Teen mothers, older fathers

Inside Bountiful's baby boom: Pregnancy rate among polygamous Mormon sect's young women up to seven times average, yet B.C. officials watch and wait

Vancouver Sun, by Daphne Bramham, April 21, 2006

Kendall says "social values of this community differ from the norm."

"It may be questioned how voluntary a young adolescent female's participation in a marriage to an older man in this community would be," he writes.

But since no Bountiful girl has stepped forward to complain, Kendall says there's been no reason for the Ministry of Children and Family Development to investigate.

As for polygamy, the chief medical health officer says that's an issue for the solicitor-general, the attorney-general and the Canadian government -- not health officials.

So, what have we got? A policy of watchful waiting by the ministry that is supposed to enforce the Child, Family and Community Service Act that says "a child needs protection if the child has been or is likely to be physically or sexually abused by the parent or another person and the parent is unwilling or unable to protect the child."

Kendall concluded there was no reason for health officials to have used that section of the act.

Yet the numbers guys -- statistics agency CEO Andrew McBride and R.J. Danderfer, the assistant deputy minister -- said it "may be problematic" explaining why no one has reported under the act.

However, they said: "This is due to the potential difficulties inherent in attempting to ascertain whether a child truly needs protection and may be exacerbated by the fact that the Bountiful community and its practices have existed for a considerable period of time."

But that pretty well sums up the Bountiful situation: It's been ignored and tiptoed about for so long that now it's even more difficult to deal with.

The folks in Victoria tiptoe about, wringing their hands over whether this is a cult or a distinct society. They can't seem to decipher the difference between religious practice and child abuse.

And all the while, Bountiful is having a population explosion. Its population has tripled from about 400 in the late 1990s (when the attorney-general overrode the RCMP's recommendation that charges be laid against the polygamist leaders) to about 1,200 now.

Don't they get it? With a policy of so-called watchful waiting, it's only going to get worse.

This is a textbook example of revenge of the cradle. And it's being done literally on the backs of young girls.

BETWEEN 1998 AND 2004 69 BOUNTIFUL GIRLS 18 OR YOUNGER HAD BABIES

46% of the fathers are 5 or more years older than the teenage mother

28% of the fathers are 10 or more years older than the teenage mother

The Vancouver Sun 2006