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Court allows class action by disabled kids' parents
FROM CANADIAN PRESS
A group of Ontario parents who were forced to surrender custody of their severely disabled children in
order to access specialized care have been allowed to pursue a class-action lawsuit against the provincial
government.
At its helm will be Anne Larcade, a mother from Huntsville, Ont., who was told six years ago that giving up
her mentally disabled son was the only way to get the province to pay for residential treatment.
"This case gives the right for us to access justice and be heard," said Larcade, who was forced to
temporarily give up custody of 9-year-old Alexandre in 1999.
"These are people that are heroes, looking after children we love. We should be given human compassion
and respect, and our time would be better spent to help our children than fighting in court."
Alexandre, who was returned to his mother's care after one year, suffers from a rare degenerative
neurological disorder that makes it difficult for him to speak, move or see. He is now 15 and living in a
group home.
Alexandre was forced into the care of Children's Aid two years after a minister with the former Conservative
government under former premier Mike Harris unilaterally cancelled a program that would have covered
his treatment costs.
Without the program, known as the Special Needs Agreement, disabled children can only get help if
classified as "in need of protection" — a designation which entailed the children being taken from their
parents and placed under the control of child welfare authorities.
Douglas Elliott, Larcade's lawyer, said there are likely hundreds of families across the province that have
been forced to give up their children.
The Ontario government had fought against the effort to certify the class action, winning support last June
from a Superior Court judge who ruled that individual suits would better answer the question of whether
the province had the right to cancel the program.
But the Divisional Court overturned that ruling in a unanimous decision issued late Friday, saying it made
much more sense to put the hundreds of claims together in a single class action.
"Requiring separate actions for all claimants would likely prove to be an obstacle to justice for the
hundreds of potential plaintiffs," Justice Anne Molloy wrote in her eight-page ruling.
"They are, by definition, parents who have been unable to provide for their own children's special needs.
What, then, can be inferred about their financial ability to carry on this sophisticated litigation against the
government?"
Encouraging the families to file hundreds of individual, but similar, cases would also "be an inefficient use
of court resources" and "risk inconsistent verdicts," Molloy wrote.
Elliott said he hopes the certification will spur Ontario's Liberal government to resume the program
immediately and sit down with the families to negotiate compensation.
The Liberals sympathized with families when the party was in opposition, Elliott said, but has yet to do
anything to reverse a policy he called "both stupid and cruel."
"We were led to believe they were going to fix it when they got into office, but so far they've just continued
the same approach that the Harris government has, which is to fight these families in court tooth and nail,"
he said.
"The whole thing doesn't make any sense. I just wish (Children Services Minister Marie) Bountrogianni
would get a little backbone and do something about resolving this."
Bountrogianni has said she wants to resolve the dispute, but will wait for an ombudsman's report that
investigated the parents' complaints.
Elliott said he is set to meet with a judge June 6 to work out the notification process so families affected by
the ruling can decide if they want to participate in the class action.
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