise Arbour: a colleague we have failed
Law Times, Canada
22 September 2008
This profession — and all of us in it — have failed to protect, honour, and defend one of our most accomplished and distinguished members. We have let Louise Arbour down by our silence when she needed and deserved voices of support.
On July 1, Arbour stepped down as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, an enormously prestigious and important international position.
The gratitude and praise which greeted her at the end of her term was shamefully muted. Arbour was a courageous champion of human rights, and a bold critic of the erosion of those basic tenets in our world.
She was never timid. She was never chained to a desk, was involved, hands on, outspoken, and challenging. She breathed life into the enormous portfolio that she was asked to take on. More..
Child poverty activists tell PM to put words into actions
June R. Callwood, CC, O.Ont (June 2, 1924 – April 14, 2007) a great Canadian journalist, author and social activist.
Canada's most visited website supporting Canadian children's rights and responsibilities.
The Canadian Children's Rights Council, is a non-profit, non-governmental educational and advocacy organization concerned with Canadian children's human rights and responsibilities.
Since 2003 over 14,370,000 unique Internet visitors have visited this site to learn about child rights in Canada. Every month we get visitors from over 160 countries.
The two days with the most visitors in 2008 were February 12 with 48,301 visitors and July 13 with 18,110 visitors.
Many thanks to all the volunteers from Goulds, NF to Comox, BC who made our website a success.
Canada's "Child Day" November 20th
a NON-Event
The Child Day Act was passed by the Parliament of Canada in 1993 yet most Canadian's don't know anything about it.
Most public schools don't even have it on their school calendars.... talk about a human rights violation.
Politicians do next to nothing with the public other than exhaust some hot air in provincial/territorial legislative assemblies. Read about Canada's Child Day click here
20th Anniversary of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child - November 20th, 2009
Incredibly, this is the 20th anniversary of the world's most ratified, important human rights treaty and yet the Canadian Children's Rights Council found little was being done by any level of government in Canada to educate the public, hold events or do anything. Read the convention click here
Canadian Government an International Embarrassment in Reporting Child Rights to United Nations
The Government of Canada failed to deliver their 5 year report on the Status of Canadian Children due January 2009 to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the child.
On September 3, 2009, the president of the Canadian Children's Rights Council telephoned the Government of Canada writer of Canada's reports to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child and asked "Where's Canada's report due 8 months ago?". The answer was " we're hoping to get it done" with no committed date.
The single report writer in charge of the project stated that she had just been put onto the project of writing the report in January 2009 and therefore she wasn't personably responsible for the delay in preparing the report. She wouldn't state when the Government of Canada received the reports from each province or territory which form part of the report from The Government of Canada.
Her manager then sent us an email with the typical government run around:
September 3rd, 2009
"Mr. Wilson, I am responding to your request to receive Canada's Third and Fourth Reports on the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was originally due at the United Nations in January 2009. The report will be publicly available once it has been submitted to the United Nations. While we have experienced some delays in completing the report, please be assured that it is one of our priority files and we are working diligently to complete the report and submit it to the United Nations."Liane Venasse
Gestionnaire / Manager
Droits de la personne / Human Rights
Patrimoine canadien /Canadian Heritage
Gouvernement du Canada / Government of Canada
This website has a whole section with hundreds of pages containing all reports from the governments of Canada and non-government organizations supporting child rights in Canada.
United Nations' definition of youth is people from 15 to 24 years of age
United Nations International Youth Day - 12 August, 2009
SUSTAINABILITY: Our Challenge. Our Future.
Sustainability does not only refer to maintaining environmental balance and renewal. Sustainability encapsulates three facets of life: the environment, society and the economy. We live our lives in the overlaps and intersections of these facets, and our actions and attitudes help shape them. Their changing shapes in turn affect the way we are able to live our lives. The negative effects of unsustainable behaviour are not easily contained. As has been proven by the global crises in food, the economy and the environment, the concept of the global village has gone beyond being a useful analogy to being a hard reality, making clear the need to adopt a global sense of social responsibility. More..
7-year-old takes Dad's Honda for a spin
The Globe and Mail, by Les Perreaux, August 3, 2009
If it were not for the seven-year-old boy at the wheel, the video would be an unremarkable vacation shoot of a young family rolling down a forest road on Quebec's North Shore.
Instead of a happy memento of summer, the YouTube clip is now evidence in a provincial police investigation.
It's unknown how the joyride ended, but the video posted on the weekend of young Samuel driving his parents and two siblings at speeds up to 70 kilometres per hour left many Quebeckers cringing yesterday.
As Dad runs the camera, the video posted on Friday shows the boy perched on the edge of the driver's seat of the Honda CRV so he can reach the pedals. More..
YouTube video of seven-year-old driver sparks police inquiry
THE CANADIAN PRESS, August 03, 2009
MONTREAL Parents who let their seven-year-old son drive a car along a bumpy back road in Quebec and filmed it to post on YouTube could be charged if they are caught by provincial police.
Video of the youngster confidently driving a Honda sport utility vehicle surfaced on the popular video-sharing website and has been seen by police.
Letting junior test drive the car may be a rite of passage in many families but police aren't amused.
"Since seeing this video, we've opened an investigation," Sgt. Chantal Mackels said Monday.
"Once the investigation is over with, we'll give it to the Crown prosecutor who will analyze it and decide if he's issuing a criminal offence."
Mackels would not comment on what type of charges could be laid.
Besides the underage, unlicensed driver at the wheel of a swiftly moving car, none of the occupants is wearing a seatbelt.
In the video, the seven-year-old sits on the edge of the driver's seat, looking relaxed but alert as he grips the steering wheel and gets the vehicle up to 70 km/h.
His father sits in the passenger seat with the video camera and gives a running commentary, identifying the boy as Samuel from the North Shore.
Dad cheerfully notes as the speed approaches 40 km/h that "it's a little fast." More..
McAfee software watches kids' Internet use
Computer World Canada, By Jennifer Kavur - June 10, 2009
Ontarios privacy commissioner gave a thumbs up to McAfee on Tuesday as the company unveiled Internet security software for families. Why protecting your kids online is protecting yourself
McAfee Inc. is taking online identity, relationship and privacy protection to the next level by focusing on youth, according Ross Allen, Canadian General Manager for McAfee.
Allen was on site at the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario in Toronto on Tuesday for the unveiling of McAfees new Internet security software for families.
Many threats now come through our children visiting legitimate Internet sites which cyercriminals have hacked into, he said.
The company is also planning to direct more attention to whitelists. We are used to trying to blacklist and keep the bad guys out. We are going to change that and say, Heres the good guys, said Allen.
McAfee Family Protection allows parents to specify time parameters for Internet use, including the amount of time their children spend online as well as what time of day they are allowed to access the Internet.
The single most important factor in determining how at-risk kids are is the amount of time they are online too much time means too much time to get into trouble, said Parry Aftab, family Internet safety advisor to McAfee and chairman of the McAfee Consumer Advisory Board. More..
Success, in contempt
Globe Editorial
The Globe and Mail ( Canada's largest national daily newspaper ), 20 May 2009,
Family courts are not supposed to reward abusive parents, and punish parents who play by the rules. They are not supposed to allow an abusive parent to nullify the responsible parent's role in a child's life. But that is exactly what an Ontario court has done in a case of parental alienation. It has, in effect, disposed of the child's father, perhaps permanently.
Tasnim Elwan has been given permission to take her nine-year-old girl from Canada to Saudi Arabia, where she will have "a seven-bedroom home with two nannies," thanks to Ms. Elwan's wealthy new spouse. The nine-year-old hates her father because he abandoned her - or so she thinks. When he managed, with the RCMP's help, to trace her to Saudi Arabia after her mother in effect kidnapped her, and made his way to that country for 10 days, he was permitted just 15 minutes with her. Some abandonment. And now he is to be allowed one telephone call a month, which the judge doesn't expect Ms. Elwan will allow, anyway.
Ms. Elwan makes no secret of her disgust with her former spouse, Ayman Al-Taher, a chaplain at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. She calls him a mentally disturbed supporter of Hamas and al-Qaeda. If those accusations were true, asked Mr. Justice Leonard Ricchetti, why then did she agree, in a formal, court- approved settlement, to allow him any access to their daughter? And why, he asked, make that settlement if she never intended to comply with its terms? (She was found in contempt of court for taking her child to Saudi Arabia.) More..
Scholarly Paper on Parental Alienation
Parental Alienation - Myths, Realities & Uncertainties: A Canadian Study, 1989-2008
May 12, 2009, by Nicholas Bala, Suzanne Hunt & Carrie McCarney
Faculty of Law, Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada
Alienation cases have been receiving a great deal of public and professional attention in the past few months in Canada. As with so many issues in family law, there are two competing, gendered narratives offered to explain these cases. Mens rights activists claim that mothers alienate children from their fathers as a way of seeking revenge for separation, and argue that judges are gender-biased against fathers in these cases. Feminists tend to dismiss alienation as a fabrication of abusive fathers who are trying to force contact with children who are frightened of them and to control the lives of their abused former partners. While there is some validity to both of these narratives, each also has significant mythical elements. The reality of these cases is often highly complex, with both fathers and mothers bearing significant responsibility for the situation.
Two of the many findings are:
Mothers are twice as likely as fathers to alienate children from the other parent, but this reflects the fact that mothers are more likely to have custody or primary care of their children; in only 2 out of 89 cases was a parent with only access able to alienate a child from the other parent.
Fathers made more than three times as many unsubstantiated claims of parental alienation as mothers, but this too reflects the fact that claims of alienation (substantiated and unsubstantiated) are usually made by access parents, who are usually fathers.
Read the full summary More..
FAMILY LAW
Parental alienation cases draining court resources
Study says such cases should be moved out of court system, handled by individual judges
The Globe and Mail, by KIRK MAKIN, JUSTICE REPORTER, May 13, 2009
An escalation in parental alienation allegations is draining valuable courtroom resources, a major study of 145 alienation cases between 1989-2008 concludes.
"Access problems and alienation cases - especially those which are more severe - take up a disproportionate amount of judicial time and energy," said the study, conducted by Queen's University law professor Nicholas Bala, a respected family law expert.
"One can ask whether the courts should even be trying to deal with these very challenging cases." More..
Montreal father of missing girl found in B.C. still fighting to see her
The Canadian Press, ANDY BLATCHFORD, May 12, 2009
MONTREAL - A Montreal father is still waiting for a "miracle" reunion with his 10-year-old daughter who resurfaced last month in Vancouver, more than two years after she vanished.
Transit police found Ashley Gonis after she ran away from her mother's Vancouver-area home and called 911 from a commuter train station several kilometres away.
It's now been over a month since she turned up, but her father Frank, who has sole custody, said Tuesday he still isn't allowed to speak to her.
Instead, Ashley's mother, who Quebec police allege abducted the child, is preparing to restart the family custody fight on a new battlefield - a British Columbia court.
Gonis, who had packed his daughter's teddy bears, clothes and drawings into boxes because it was too painful to look at them while she was missing, described her reappearance as a "miracle." His jubilation, however, has since eroded.
"(It's like) there's a nightmare, you wake up and then the nightmare comes back - and now here we go, Round 2," he said.
"Parents shouldn't have to go through stuff like this." More..
Parental Alienation Conference This weekend - Canadian Children's Rights Council President Criticizes Government of Ontario for not sending anyone to the conference.
March 26, 2009
The president of the Canadian Children's Rights Council, Grant Wilson, very publicly, criticized the Government of Ontario on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 in his speech to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, Standing Committee on Social Policy.
He complained that the province had not registered anyone from the Government of Ontario ministries to attend the March 27th-29th international conference being held in Toronto, Ontario regarding Parental Alienation in family law disputes.
The conference, the Canadian conference on Parental Alienation, will have speakers from around the world from both the legal and mental heath professions to discuss this important child abuse issue.
On Thursday, Mr. Wilson stated " Parental Alienation is a serious, terrible form of child abuse and with a 40% divorce rate, children need to be protected from parents who alienate them from their other parent. "
Governments fund the enforcement of child financial support but not court ordered parenting time.
"For example, all Ontario parents, no matter what their income, have the Government of Ontario agency, The Family Responsibility Office, to enforce child financial support orders but the government refuses to protect children from this form of child abuse and to enforce parenting time schedules ordered by family law courts. There are few mental health professionals that specialize in this form of child abuse and the government health insurance plan doesn't even cover some of those costs."
In 1998, The Special Joint Committee on Custody and Access, a committee comprised of MPs and Senators held hearings across Canada and heard from over 500 witnesses, an equal number of men and women. Substantial information was provided by mental health professionals regarding Parental Alienation.
The recommendations made by the Special Joint Committee have largely been ignored and children and their parents suffer.
The Canadian Children's Rights Council president, Grant Wilson, interviewed on Canada AM, Canada's most watched morning TV show. March 27, 2009 at 8:10 am
Play The TV Clip click here
Gender bias evident in parental alienation cases
Mothers are more likely to be the parent behind children's estrangement, yet fathers more often ordered into counselling, study finds
The Globe and Mail, Canada's largest national newspaper, by KIRK MAKIN, Justice Reporter, Saturday, March 28, 2009
JUSTICE REPORTER A study of alienated children has found that mothers were significantly more likely to be the parent who emotionally poisoned their children than were fathers.
Toronto family lawyer Gene Colman told a Toronto symposium yesterday that of 74 court rulings that found parental alienation since 1987, the mother was the alienator in 50 cases. The father was the alienating parent in 24.
"I'm not trying to dump on moms," Mr. Colman told about 150 psychologists, family lawyers, mediators and activist parents. "I'm just saying, that is what the data reveal."
In parental alienation syndrome, an estranged parent systematically brainwashes a child into hating the other parent. The profile of the syndrome escalated over the past year, after three Ontario judges ordered that children be removed from an alienating parent and taken to U.S. clinics for deprogramming therapy.
Mr. Colman said that alienating fathers were twice as likely to be ordered to undergo counselling as were mothers in alienation cases - a finding that raises serious questions about whether judges are exhibiting gender biases. More..
Dads who fight win favour in custody cases
FATHERS who want custody of their children will have more success in the Family Court than by trying to strike a deal with their ex-partners.
The Australian, Australia's national daily newspaper, By Michael Pelly, March 24, 2009
In a break with conventional wisdom, fathers are twice as likely to get majority custody of their children if they take their fight to the court.
A Family Court review shows fathers were given majority custody in 17 per cent of litigated cases, but only in 8 per cent of those settled by consent, or early agreement, with the mothers.
The review of the shared parental responsibility reforms of 2006 shows that in 14 per cent of litigated cases, the father received between 30 and 45 per cent of custody. This figure fell to 11 per cent for early agreements.
The review shows that, if fathers are given less than 30 per cent custody, abuse and violence are the main reasons. And about one in 12 court cases end with an order that a child should spend time with their grandparents.
The reforms, passed by the Howard government, introduced a rebuttable presumption of "equal time" parenting and were aimed at promoting co-operation over conflict. More..
Custody judges rule on vengeance
Courts criticized for recognizing parental alienation
National Post, ( Canada's 2nd largest national daily newspaper), by Kathryn Blaze Carlson, Friday, March 27, 2009
Toronto -- The scope of the courts' reach into family affairs has long been contentious, but a recent trend in Canada's legal system has brought a new controversy that has some onlookers praising judges and others condemning them for accepting what they call "voodoo science."
More than ever before, Canada's judges are recognizing that some children of divorced and warring parents are not simply living an unfortunate predicament, but rather are victims of child abuse and suffering from Parental Alienation Syndrome. More..
Judge chastises Norway after woman, daughters flee Canada
The National Post, Saskatoon StarPhoenix, By Lori Coolican, March 26, 2009
SASKATOON A Saskatchewan judge slammed the Norwegian government last month for providing new passports to help a woman flee Canada with two children in the midst of a nasty, transatlantic custody battle.
The Norwegian government played a pivotal role in the breach of orders of this court. (They) could not have left Canada without its assistance, Court of Queens Bench Justice Geoff Dufour remarked in a Feb. 19 written decision obtained recently by the Saskatoon StarPhoenix. More..
Moms club to Surrey dad: we 'hate to discriminate, but...'
Father and son get boot
Surrey Now, Surrey, BC, by Ted Colley, Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Sorry, no dads.
Rick Kaselj and his Cole are looking for a new place to meet other
parents and children. Photo by Brian Howell.
That's the message a Clayton Hills father got when he tried to join the activities of the Cloverdale Mommy & Me Meetup group.
Rick Kaselj is a registered kinesiologist and father of Cole, his infant son. A relative newcomer to Surrey, Kaselj was looking for opportunities to meet people in his neighbourhood when he discovered the group online.
"My wife and I just had our first child. She works days and I work evenings, so I'm a part-time stay-at-home dad. I found this group online two or three months ago and signed up." More..
Owen Sound Sun Times newspaper had news story about local MP Larry Miller writing judge to influence international child abduction case in mid August but didn't publish anything about it. WHY?
The following email was sent to Scott Dunn of the Owen Sound Sun Times newspaper on October 10, 2008 by Grant Wilson, president of the Canadian Children's Rights Council.
Published Friday, October 10th, 2008 at 6pm.
Scott Dunn
Owen Sound Sun Times
290 9th Street East
Owen Sound, ON N4K 5P2
Dear Scott,
I called you a few minutes ago. You didn't wish to comment for
publication on our website. I asked you if you knew the date that the child abductor, Jessica Fleguel, was going back to
court in Owen Sound. You refused to answer. I stated how much
assistance we provided to you with information about the
unfair lobbying of the judge by Larry Miller MP and provided you with a copy of the letter he wrote to the judge. You
previously stated to me that you were unable to find the letter in the court file when you attended at the Owen Sound Court to
examine the court files. You have never published the information that you had about Larry Miller MP writing the
judge until now, immediately before the election although you had the information in our conversations and emails of
August 15-18th. We have received calls from concerned citizens of the Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound electoral district in
the last few days including today. From your reaction to my phone call today, you are apparently going to write about
Larry Miller MP and his correspondence to the judge presiding on this case now nearly 2 months after you had
absolute proof of what he did. Why? You refused comment.
In addition, the Owen Sound Sun Times was emailed on the October 6th, 2008 but made no reply by email or telephone.
The actual letter of Larry Miller MP written to the judge has been on this website with a link from the front webpage on this website since August 18th or shortly thereafter.
Ontario Court of Appeal awards low court costs to mother who abducted child
October 10th, 2008
On Friday, October 3rd, 2008, Jessica Fleguel, a child abductor who now resides in Owen Sound, Ontario, had her second day in court when her appeal was heard by the Court of Appeal for Ontario.
The child abductor lost in the Superior Court of Justice in Owen Sound, Ontario, on May 15th, 20. She has stalled the "expedited" nature of such cases of international child abduction for 10 months. The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction requires Canada to have the police find the abductor and all court proceedings to be completed and the child returned within 6 weeks.
Ms. Fleguel was represented at the Court of Appeal for Ontario by one of Canada's most prominent lawyers, Martha McCarthy and 2 associate lawyers from the law firm of Martha McCarthy & Company. Ms. McCarthy was the Ontario Bar Association's "Family Lawyer of the Year 2007" because she won the Supreme Court of Canada case giving gays and lesbians the right to marry. She also handled the 1st lesbian divorce.
One of the 3 judges that heard the appeal asked for the amount of legal fees charged by Ms. Fleguel's lawyers, all 3 of them, which was stated as $25,000. They considered awarding costs to the father of the same amount because that is what Ms. Fleguel's lawyer's were seeking had they been successful. In the end the judges agreed to only $10,000. She got lucky.
Child abduction is clearly child abuse but the local media don't see it that way. The Owen Sound Sun Times has written about the case as if it were a family law dispute in many ways. Staff Writer Scott Dunn even asked the public to donate to pay the child abductor's legal fees. They provided the banking information for anyone to donate to cover the child abductor's legal fees.
Although it was known to Scott Dunn of the Owen Sound Sun Times that the mother had given birth to another child fathered by the same Australian father, he never wrote the story about this father that had never even seen his own newborn son or held his new baby boy in his arms because the mother took off to Canada before the child was born.
The father reported to the Canadian Children's Rights Council that at no time did the mother consult the father with regards to naming their child and she refused to provide a copy of the "Statement of Live Birth" form used to register a birth. The father rported that the mother wanted to name their children "using Star Wars movie character names or derivatives of same.
The "Baby-Naming" decision of the Supreme Court of Canada requires that both parent's names be used unless the parents both agree otherwise. The father now has to fight that legal battle to even get on the birth registration. Their child is entitled to dual Australian/Canadian citizenship which is, in the opinion of the Canadian Children's Rights Council ,a major advantage throughout a person's life in a growing world economy. It also assists a child to travel freely to visit relatives in both countries.
The father has not spoken to the media other than the Canadian Children's Rights Council accept when he declined comment to Scott Dunn of the Owen Sound Sun Times on October 10th, 2008. The child abductor has been protesting on the streets of small town Owen Sound and in front of the courthouse and has been in the media locally trying to get public sympathy and even ask people to donate to pay for the court costs and her legal bill so far which total $25,000. Why any member of the public would donate to help a child abductor is beyond us. We wonder why Scott Dunn, the reporter from the Owen Sound Sun Times newspaper would even invite people to pay the legal costs of the child abductor. He provided information in his article of October 10 ( 10:30 pm website, October 11 in print) on the bank and account number to which people may contribute to pay the legal costs of the child abductor mother.
International Child abduction Case - Interference by MP Larry Miller
Federal Member of Parliament for Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound, Larry Miller has caused an international embarrassment. His is a member of the Conservative Party of Canada, the ruling political party that forms the Government of Canada and which appoints federal judges sitting on the bench of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario, Canada's most populous province.
Larry Miller wrote the judge presiding over the case to lobby for his new constituent, the mother who abducted her child to Canada. More.. To read his letter click here
The father has reported to the Canadian Children's Rights Council that he is suing Larry Miller for interferring with the case and claims that justice was delayed and lawyer's fees were paid as a result of Larry Miller's actions. The father also states that his lawyer is seeking legal action against Larry Miller by Legal Aid Ontario which paid legal fees at part of the lawyer's usual rate of pay. The father is seeking punitive damages as well for Larry Miller's actions to prevent Members of Parliament from abusing their power and lobbying judges on any court cases.
Australian father successful in international child abduction case heard by Superior Court of Justice in Owen Sound, Ontario also wins appeal heard by the Court of Appeal for Ontario.
Cannock v Fleguel - International Child abduction case October 7, 2008
This international child abduction case heard in Owen Sound by Justice Robert Thompson on May 15th, 2008 which resulted in his written decision of June 27th, 2008 was appealed to the Court of Appeal for Ontario. Justice Thompson ruled that the child was abducted from his habitual residence in Australia and that the mother had to return the child to Australia.
The appeal was heard on Friday, October 3rd, 2008. The judges' written decision is forth coming. The 3 judges hearing the appeal dismissed the appeal and the father won. The court therefore agreed that the child had been abducted by the mother, Jessica Fleguel, and sent the case back to the Superior Court of Justice in Owen Sound, Ontario. for implementation of the deportation order to reunited the child with his father. More..
Larry Miller MP writes Superior Court of Ontario judge hearing child abduction case to lobby on behalf of child abductor.
The Member of the Parliament of Canada for Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound, Larry Miller MP wrote a letter to lobby Justice Robert M. Thompson, the presiding judge on an international child abduction case.
The hearing was a case regarding the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction regarding a mother living habitually in Australia who abducted her child to Canada. As is the procedure under Hague, the Australian Government requested that the Canadian federal government locate the child and return the child to Australia. Due process includes a hearing in which the judge orders the child back to the parent from which the child was abducted in the other country. That allows both parents to attend at the family court in that country to present their family law case.
On May 29th, 2008, Larry Miller MP wrote Justice Robert Thompson, the presiding judge on this case, regarding the case and expressed his opinion that the correct judgement would be to allow the child abducting mother to keep the child in Canada. He cited letters from members of the woman's family, his constituents, as the sole evidence and his justification for severing the child's relationship with the Australian father. The case being heard wasn't even a family law case. It was a Hague Convention case about child abduction.
For the complete details and to view a copy of the letter Larry Miller wrote to the judge click here
Four-year-olds in Montreal will use laptops in kindergarten class
Computer World Canada, By Jennifer Kavur, Sep 02, 2008
A pilot program led by Lester B. Pearson School Board (LBPSB) in Quebec will provide HP 2133 Mini-Note notebook PCs to four-year-old students this fall. The Kindergarten for Four-Year-Olds program will distribute 100 laptops among five Montreal-area schools and the International Language Centre in Pointe-Claire.
According Bob Mills, director general of LBPSB, the program will enhance learning opportunities by incorporating technology as part of a total education package. Research has show that the use of technology by three- and four-year-olds develops gain in intelligence, non-verbal skills, structural knowledge such as long-term memory and manual dexterity, he said. More..
Surrogate mothers: Outsourcing pregnancy in India
The practice of renting a womb and getting a child is like outsourcing pregnancy. This trade's business volume is estimated to be around $ 500 million and the numbers of cases of surrogacy are believed to be increasing at galloping rate in India.
MeriNews, By Joseph Gathia, June 23, 2008
India - THE MINISTRY of Women and Child Development is examining the issue of surrogate motherhood in India for bringing up a comprehensive legislation. But surrogate motherhood - as an arrangement, in which a woman carries and bears a child for another person or persons, but takes no ownership of the child born - has also raised moral, ethical, social and legal questions about both the woman and the commissioned baby.
To understand the issues involved, let us see the case of Surekha. She is seven-months pregnant like any other expecting mothers, except that the child she is carrying isnt her own. When Surekha gives birth to this child in India, the newborn will be immediately be handed over to its biological parents, Non Resident Indians (NRIs) who live in Canada and who have been unable to bear a child on their own. In return for renting her womb, Surekha will be paid one lakh rupees.
This practice of renting a womb and getting a child is like outsourcing pregnancy. The business volume of this trade is estimated to be around $ 500 million and the numbers of cases of surrogacy are believed to be increasing at galloping rate. More..
Quebec man wants name stricken from birth certificate of child who isn't his
The Canadian Press, March 30, 2009
MONTREAL A Quebec man who has failed to have his name removed from the birth certificate of a young girl he found out was not his biological daughter wants to argue his case before the Supreme Court of Canada.
The businessman has already struck out in Quebec Superior Court and in the Quebec Court of Appeal.
Both courts ruled that paternity is ironclad if a man's name is on the birth certificate, if that status is not contested within a year of the child's birth and if other factors, including the same family name, indicate obvious bonds between the child and the parents.
The courts ruled there is little room for interpretation, but the man's lawyer disagreed with both rulings. More..
The sins of the mothers
The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, Australia, by Adele Horin, September 12, 2008
When Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears ran amok, the public blamed their mothers. Their fathers - Lohan's had served time in jail and had addiction problems - escaped rebuke entirely.
Now an Australian study provides some evidence that bad mothering has a worse effect on children than bad fathering.
It shows that mothers who exhibit "toxic" behaviours - from being cold and indifferent to being abusive, manipulative or over-controlling - are far more likely to warp their children's outlook on life than fathers with similar behaviour.
Meltdown . . . Britney Spears shaves her head at the height of her very public breakdown.
Wayne Warburton, a research fellow at Macquarie University's Children and Families Research Centre, said: "Mothers have a really powerful effect on the way their kids view the world and themselves, probably because kids spend more time with their mothers, especially in the crucial early years."
Dr Warburton asked 441 university students to fill out detailed questionnaires on the parenting styles of their mothers and fathers, and on their own patterns of thinking. More..
The International Day of Disabled Persons - December 3
The International Day of Disabled Persons, which is held every year on 3 December, aims to promote an understanding of disability issues and mobilise support for the dignity, rights and well-being of persons with disabilities. The 2007 theme was 'Decent work for persons with disabilities.'
Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities - the first major human rights treaty of the 21st century
This year's International Day of Disabled Persons had special significance as a new international Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2006, has become the fastest ever signed Convention, with 118 signatures so far.
Two countries - Spain and South Africa - took the opportunity of the International Day to ratify the new Convention; Bangladesh also ratified last week.
However, the Convention has yet to come into force as only 10 countries Bangladesh, Croatia, Cuba, Gabon, Hungary, India, Jamaica, Panama, South Africa and Spain - out of a required 20 have ratified the Convention.
Children with disabilities
Some 150-200 million out of two billion children worldwide - or ten per cent of children - live with disabilities. Children with disabilities experience widespread violations of their rights, many of which are common to those faced by adults poverty, social exclusion, lack of accessible environments, violence.
They face abuses including abandonment as babies, institutionalisation, exclusion from education, lack of birth registration, lack of respect for their evolving capacities, inappropriate child protection systems. Estimates indicate that over 90 per cent of all children with disabilities are unlikely to receive any formal education.
Children and the new Convention
The new Convention marks a shift from seeing children with disabilities as objects of charity, and addressing their 'special needs' - the approach set out in Article 23 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child - to subjects of rights.
All the Articles in the text apply to children with disabilities; in addition, Article 7 sets out specific obligations to ensure children with disabilities enjoy of all human rights and fundamental freedoms on an equal basis with other children, to ensure that the best interests of the child is a primary consideration, and to provide disability and age appropriate assistance to ensure that children with disabilities are able to realise the right to their express views on all matters of concern to them and have them taken seriously in accordance with age and maturity.
Read more in Gerison Lansdown's paper: The New Disability Convention and the Protection of Children.
Proposed change to Manitoba child protection law a witch hunt at best.
Priority should be stopping the abuse of over 50,000 children in Manitoba that suffer from Parental Alienation Syndrome
Canadian Children's Rights Council website shut down by false allegations of child pornography More..
On November 28, 2007 the governing party of the province of Manitoba introduced the Child and Family Services Amendment Act which calls for jailing or fining anyone who knows about child pornography but doesn't report it to authorities.
Manitoba law already has penalties for anyone not reporting child abuse. The information stated in the media is that no person has ever been charged with failing to provide information about child abuse to authorities and that the Minister introducing the legislation doesn't anticipate that arrests or fined will result because of the inclusion of child sexual exploitation in the amended law. ....Then why waste time on such a meaningless amendment?
We are sure that some perverted person will find some innocent picture of a baby in a bathtub sexual. The media has reported that no person in Manitoba has ever been charged with not reporting child abuse that they reasonably believe occurred or witnessed but we know that hundreds of parents have reported to police that their ex-spouses who have violated parenting time orders made by family law courts or as part of separation agreements made between 2 parents in family law cases. Such violations are child abuse. Often they involve parental alienation which is also child abuse.
Comments in the media attributed to the Minister stated that we should do everything possible to stop child pornography no matter what it take to save just 1 child from sexual exploitation. This is dangerous to parents that take innocent non-sexual pictures that some pervert may see as sexual. A picture of baby not wearing a diaper while walking on a beach could result an investigation of the family and a stigma that can ruin their lives.
It is our position at the Canadian Children's Rights Council that people will report child abuse, in all its forms, including child porn without threats that if they don't, they will go to jail or at least spend thousands of dollars on defence lawyers and face the stigma associated with such charges.
It is our position that if the Government of Manitoba wants to stop child abuse en masse, they should enforce parenting time orders made by their own family law courts and provide much need mental health services specifically to help children that are victims of parental alienation syndrome in family law cases.
The Internet is international and so is the problem of child porn and the child sex trade
The International Criminal Police Organization INTERPOL, an agency of the United Nations, is the logical police service that should be battling international child porn in conjunction with the sex tourism business. They should report widely on offences being committed in all countries that use disobey their own laws against child sex workers/slaves while hotels and others profit from the child sex tourism business.
Each of INTERPOLs member countries maintains a National Central Bureau (NCB) staffed by police officers. In Canada, it is INTERPOL Ottawa run by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ( RCMP), Canada's national Police service.
INTERPOL's world head office is located in France and is staffed by police officers from around the world. Its staff is relatively small. In our opinion, it should be quadruple its size and really fulfill the need for a truly international police force.
If you really want to stop child porn on the Internet, suggest to your Member of the Parliament of Canada that you want your tax dollars spent on more International police including an expanded role for INTERPOL both in Canada and around the world.
Child Porn - An international issue. The Internet knows no national boundaries. Many Countries don't even have child porn laws. Let's go after them.
Read about how other countries that feed child porn into Canada over the Internet don't even have their own criminal laws and how they fail to protect their own children while their citizens such as hotel owners make money in the sex tourism trade. More..
The damage to families when false allegations are made.
In Toronto, Ontario, a few years ago, a medical doctor was accused of being a child pornographer. His medical practice was ruined. He was found not guilty in criminal court but committed suicide because of the stress. His reputation was ruined and there was no way to retract the damage done to him by the media coverage made when he was charged. He had subscribed to adult pornography on the internet and his credit card had been charged. The same company providing the adult porn had been providing child porn to others and used the same company to charge credit cards.
Canada's National "Child Day" - November 20th
Canada's national "Child Day" is held November 20th each year as enacted in Bill C-371, otherwise known as the Child Day Act, by the Parliament of Canada in 1993.
It commemorates the United Nations adoption of two landmark documents concerned with the human rights of all children and youths.
On Canada's "Child Day", Canadians honour our children and The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of The Child on November 20th, 1959, and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child on November 20th, 1989.
The Convention spells out the basic human rights to which children ( under the age of 18 ) everywhere are entitled.
The purpose of Canada's "Child Day" is to promote awareness in Canada of the Convention. More..
Write us and tell us what you did to promote National Child Day and the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in Canadian domestic laws.
Children: The Silenced CitizensEFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION OF CANADA'S INTERNATIONAL OBLIGATIONS WITH RESPECT TO THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN Final Report of the Standing Senate Committee on Human RightsApril 2007view / download in pdf (324 pages) 1.3 mb click here |
Les enfants: des citoyens sans voixMISE EN OEUVRE EFFICACE DES OBLIGATIONS INTERNATIONALES DU CANADA RELATIVES AUX DROITS DES ENFANTS Rapport final du
Comit snatorial permanent
des Droits de la personne
|
Parents win right to grow babies for 'spare parts'
November 11, 2007, London UK
PARENTS of sick children in Britain will be allowed to use IVF to create "spare-part babies" under controversial laws published yesterday.
The legislation will dramatically relax rules on IVF clinics creating "saviour siblings" who can help cure their older brothers and sisters of medical conditions such as leukemia. More..
Canadian Governments failing native children, report says
14 August 2007 - Hundreds of aboriginal children with severe medical problems in Canada are being moved to institutions in big cities because health authorities cannot agree on who should pay for their care, according to a new report.
Yet if these children lived 'off-reserve' (not on indigenous land), they would virtually be guaranteed the care they need at home, according to the latest edition of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
"That is discrimination, pure and simple," Noni MacDonald, a professor of paediatrics and a senior CMAJ editor, said in an editorial.
Amir Attaran, the Canada Research Chair in Law, Population Health and Global Development Policy, said the practice is screamingly illegal, and a clear violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The editorial, co-written by the two academics, says that the governments deserve to be sued for such a failure.
The pair reject arguments that services for complex medical needs, such as those of ventilator-dependent children, cannot be provided on reserves because communities are too remote.
"Geography is no excuse for the pusillanimous, inequitable distribution of wealth, such that advanced care exists only in the south and first nations children, parents and communities endure psychological and cultural stress to access it, " Dr. MacDonald and Dr. Attaran wrote.
Cindy Blackstock, executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society, said that in fact native children are being discriminated against both in remote communities and reserves located close to big cities.
Attempt to rationalise
"This is an attempt to rationalise pretty blatant discrimination," she said.
At the root of the problem is an age-old dispute about who pays for the medical care of Indian, Inuit and Mtis people. Generally speaking, care provided on reserves is paid by Health Canada (or Indian Affairs, if it is a social service) and by the province off-reserve.
But the situation gets complicated when someone travels away for care and then wants to return to the community and receive continuing care.
The situation came to a head a few years back with the tragic case of a boy named Jordan from the Norway House Cree Nation in northern Manitoba.
Jordan whose family asked that his last name not be published to protect their privacy was born in 1999 with a severe neuromuscular disorder. He was referred for care in Winnipeg, where he became wheelchair-bound and ventilator-dependent. But his health stabilised and he was discharged in 2001.
He was placed in a specialised home near his home reserve but Ottawa and Winnipeg could not agree on who would pay.
For two years, bureaucrats warred over the most mundane details of Jordan's care, right down to who would pay for a showerhead required for a wheelchair-accessible shower.
Jordan ended up back in a Winnipeg hospital where he died at age of four.
Patient's interests second
"Jordan's interests fell a distant second; intergovernmental squabbling over the duty to pay came first," Dr. MacDonald and Dr. Attaran write in their editorial.
"Many of the services Jordan needed would be paid for without question for a white Manitoban, or off-reserve aboriginal. It was Jordan's living on-reserve that caused the bureaucracy to choke."
The boy's case became a cause clbre in social welfare and child health circles. The term "Jordan's principle" was coined the principle being that the needs of a child should supersede bickering over who pays the bills.
Senate committee chastises Canada for its treatment of aboriginal children
Ottawa Citizen, CanWest News Service, by Juliet O'Neill, Friday, April 27, 2007
OTTAWA - Canada's treatment of its aboriginal children is "a national total disgrace," Senator Romeo Dallaire said Thursday as a Senate committee issued a report on the government's failure to comply with an international treaty on children's rights.
"They're living in the Third World," said Dallaire, a retired general who led a UN mission during the genocide in Rwanda in the mid-1990s. "You wonder if you're a colonial white man in black Africa," he said, recalling testimony that while Canada ranked among the top-five countries on a UN human development index, Canada's aboriginal population lagged in 78th place. More..
NETHERLANDS: Seventeenth European State to ban
corporal punishment by parents
On 6 March 2007, a new law prohibiting all corporal punishment by parents and carers was passed in the Senate. The law amends the provisions in the Civil Code on parental authority so that article 1:247 now states (unofficial translation):
(1) Parental authority includes the duty and the right of the parent to care for and raise his or her minor child. (2) Caring for and raising ones child includes the care and the responsibility for the emotional and physical wellbeing of the child and for his or her safety as well as for the promotion of the development of his or her personality. In the care and upbringing of the child the parents will not use emotional or physical violence or any other humiliating treatment. More..
Article 1:248 of the Code applies article 1:247 to all other persons acting in loco parentis.
The Cabinet agreed to proceed with prohibition in February 2005, following a government-commissioned study on the experiences of abolition in other European countries. Department of Justice press releases at the time the Bill to contribute to the prevention of emotional and physical abuse of children or any other humiliating treatment of children in care and upbringing was introduced to the Cabinet stressed that the primary purpose of the new law is to set a standard. It emphasised that the law would bring the Netherlands into compliance with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and article 17 of the European Social Charter, and address the recommendations made to the Netherlands government by the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the European Committee of Social Rights.
Now that the law has been passed, a government Communication Plan to inform parents and the general public about the ban is being prepared. The law is expected to come into force by the summer.
At least 16 countries in Europe have enacted bans on corporal punishment by parents and all other carers: Sweden (1979); Finland (1983); Norway (1987); Austria (1989); Cyprus (1994); Denmark (1997); Latvia (1998); Croatia (1999); Germany (2000); Bulgaria (2000), Iceland (2003); Romania (2004); Ukraine (2004), Hungary (2004), Greece (2006); Netherlands (2007). In addition, a Supreme Court judgment in Italy (1996) declared all corporal punishment to be unlawful, but this has not yet been confirmed in legislation. At least six more states have committed themselves to full law reform in the near future: Lithuania, Luxembourg, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain.
The pace of reform is gathering momentum in light of the UN Secretary Generals Study on Violence against Children, which recommended in its final report prohibition in law of all corporal punishment of children by 2009. Many more governments across the world have committed themselves to full prohibition, including at least a further six in Europe.
UK: Doctors call for debate on mercy killing of disabled babies
BBC - 6 November 2006
UK - Doctors are calling for a debate over proposals for the "mercy killing" of severely disabled babies. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists wants a discussion over whether "deliberate intervention" to cause death should be legalised. Withdrawing treatment is already permitted in some cases.
The college said it was not necessarily in favour of the move, but felt it should be debated. However, some are angry it has even been suggested. Simone Aspis, of the British Council of Disabled People, said: "We really do not know how long babies and young people will live for. "We should not deny people the opportunity to live for as long as they are able to."
And Matthew O'Gorman, a spokesman for the Life charity, said it was "extremely worrying". "There is a huge difference between withdrawing invasive treatment that has become futile, and taking action to intentionally end a child's life because treatment is considered to be too expensive or time-consuming."
The college made its comments in a submission to the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, which is carrying out an inquiry into the viability of life. Nuffield will publish its report on critical care decisions in foetal and neonatal medicine next week.
A working party has been consulting on the issue on the back of improvements in medical technology which means very premature and ill babies can survive, although some with severe disabilities.
The college said: "We would like the working party to think more radically about non-resuscitation, withdrawal of treatment decisions... and active euthanasia, as they are ways of widening the management options available to the sickest of newborns."
Maggie Blott, a member of the college, said these were "very difficult decisions" that would be taken over days, weeks and even months in consultation with the parents. She added it was a debate that needed to happen.
Doctors have mixed views over the suggestions.
John Wyatt, professor of neonatal paediatrics at University College Hospital London, said: "It changes the nature of medicine... into some kind of social engineering."
But John Harris, professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester, said it was not a question of whether or not these decisions were taken - as they already were through withdrawing treatment - but how to take them in the most humane way.
Dalton McGuinty, Premiere of Ontario, fails the children of Ontario.
Dalton McGuinty plays cheap politics involving crying mothers in front of legislature - Will "Kevin and Jared's Law", a law calling for mandatory coroner's inquests into the deaths of a child killed by his or her parent, ever become law?
Liberal and Conservative governments of Ontario have failed to enforce protection of children from prostitution in the Rescuing Children from Sexual Exploitation Act, 2002
This bill fights child prostitution by allowing police to seize underage hookers -- i.e., hold them in custody -- for up to 30 days, instead of the normal practice, which generally sees them right back out on the street after an arrest, with no hope of getting free of their pimps and the seedy lure of street life.
The idea is to protect these children by holding them long enough to get them care and support -- it's about giving them a chance to return to a normal life, not about jailing or punishing them. (In case that's not clear, it's called the Rescuing Children from Sexual Exploitation Act, 2002.
YEARS OF LOBBYING
Other provinces, notably
Alberta, have had such a law for years, and it has
proven effective.
In Ontario, where we have an estimated 1,200 child
prostitutes, it took years of work and lobbying, but in
2002, the then-Conservative government endorsed and
passed the private member's bill originated by MPP Rick
Bartolucci, a Liberal.
The trouble is, it was never proclaimed -- not by the Tories and not by the Liberals since they came to power, even though it was the brainchild of one of their own. Amazingly, some youth outreach groups oppose the law as too "draconian"; -- because, hey, why shouldn't a 14-year-old have the right to sell her body for cash? A 14-year-old is obviously not mature enough to make such a decision which is why the act was passed. But will it become law or More ..
Overdue support to disabled just first step
The Toronto Star, (Canada's largest daily newspaper ) by HELEN HENDERSON, Aug. 29, 2006.
Kudos to Sudbury community legal worker Marie Lalande for setting in motion the action that led to Ontario finally agreeing to pay $25 million in overdue support to some 19,000 people with disabilities.
As reported by the Star's Rob Ferguson, cabinet approved the payout last week in response to a blistering attack by Ontario Ombudsman Andr Marin. Marin called it "morally repugnant" that the province was taking an average of eight months to process disability support applications but would pay only four months of retroactive benefits to those whose applications were accepted.
The four-month cut-off was cancelled May 31, the day Marin released his report, but the system was so backlogged, there was no immediate relief.
The province is to be commended for acknowledging its responsibility and moving quickly to correct an inequity that has created so much unnecessary hardship. But as Lalande and other advocates point out, this is by no means the only flaw in the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP).
With a surplus in its coffers, Queen's Park should move to help people with disabilities rise above subsistence levels. It would pay off big time and long term, improving general health and helping them reach their full potential. More .. ODSP Action Coalition
