Pubdate: Wed, 26 Oct 2005
Source: St. Albert Gazette (CN AB)
Copyright: 2005 St. Albert Gazette
Contact:  http://www.stalbertgazette.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2919
Author: Cory Hare, staff writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?241 (Methamphetamine - Canada)

PROVINCE LOOKS AT TAKING CHILDREN FROM ADDICTS

The Alberta government is working on legislation that will allow
officials to apprehend children and charge parents who expose them to
grow-ops, meth labs, drug trafficking or drug use.

Currently being called the Drug Endangered Children's Act, the
legislation is in the works for the spring session.

Children's Services Minister Heather Forsyth has claimed that homes
where drugs are prevalent contain serious health risks such as black
mould, and that children need to be protected. The legislation will
provide additional protection for children, even though current child
welfare laws already allow officials to remove them from harmful
situations, said ministry spokeswoman Christine Skjerven.

"We've always been able to apprehend children from environments that
put them at risk, but this strengthens our ability to do that. It
would give us another charge to lay against the parents in terms of
neglect or abuse of their children," she said.

Since it's still in the development stage, few details are publicly
available about the new legislation, but Skjerven said it will include
a new type of charge that law enforcement officers could lay against
those who expose children to the harmful environment of drug
operations and consumption.

"Let's say, just for example, there were some parents who had a meth
lab going, apart from being able to charge them with the manufacturing
of drugs, we could also charge them with creating an environment that
endangers children," Skjerven said.

Premier Ralph Klein said last week that the legislation is similar to
the Protection of Children Involved in Prostitution Act, which allows
the province to apprehend and detain child prostitutes. That
legislation was challenged as a violation of the Charter, forcing the
government to make changes.

While Klein said he isn't worried about a court challenge of the new
legislation, one constitutional law specialist said it's likely to
raise a couple of issues.

"If what they're seeking to do is charge parents, they don't have the
jurisdiction to do that," said Jennifer Koshan, assistant law
professor at the University of Calgary. "It's the federal government
that has the jurisdiction over criminal law."

The provincial government can prosecute violations of the Criminal
Code but it can't create new offences, Koshan said.

The current Criminal Code has sections that deal with criminal
negligence, providing the necessities of life, unlawful abandonment
and exposing a child under 10 to life endangerment or permanent
injury. These sections could be used to prosecute an adult who exposes
a child to a harmful environment like a drug lab, Koshan said.

"Would I say that they're entirely covered? Probably not, but there
certainly are sections of the Criminal Code that could be used."

Another legal sticking point stems from the removal of children from
their homes, something that is always open to constitutional
challenge, Koshan said.

"It would be parents arguing that their right to liberty or security
of the person had been infringed by the apprehension of their
children." Child welfare legislation has brought about those types of
challenges before.

"The challenges have always failed on the basis that the government is
permitted to intervene to protect children if they do so in a way
that's reasonable," Koshan said.

Drug houses do pose real risks to children, said Const. Mike Moulds of
the St. Albert RCMP drug unit. Black mould is common in marijuana grow
operations and second-hand smoke from pot, crack and meth are
hazardous. Meth chemicals are particularly dangerous whether stable or
mixed.

"The fumes that come off of that while it's cooked are highly
carcinogenic and volatile in terms of it can blow up at any time," he
said.

"They don't tend to be the cleanest places in the world if they're
cooking meth. They may cook meth in the same utensils that they cook
food in or they may have some of the chemicals within reach of where
the children are."

Despite the risks that drug exposure poses to children, legislation
that allows them to be taken from their parents should be approached
with extreme caution, said St. Albert Liberal MLA Jack Flaherty.

"The legislation has to be very clearly and finely worded so there's
no vagueness, so the doors are not opened too easily and we're not
trampling on the basic value of Albertans -- the sanctity of the family."

Flaherty expressed concern about defining the criteria for removing a
child from a home and about who decides to take this step. To be
effective, the bill should get province-wide input from stakeholders
such as parents, foster parents, child welfare experts and aboriginal
people, he said.

"Social workers that are involved in doing this have to have a good
understanding of the drug culture, have to be able to define when it's
on a dangerous level and when the children are at risk," he said.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin