Preamble
WARNING
The court hearing this matter directs that the following notice be attached to the file:
This is a case under Part V of the Child, Youth and Family Services Act, 2017, (being Schedule 1 to the Supporting Children, Youth and Families Act, 2017, S.O. 2017, c. 14), and is subject to subsections 87(7), 87(8) and 87(9) of the Act. These subsections and subsection 142(3) of the Act, which deals with the consequences of failure to comply, read as follows:
87.— (7) Order excluding media representatives or prohibiting publication. — Where the court is of the opinion that the presence of the media representative or representatives or the publication of the report, as the case may be, would cause emotional harm to a child who is a witness at or a participant in the hearing or is the subject of the proceeding, the court may make an order,
( c ) prohibiting the publication of a report of the hearing or a specified part of the hearing.
(8) Prohibition re identifying child. — No person shall publish or make public information that has the effect of identifying a child who is a witness at or a participant in a hearing or the subject of a proceeding, or the child’s parent or foster parent or a member of the child’s family.
(9) Prohibition re identifying person charged .— The court may make an order prohibiting the publication of information that has the effect of identifying a person charged with an offence under this Part.
142.— (3) Offences re publication. — A person who contravenes subsection 87(8) or 134(11) (publication of identifying information) or an order prohibiting publication made under clause 87(7)( c ) or subsection 87(9), and a director, officer or employee of a corporation who authorizes, permits or concurs in such a contravention by the corporation, is guilty of an offence and on conviction is liable to a fine of not more than $10,000 or to imprisonment for a term of not more than three years, or to both.
Court File and Parties
ONTARIO COURT OF JUSTICE
DATE: February 19, 2021
COURT FILE No.: Sault Ste. Marie File No. 231/14 - 001
BETWEEN:
CHILDREN’S AID SOCIETY OF ALGOMA
Applicant,
— AND —
F.M.
M.K.
C.K. (Added Party)
Respondents.
Before: Justice John Kukurin
Heard on: Feb 16, 2021
Ruling on Voir Dire released on: February 19, 2021
Counsel: Jennifer Mealey....................................................................... counsel for the applicant society Shad McCooeye......................................................... counsel for the respondent mother, F.M. Jasmine Gassi Harnden.................. counsel for the respondent paternal grandmother, C.K. M.K.......................................................................................... not present, although duly served Lindsay Marshall.............. Office of the Children’s Lawyer legal representative for the child
KUKURIN J.:
[1] This is a Ruling on a voir dire held on the first day of trial in this status review application relating to the child X who is six years of age. The voir dire was held because the applicant society wished the court to qualify Mr. John Dahl as an expert witness in the field of psychology, and more particularly, in the areas of parental risk assessment and child development. All parties agreed that the voir dire would be a blended one, namely, that evidence heard in the voir dire would be trial evidence as well, regardless of the outcome of the voir dire.
[2] Earlier on in this case, the society brought a motion seeking an order under s. 98 of the Child, Youth and Family Services Act, 2017 (the CYFSA) for a Parenting Capacity Assessment (PCA) of the child’s mother. A review of the court record indicates that there was some argument of this motion. However, it was not about the assessor, nor about the questions to be put to the assessor for answers. Rather it related to what materials would be provided to the assessor by the parties, or any of them. Ultimately, the issue of the materials were the subject of a judicial endorsement. Mr. Dahl was the named assessor. At this voir dire hearing, it was evident that his curriculum vitae (CV) had been before the judge who made the s.98 order.
[3] Mr. Dahl duly performed the assessment of the mother. He prepared a PCA report dated March 3, 2020. It has been available now to all parties for almost a year. It contains a number of opinions that the society wishes to have admitted into evidence in this proceeding and which the mother wishes to be excluded. No one has brought any motion to exclude the PCA report. Instead, the issue that was raised was the qualification of Mr. Dahl to state these opinions as an expert. Hence the voir dire – to determine if he is an expert to give such opinions.
[4] The starting point is s.98 of the CYFSA
S.98 (1) In the course of a proceeding under this Part, the court may order that one or more of the following persons undergo an assessment within a specified time by a person appointed in accordance with subsections (3) and (4):
The child.
A parent of the child.
Any other person, other than a foster parent, who is putting forward or would participate in a plan for the care and custody of or access to the child.
(2) An assessment may be ordered if the court is satisfied that,
(a) an assessment of one or more of the persons specified in subsection (1) is necessary for the court to make a determination under this Part; and
(b) the evidence sought for the assessment is not otherwise available to the court.
(4) The court shall appoint the person selected by the parties to perform the assessment if the court is satisfied that the person meets the following criteria:
- The person is qualified to perform medical, emotional, developmental, psychological, educational or social assessments.
- The person has consented to perform the assessment.
(5) If the court is of the opinion that the person selected by the parties under subsection (3) does not meet the criteria set out in subsection (4), the court shall select and appoint another person who does meet the criteria.
(6) The report of an assessment ordered under section (1) is evidence and is part of the court record of the proceeding.
[5] The statutory fiat in s.98(6) creates somewhat of a conundrum. If the PCA report generated under s. 98 is evidence and part of the court record of the proceeding, how does a judge tipsie toe around this fact to exclude as evidence, part or all of the report of the assessment. In the present case, regardless of the ostensible objective of the voir dire, that is indirectly what is being asked, by making the content of the report that is opinion of the assessor not be permitted as evidence, on the basis that the assessor is not qualified as an expert to give such opinion.
[6] This difficulty is exacerbated by the questions put to the assessor in the order made under s.98, namely:
a) Does the mother have the ability or capacity to parent the child as well as meet the demands of a child with Leukemia?
b) If the mother alone does not have the ability or capacity, does the mother, in combination with the maternal grandmother have the ability or capacity to parent the child?
c) If the mother does not have the ability or capacity currently, will she be able to develop that ability or capacity, what is the likelihood that she will do so and in what time frame?
d) Do the attributes of the child and any psychological, medical or behavioural issues of the child impact or limit the mother's abilities or capacities to parent?
e) Does the mother have any psychological, psychiatric, cognitive, or other disorder or condition which would prevent her from providing appropriate care for the child? As well, if such delays or concerns exist, the impact this would have upon the mother's ability to acquire the skills or abilities necessary to parent?
f) What is the psychological profile of the mother, including any propensity towards unstable behaviour and substance abuse? If the mother has a propensity toward unstable behaviour or substance abuse, is it possible to make any predictions as to reoccurrence?
g) If it is determined that the mother does not currently have the ability or capacity to parent the child, but may at some future date, what services or skills, if any, would be needed for the mother to be able to appropriately care for the child and what is the likelihood of success?
h) Attachment and bonding issues as they relate to the child and the mother. What is the extent of the child's attachment to the mother, and the bonding between the child and the mother? Is the child capable of successfully attaching with someone other than the mother?
i) If it is determined that the mother could care with the assistance of the maternal grandmother, what
skills and characteristics would be required of that the maternal grandmother, what degree of assistance would be required and what is the likelihood that the mother could maintain a cooperative and stable relationship with the maternal grandmother or any other caregiver; and,
j) any other issue that the Assessor, in the Assessor's opinion, feels should be addressed
[7] It does not take much acumen to infer that most, if not all, of the questions asked of the assessor involve his opinion. So it is not unexpected that the assessor would answer with his opinions based on what he found through performing the assessment. I should say that the assessment process was typical of other assessment processes in that it involved meeting with the mother, conducting a number of psychometric tests, mostly typical ones conducted in parenting capacity assessments, scoring these tests, making clinical observations of the mother, of the mother and the child interacting, and obtaining other historical and current information from collaterals, in this case mostly supplied by the children’s aid society. It was all bundled up in his report, and from the foregoing, the assessor answered the questions put to him as best he could, almost always in the form of his opinion.
[8] As the judge at this voir dire at this stage of the case, the thought comes to me that perhaps this voir dire should have been held before the judge who made the s.98 order. However, that is clearly water already under the bridge and the ruling is left to this court.
[9] The law that relates to expert evidence is not the law that relates to qualifying a person as an expert. The former is quoted by other jurists who have a knack for being concise and precise, so I do not hesitate to plagiarize from them (especially in this age of cut and paste). Most notable is my sister judge P. Jones in her comprehensive decision of Children’s Aid Society, Region of Halton, v. J.B., [2018] O.J. No. 6760, 2018 ONCJ 884 which referred to other jurisprudence thus (at paragraphs 10 and 11):
“ …. the two leading cases which set out the test to be applied at the voir dire stage to decide whether to admit expert opinion evidence are R. v. Mohan, [1994] 2 S.C.R. 9 and White Burgess Langille Inman v. Abbott and Haliburton Co., 2015 SCC 23, [2015] 2 S.C.R. 182.
“ Justice Forestall in R. v. Millard, 2018 ONSC 4410 succinctly captures the current approach to the admissibility of expert evidence in paragraphs 36, and 37, of that decision. He wrote:
[36] Opinion evidence is presumptively inadmissible and the party seeking to introduce it bears the onus of establishing its admissibility on the balance of probabilities.
[37] Laskin J.A. in [R. v. Abbey[^1]] set out the framework for the determination of the admissibility of expert evidence:
Expert evidence is admissible when:
(1) It meets the threshold requirements of admissibility, which are:
a. The evidence must be logically relevant;
b. The evidence must be necessary to assist the trier of fact;
c. The evidence must not be subject to any other exclusionary rule;
d. The expert must be properly qualified, which includes the requirement that the expert be willing and able to fulfil the expert's duty to the court to provide evidence that is:
i. Impartial,
ii. Independent, and
iii. Unbiased.
e. For opinions based on novel or contested science or science used for a novel purpose the underlying science must be reliable for that purpose.
and
(2) The trial judge, in a gatekeeper role, determines that the benefits of admitting the evidence outweigh its potential risks, considering such factors as:
a. Legal relevance,
b. Necessity,
c. Reliability, and
d. Absence of bias.
[10] One can see from the foregoing framework that there is overlap, or perhaps some redundancy, in the threshold requirements for admissibility of expert evidence, and in the cost benefit analysis placed on the judge as a gatekeeper of the evidence to be admitted. “Relevance” of the evidence is a factor in both. So also are ‘necessity” to the trier of fact, and absence of “bias”.
[11] Justice Jones continues at paragraph 12 of J.B.
“ Given the real risk that a miscarriage of justice will arise from the too- ready admission of unreliable expert opinion evidence into the trial record for consideration by the triers of fact (examples of which are documented in the Goudge and Motherisk reports), trial judges, as gatekeepers, have been directed to actively scrutinize the credentials of the expert and the nature of the opinion evidence sought to be adduced at the front end by way of a voir dire. The purpose of doing so is clear--it is to weed out unreliable opinion evidence that would offer little benefit to the trial process given its unreliability, and might distort and prejudice the fact-finding process”
[12] And she concludes, and, relevant to the opinion evidence in the present case, states (at paragraph 17)
“Given the serious risks of a miscarriage of justice associated with the admission of unreliable opinion evidence, I am satisfied that the White Burgess test for the admission of expert opinion evidence applies equally to court ordered expert opinion evidence.
[13] What I take from all of the foregoing is that weeding out unreliable opinion evidence is a function of the trial judge. While I am the trial judge, I am now dealing only with the qualification of the author of the PCA report as an expert in the field of expertise in which he is tendered. The test of admissibility of expert evidence is two fold. The first has five threshold requirements. My role in this voir dire is to deal with the fourth requirement, namely:
The expert must be properly qualified, which includes the requirement that the expert be willing and able to fulfil the expert's duty to the court to provide evidence that is:
ii. Impartial,
ii. Independent, and
iii. Unbiased.
[14] Of note is that the words “properly qualified” do not just mean “judicially qualified” as an expert. They refer also to academic and experiential credentials, and registration with a governing body in the area of expertise. They explicitly include a willingness and ability to fulfil the expert’s duty to the court. And that duty is to provide to the court evidence that is impartial, independent and unbiased.
[15] Ultimately, my decision is not to qualify Mr. Dahl as an expert in the filed in which he is tendered as an expert and for the reasons below.
Academic and Professional Qualifications
[16] Mr. Dahl has a Master’s degree [^2] in counselling psychology. His governing body, the College of Alberta Psychologists [^3], list and define seven branches of the field of psychology: (1) Educational/Social (2) Clinical/Counselling (3) Forensic (4) Neuropsychology (5) Health (6) Rehabilitation (7) Industrial/Organization. By his own admission, Mr. Dahl is in the second category of psychologists, namely Clinical/Counseling. The description of this category of psychology is
“ The application of psychological knowledge, skills and judgment to alleviate maladjustment, disability and discomfort as well as to promote human adaptation, adjustment and personal development”
[17] This describes an area that is a ‘hands on’ healing area of the practice of psychology. While an assessment is likely an inevitable first step in any healing or treatment, one has to question whether the parenting capacity assessment is a primary or secondary aspect of this area of practice. That is not to say that conducting such assessments are beyond the scope of this area of practice. The more pertinent question is whether as a clinical/counselling psychologist, Mr. Dahl has ‘expertise’ in the parenting capacity assessment portion of this area of practice.
[18] The College’s description of what falls within the branch of Forensic psychology seems more suited to the type of expertise that is required in order to give an opinion in the legal context of this case. The description is
“The application of psychological knowledge, skills and judgment about human behaviour to the understanding, assessment, diagnosis and/or treatment of individuals within the context of criminal and/or legal matters”
Mr. Dahl stated quite definitely that he was not a Forensic psychologist.
[19] While Mr. Dahl has performed approximately 200 PCA’s to date, about 25% of which involved cognitive testing, and while he has done over 300 cognitive tests [^4] in his career to date, this does not necessarily equate to expertise sufficient to give an opinion based on such tests in the context of legal proceedings. It may, however, give him the necessary degree of expertise to explain how someone who scores like the mother scored in this case would perform as a parent to a child like a child in this case. While this may seem like splitting hairs, there is a difference. The court needs an expert when it needs information that it does not ordinarily possess. A psychologist who administers and scores tests, and interprets the results, and has the advantage of clinical observations, and many years of experience can be of great help to the court short of giving specific opinions on specific persons.
[20] Mr. Dahl candidly admitted that he had no professional publications in his career as a psychologist, peer reviewed or otherwise. His main education and experience in the use of PCA’s came in a two day seminar in 2010, and in six to nine months of ‘shadowing’ a more established psychologist transitioning to performing these himself and being monitored by this individual. This was followed up by a series of two hour long professional development sessions in 2012 and another series in 2018, both geared to parenting assessments. Although he was qualified as an expert by about a dozen Alberta judges between 2013 and 2020, and apparently in child protection cases that involved parenting capacity assessments or parenting assessments, this does not give much detail on what his opinions were about and he conceded that he had no feedback on whether his opinions in these court appearances were accepted or rejected or had any impact at all.
[21] In summary, Mr. Dahl has a Master’s degree, somewhat short of what would be required in Ontario for qualification as an expert. His area of practice within the field of Psychology is Clinical/Counseling which, while it relies on assessments of individuals, such assessments are aids to what his area of practice is mostly concerned with, namely alleviating mental health problems and promoting better mental health. His training in PCA’s, while not scanty is not impressive from the point of view of whether he has expertise. He has not published at all professionally and not in the area of PCA or parenting assessments. Although he has completed an impressive number of PCA’s, and although he was qualified by Alberta courts as an expert, the PCA’s were clearly for non legal purposes, and of the less than twenty relating to which he was qualified as an expert, there is no evidence of what the courts did with his testimony or what the testimony was about. Finally, he is not a forensic psychologist, who is much more suited, in my view, to be qualified as an expert in court proceedings than is Mr. Dahl.
Impartiality, Independence and Unbiased
[22] Of more concern, from the perspective of judicially qualifying Mr. Dahl as an expert is his understanding of for whom he works. He was questioned on a statement he made to the mother at their first interview as follows:
“This writer clarified that, although I am an independent psychologist, I am working for Children’s Services and the report that I complete is provided to them and owned by them.”
[23] He was questioned on this in the voir dire and confirmed his belief. While this may be an appropriate belief in Alberta, it is not in Ontario. In Ontario, the court appoints an assessor and the report of that assessment is the property of the court in the sense that it is evidence in the proceeding and forms part of the court record. Mr. Dahl may have received remuneration for his PCA of the mother from the applicant society, but he was not to be working for the society and his PCA was not its property. I do not fault Mr. Dahl as he practices in Alberta and not in Ontario. It was incumbent on the society to clarify to Mr. Dahl what his role was and for whom he was performing it.
[24] In fact, he was tendered as an “expert”. Rule 20.3 of the Ontario Family Law Rules apply to a court appointed expert. Rule 20.3(9) (b) excludes the application of Rule 20.3 to a person appointed as an assessor under s.98 CYFSA. Whether Rule 20.3 applies to an assessor appointed under s.98 of the CYFSA who is tendered as an expert in a court proceeding is a question to which I have no answer (and no case law I have been able to find to assist me). However, a Rule 20.3 expert must file a Form 20.2 which is an acknowledgement of expert’s duty. It is a useful form and is unequivocal in setting out what the expert signing such form is actually doing in the court proceeding in which he or she is participating. Form 20.2 provides a statement identifying by whom the expert has been retained and, among other things, the following acknowledgements:
That in relation to the proceeding it is the expert’s duty to provide
(a) opinion evidence that is fair, objective and non-partisan,
(b) opinion evidence that is related to matters that are within my area of expertise: and
(c) such additional assistance as the court may reasonably require to determine a matter in issue
and that the duty referred to above prevails over any obligation which I may owe to any party by whom or on whose behalf I am engaged,
[25] No Form 20.2 was signed by Mr. Dahl and he was never made aware of it. The society took the position that Form 20.2 was not required from Mr. Dahl under the Family Law Rules, and perhaps rightly so, from a technical standpoint. However, its absence, or at least the lack of the kinds of acknowledgements contained in such form, may have contributed to a misunderstanding by Mr. Dahl in what he was ordered to do. While this does not necessarily mean that what he did was tantamount to any dereliction of his duty, it creates undesirable optics when it is juxtaposed to his statement set out in paragraph [22] above and his answers in cross examination on this point.
[26] That is not all that is disquieting about this aspect of Mr. Dahl’s expertise. In cross examination in the voir dire, it appears that Mr. Dahl received from the applicant society a number of documents that were not solicited by him, or if they were, he could not recall. In any event, he acknowledges that he did receive some materials including a letter from the society’s lead child protection worker from which he quoted several passages in his PCA report. These were not, by any means neutral passages, and Mr. Dahl conceded that he accepted the information in this letter as reflective of the actual state of affairs that were described. In addition, Mr. Dahl received and reviewed a number of medical and psychological reports authored by others that related to the mother, as he was entitled to do. He also received from the society numerous police reports from two police services and, importantly, “multiple court applications sworn affidavits, and Child Protection status reviews” all sent to him without his formal request. He indicated he had received nothing from the mother or her counsel, but stated that he interviewed her (including observing her and conducting psychometric testing of her) several times in February. The overall impression is that he had substantially more material from the society than from the mother. Unfortunately he did not provide any schedule these materials or any details of what they were. So it is inviting, but admittedly speculative, to infer that whatever he got was slanted in favour of the society, which of course, is adverse in interest to the mother. Mr. Dahl confirmed that he did nothing to corroborate any of the information he received aside from his interviews with the mother and collaterals.
[27] In summary, this court does not have the comfort of the assessors written acknowledgement of his impartiality and lack of bias. He stated to the mother, and confirmed at the voir dire, that he is working for a litigant in doing the PCA, namely the society. His receipt of materials that were undocumented by him in any relevant detail but were received from one litigant only casts a pall on whether any bias was created and existed in his mind, perhaps even without his awareness. More to the point, he did not acknowledge that he completed the PCA for the court, and that this duty prevailed over his duty to any other party.
Ontario Order for Assessment – Legislative and Regulatory Changes
[28] In yet another way, there are some problems with qualifying Mr. Dahl as an expert in this proceeding. And I preface this by saying it is no fault of his. It has more to do with the differences between provinces, legislative and regulatory changes, and the order that was made for the assessment. At the time that the Ontario order for the assessment was made (13 Dec 2019), the CFSA had been repealed and the new CYFSA was in force (as of April 30, 2018). The CFSA contained a provision in s.54(1.4) that was included verbatim in the CYFSA in its s.98(6) set out below:
S.98 (6) An order under subsection (1) and the assessment required by that order shall comply with such requirements as may be prescribed.
[29] In fact, there was a regulation made under the CFSA, namely O. Reg. 25/07, that contained a number of provisions that related to the order for an assessment, as well as the assessment itself and the report of that assessment. Alas, that regulation was revoked by O. Reg 160/18 as of either April 3,2018 or April 30, 2018. No replacement regulation was made, or if it was, its location is too well hidden from me, and I suspect from Mr. Dahl and from the applicant society. As a result, the order made for an assessment on 13 December 2019 bears little resemblance to the formal assessment orders that were previously made under the CFSA. Moreover, the requirements under O. Reg 25/07 of the assessments that were done under the CFSA no longer applied. These requirements included, among others:
➢ The reason why the assessment is necessary
➢ What questions specifically require recommendations
➢ A resume outlining information outlining the type and number of assessments previously conducted
➢ A list of the materials provided and considered
[30] A further twist in this tale of legislative and regulatory changes is that effective April 30, 2018, a CYFSA s.98 Endorsement Sheet [^5] came into effect which contains almost verbatim all of the requirements that were contained in the revoked O. Reg 25/07. While this is not given a Form Number, it is found in the Ontario Court Forms website under the heading “CYFSA Endorsement Sheets”. Presumably, it applies to orders for assessment made under s.98. The actual order made in this case does not follow this endorsement form. [^6]
[31] Mr. Dahl admitted that he had the order for the assessment, but that is all he had. He was not privy to the Ontario statute, nor to any Ontario regulations, nor to any Ontario Forms or Endorsements. The main reason why he was appointed to conduct the assessment in Alberta was because the mother resides in Calgary, and it makes sense from a practical point of view that an Alberta psychologist perform it.
[32] In summary, the order was deficient, or at least suspect. The assessment report was deficient in that it did not provide all of the information that was required. The knowledge of Mr. Dahl, the assessor, was deficient because he was from another province, would not have known of Ontario requirements, and no one in this case told him about them. In addition, some blame can be laid to the province of Ontario which did not fill the gap that resulted from the revoking of O. Reg 25/07. The result is that all of this adds another element to the lack of expertise that is attributed to Mr. Dahl.
Conclusions
[33] For the above reasons, I decline to qualify Mr. John Dahl as an expert in the field of parenting capacity assessments prepared by him as a psychologist. There is nothing statutorily of which I am aware that requires a court to qualify a person as an expert. If the person tendered as an expert has met all of the criteria set out in the jurisprudence, there is an almost presumption that he will be accepted and qualified as an expert by the court. However, even then, it is up to the discretion of the court to make that expert qualification. In the present case, there are several reasons why the pre-requisites in the jurisprudence have not been met or are questionable. In the end, they are sufficient for me to not accept Mr. Dahl as an expert in parenting assessment or parenting capacity assessment.
[34] This is not a rejection of his parenting capacity assessment report. It is merely a ruling on this voir dire. The expectation was and still remains that Mr. Dahl will return as a witness as the author of a PCA that he authored and that he will be cross examined on that report. What the court will do with that report is a decision for another day.
Released: Feb. 19, 2021 Signed: “Justice John Kukurin”
Footnotes
[^1]: R. v. Abbey, [1982] S.C.J. No. 59, [1982] A.C.S. no 59, [1982] 2 S.C.R. 24, [1982] 2 R.C.S. 24, 138 D.L.R. (3d) 202, 43 N.R. 30 (SCC) [^2]: In Ontario, a person with a Master’s degree could only attain the qualification of Associate Psychologist. An autonomous Psychologist requires a doctoral degree. See https://cpo.on.ca/applicants/how-to-apply/supervised-practice-psychological-associate/ [^3]: https://www.cap.ab.ca/Portals/0/pdfs/Definitions%20Branches%20Activities%20(March%2019,%202016).pdf [^4]: In his evidence, Dr. Dahl was asked whether cognitive tests and intellectual functioning tests were within the purview of what are referred to as psychometric tests, and he agreed that they were. Test he administered and scored and interpreted in this case included, for example, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS IV) for cognitive functioning, the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI 2 RF) for patterns of personality and psychological disorders, and the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI IV) to test for psychopathology and specific disorders in the DSM-V. [^5]: See http://ontariocourtforms.on.ca/en/family-law-rules-forms/ [^6]: Although not raised in tis voir dire, there has been another change relating to PCA’s. In Huron-Perth CAS v. A.C. [2020] O.J. No. 2408, 2020 ONCJ 251 (Neill Ont CJ) Justice Neill says at paragraph 91:
“On August 22, 2019, the Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services issued a Policy Directive regarding parenting capacity assessments in child protection matters, including the following requirements for societies: [Partial list included below]
* Societies shall identify all parenting capacity assessments that are in progress and all parenting capacity assessments that have been completed in cases that are still before the court, and take the following steps with respect to the assessor(s):
(a) For individuals who have identified themselves as being a member of a regulatory body for a particular profession or professions, verify their representation of their professional credentials in accordance with the requirement set out in this directive, and
(b) Where concerns are identified with respect to an individual's representation of their professional credentials, follow the requirements set out in this directive.
* Reporting: By September 30, 2019, each society shall confirm in writing to the ministry that it has implemented the requirements in this directive.