Child abuse rising in Nunavik’s Hudson Bay coast

Akulivik councillor Louee Makimmak (left) says too many Nunavik children are being sent down south to be absorbed into non-Inuit families. (PHOTO BY SARAH ROGERS)

KUUJJUAQ — Reports of child abuse in Nunavik’s Hudson Bay Coast area are on the rise.

Reports to youth protection authorities rose from 910 there last year to 1,217 in 2010, a meeting of Kativik Regional Government regional councillors heard Dec. 1 at their meeting in Kuujjuaq.

A “report” is a call, visit or letter to youth protection services indicating that a child may be in danger.

“A lot of the escalation we’re seeing is in the cases of physical abuse,” said Marianne Martin, the KRG’s director of youth protection for Hudson coast. “It’s not pushes we’re talking about, it’s burns, bruises and broken bones. It’s quite serious.”

The majority of the children reported are under the age of five, she added.

And even the youngest of children are at risk.

Years ago, incidents of intoxicated parents harming their babies were rare, Martin said, “but in the last year alone, I’m aware of 15 cases of babies injured while in the amautik of a drunk parent.”

Of the reports made on Hudson coast, about three-quarters of them were retained, meaning they were strong enough cases to be investigated by youth protection workers.

A child can only be taken from a home if there is a pattern of physical or psychological abuse, Martin pointed out.

Every effort is made to keep the child in their family environment, she said, but when options are exhausted, children must be placed into foster care.

As recently as October 2010, 162 Nunavimmiut children from the Hudson coast were in foster care, not including emergency placements.

But some regional councillors told her that they want to see fewer children taken from their homes, suggesting that their abusers need to be dealt with first.

“This is not our culture to remove children from their homes,” said Inukjuak councillor Siasi Smiler.

“We need to re-evaluate the reasons children are taken from their homes. I know grandparents whose grandchildren are placed down south and they would like to have them at home,” she said.

Akulivik councillor Louee Makimmak said too many children were being sent down south to be absorbed into non-Inuit families.

“I know you are following the [Youth Protection Act] but we have our own Inuit culture,” Makimmak said. “Are you giving our children away?”

But Martin said past reports of high numbers of Inuit children being sent to Montreal for foster care are false and that it is exceptional when it happens.

The most recent statistics show that of the 162 children fostered from the Hudson coast, 82 of them were placed within the family, another 20 in the same community and another 18 with Inuit families in Nunavik.

Of the 10 to 15 placed in care in the south, most went to non-Inuit families.

The number of retained reports on the Ungava coast this past year (between April 2009 to March 2010) went up slightly from last year, from 316 to 325.

And it’s not just numbers that separate the two regions — it’s who is contacting youth protection in the first place.

Martin pointed out that half of the reports made on the Hudson coast were made by other children, parents and extended family members, compared to the Ungava coast where only 15 per cent of reports are made by family.