The British Columbia Department of Children and Families (MCFD) has saved thousands of dollars in funding from grandparents who needed the money to help care for their grandchildren, a new report has found.
The British Columbia ombudsman said the ministry had failed to transfer $ 7,000 in federal financial aid to the grandparents mentioned in Tuesday’s report as Taylor. The couple was eligible for funding because their granddaughter lives with a disability.
Through an “unfair” funding model, the money intended to help Taylor ended up in the province’s bank account.
“This case is disturbing on several levels,” Ombudsman Jay Chalk wrote in a statement Tuesday.
“Not only did the Taylor family not receive money they could use to take care of their granddaughter, the ministry knew there was a problem and it took too long to fix it.”
Grandparents “shifted briefly” for years: report
The Taylors began caring for their then two-year-old granddaughter, identified as Jesse, in 2013. Jesse is a native and lives with a physical and mental disability.
The MCFD has begun giving Taylor just over $ 1,000 each month in provincial funding to help care for Jesse, according to the report.
The couple later learned that they were eligible for additional federal funding due to Jesse’s disability. They have successfully applied for benefits for children with disabilities, which offers approximately $ 242 a month to caregivers of children and teenagers with severe disabilities.
Taylor’s application was approved, but they did not receive the money.
BC Ombudsman Jay Chalk at a press conference in Victoria on April 6, 2017 (Chad Hipolito / The Canadian Press)
Under federal law, the MCFD was still considered “maintaining” Jesse’s care at the time because it still provided funding to Taylor Province. So, the federal disability benefit was paid to help the province – not the grandparents.
The ministry kept the money as common income and did not send it to Taylor.
“By failing to transfer these benefits to the Taylor family, the ministry is taking advantage of Jesse’s disability,” the report said.
The ministry already knows about the problem
The Taylor family complained to the ministry in 2019. A ministry official responded and agreed that the situation was “problematic”, but did not rectify it. Another subsequent response said the ministry could not make any changes until “appropriate consultations, reviews and approvals” were made.
The Ombudsman launched an inquiry in 2020. The report said that the Ombudsman rarely launched an inquiry and found that the complainant was already aware of the problem but simply had not resolved it.
“The injustice of this case is underscored by the fact that by the time the Taylor family complained to us, the ministry had already acknowledged that this was a problem,” Chalk wrote.
In total, Taylor was entitled to more than $ 7,000 for regular benefits and one-off payments from 2019.
It was not until February this year, more than two years after Taylor’s complaint, that the ministry informed eligible carers that the province would start providing them with additional benefits equivalent to child benefits to deal with the problem.
Payments will be retroactive until 2019, as recommended by the ombudsman’s office.
“I am pleased that the Ministry is now providing an amount equal to the benefit for children with disabilities to those who care for them, but given the impact on children with disabilities and those caring for them, I would expect,” that once this problem is identified, the ministry will have it fixed immediately, “Chalk said.
“For families caring for children with disabilities, every dollar counts, and it’s not acceptable that Taylor and families like them were briefly changed at the time, and it wasn’t until this year that they were promised the money they should have received years ago. . “
Add Comment