Human Resources Committee on April 19th, 2010

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

I'm sorry, but if I could interject for a minute, Mr. Watson, are you suggesting that for adoptive parents the period or the program we would give would be special and different from what parental leave is now?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

No, this would be in addition to parental leave. There's a maternity benefit, which is 15 weeks beyond the parental. Parental can be shared between two—

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

So you would make it beyond...? You would add to it?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

—but maternity can't be extended to adoptive parents, for obvious reasons. There's even jurisprudence, I think, around that; it can't be called “maternity”. But is there some equivalent benefit, some additional weeks beyond parental leave, that would be available to recognize the significant challenges around attachment?

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thank you.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Raymonde Folco]

Mr. Savage.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Watson, I was going to talk about my experience with adoption here and get your view on that. I have both a brother and a sister who have adopted, one here in Canada, one in China--different circumstances, but in some cases, similar challenges.

I want to get a sense from you of what you expect of this committee. You've outlined it a bit, to be bold, etc., but when this came to the House, I had a chat with you about this because I wasn't sure exactly where this was going to go, and I think it's a worthwhile study. But this committee does have a number of things on its plate. What are your expectations? What would you like to see the committee do in terms of time in studying this motion?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

I have some difficulty answering the question only insofar as I respect that the committee--

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Raymonde Folco]

I would suggest, perhaps, Mr. Watson that you answer that question--

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Oh, I'm sorry, Madam Vice-Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Raymonde Folco]

--as you manage the other questions that you're going to have. I'm sorry, but I have to cut you off.

I'll now go to Madam Beaudin.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Vice-Chair.

Thank you for coming here, Mr. Watson.

As you know, I did rise in the House to speak to your motion. I am pleased with it as it calls for measures that respect Quebec and provincial jurisdictions. I would like to know if you have any information about the costs associated either with an international adoption or with the adoption of a child here in Canada.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you to the member for the question.

I don't know if I have the exact cost, because that will vary by jurisdiction, but it can be a significant cost, particularly when you're getting into international adoption, which can be extremely costly. You could be running as high as $30,000 or $35,000 for an international adoption. But certainly it's not unrealistic to be spending $10,000 to $15,000 with respect to adoption. I think there are other witnesses who can provide more detailed information by jurisdiction on how that goes.

There will be some opportunity for this committee as well to take a look at adoption across the country, and one of the reasons that I think it would be good for this committee is that best practices can be looked at as well. In particular, the Province of Quebec is quite ahead of the rest of the country in this regard, and there may be some lessons learned for the committee in looking at how they handle the issue of adoption.

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you very much.

When you spoke to your motion when it was tabled in the House of Commons, you talked mainly about—as is also the case today—employment insurance as a component of maternity benefits. In Canada, however, adoptive parents are not eligible for 15 weeks of employment insurance.

Is that correct?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

That's correct, though that may not be the only fiscal consideration for the committee in terms of what supports are offered. But certainly, while parental leave is a good starting place for families who adopt children, there are some really difficult challenges, particularly given the older the child is who is being adopted. We could be dealing with multiple caregiver issues, or perhaps prolonged attachment to a biological parent, before there's placement with an adopted family. The older the child is when that happens, of course, the tougher the trauma is of leaving a biological parent.

Attachment is the key issue. If we look at it with an eye to the successful attachment of children and parents, and an equivalency--no distinction, if you will--between biological parenting and biological children and adoptive parenting and adopted children, I think we've really hit the mark there. I would go further. Perhaps you could make an argument that the attachments are far more difficult with adoptive parenting, such that—

[Josée Beaudin, Bloc, Saint-Lambert, QC]

You have partially answered my question and since our time is limited, I would like to ask you one final question, if that's okay with you.

I agree that financial considerations are important, but I would also imagine that you would like parents to have access to services before and after the adoption. Quebec treats adoptive parents the same way as biological parents. Adoptive parents have access to parental benefits. Before and after the adoption, they are even eligible to receive psychological support from our youth centres, as well as being eligible for a refundable tax credit covering 50% of adoption-related expenses, up to a maximum of $10,000.

What concerns me in particular is the fact that your motion claims to recognize and respect provincial and territorial jurisdictions. If this committee is prepared to hear you and recommend measures, I'd like to know if you are prepared to allow Quebec, in this motion, to have the right to withdraw unconditionally from any proposed measures with full compensation.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

I'll have to think about that, because that ultimately would be a decision for what government does with recommendations in terms of how they handle that particular issue. I don't know if it's germane for me, as a sponsor of a motion, to begin to wade into that. Yes, I think I would leave it for our government to answer how they would handle that.

But with respect to post-adoption supports and funding, you've suggested that the tax code may be one way, in terms of a tax credit. I suggested that the entire issue could be put on the agenda, either for first ministers or for relevant ministers to discuss in the next year or so. The tax code may not be the only way to do it. It could be some sort of a funding formula that could be worked out, I don't know. There could be other ways of looking at the issue that would provide support to allow it to be considered. I'll leave the answer at that, though.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Raymonde Folco]

Thank you.

Ms. Chow.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Thank you.

I have a series of questions. I will ask them all and you can pick one.

Right now some parents have been waiting for their adoptions from the country of Nepal. They were told there is a suspension going on. Some of these parents have been waiting for many years. For this country, Nepal, perhaps there were some problems previously, but some of the 2009 adoptions need to be finalized. My office received some calls about that, so I am using this as an example of occasional situations where Canadian families who want to adopt children from some countries lose that opportunity. This could be one of the areas we could study, but Nepal is definitely a problem.

The number two area that I can flag is that the immigration committee last year discussed the issue of how second-generation children, if born abroad, could become non-citizens. For example, if I am born outside of Canada and my adopted child happens to be living in Beijing and has a child there, my granddaughter will become stateless. She will not be a Canadian citizen. That would apply only to adopted kids who come into the country as landed immigrants. This is an area that's a problem. A lot of parents with adopted kids say that it's not fair for their children if they end up having children outside Canada. This is a second area that we might consider.

There is a third area that may be worthy of discussion. I know that a lot of the children's aid societies across Canada--especially the one in Toronto, for example--are looking for foster parents, especially in some of the ethnic communities. Some kind of countrywide promotion of people who want to be foster parents may be an area that this committee or the federal government can look at.

The fourth area that I think may be of interest, and on which I want your comment, is that I know that a higher percentage of teenagers who are from foster homes sometimes get into trouble and end up leaving home. Some of them have great difficulty finding housing when they turn sixteen, so housing for kids who are from adopted or from foster care homes is an area that this committee can possibly look at.

I thought I would present those four areas that came to my mind and see if you can comment on any of them.

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you to the member for the questions.

I'm not sure that I've considered all of those issues myself in putting forward the study. Let me just say first and foremost that ultimately the committee can and will determine in which direction they can go.

There are probably 50 or 100 different issues that have some bearing on adoption or are at least peripheral to it. My overarching sense of this--let me come back to that for a moment, if I could--was that we could examine the system both in terms of federal supports and in terms of the adoption system itself with an eye to seeing how that can be renovated to the new realities. My concern is that the system has some deficiencies, ultimately; it was created for a different time period. Some of these areas may get looked at by the committee. I don't know what you're going to ultimately choose, but how do we bring that system into the 21st century?

Ultimately, I think, I would like to see this put high on the agenda for either a first ministers meeting or for the relevant ministers to begin to look at how we would do this in partnership, because it can't be done in isolation. I know that the study will make recommendations to the federal side only, but looking at how we bring this into the 21st century will require a partnership moving forward.

Those were my original considerations, but it will touch on a number of areas, obviously. It could touch on areas like immigration policy. I think I mentioned in my opening statement the particular concern about how we encourage the consideration of adopting older children. There is typically a preference among parents for an infant or for someone young enough... There are all kinds of challenges.

At one point in our quest to adopt children, my wife and I considered, because my wife is a sign-language interpreter, whether or not we would consider a young deaf child, or an older deaf child, for that matter, because of our ability to meet the language needs. This could go in a number of directions, and I'll be interested to see what the committee ultimately settles on.

If I may add to that, I know that Mr. Savage asked about duration. I don't know how many meetings this will take, but I just don't want it to be a quick study that could miss some of the meaty substance of some of these issues. I know that the calendar can get quite crowded, but hopefully there will be a good amount of time spent on this, both to give it profile and to get into some of the weighty issues in front of the committee.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Do you see the next step being this committee listing three or four key areas and then submitting a report? Because I see this overlapping in some areas, such as Foreign Affairs--which country we should get adopted kids from and which we should--and immigration, etc. So maybe a list and what the parameters of the study are...would that be the first report?

[Jeff Watson, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Are you contemplating...?

Sorry, Madam Chair, I don't know if she's contemplating more reports than one. I wasn't quite sure.

Obviously at the beginning the committee will want to scope out the parameters of its study and apportion a certain number of meetings to the areas they'd like to go into. I don't know if I'll comment to the committee on where they want to go with that. I think I've given you the big picture of what I'd like to see a study incorporate and, obviously, the encouragement to think bigger rather than smaller. The ability to produce a landmark study here, I think, should not be missed by the committee.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Raymonde Folco]

Mr. Komarnicki.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll be sharing my time with Mr. Cannan.

I certainly appreciate this witness sharing his thoughts on this issue. I know that in many ways it's fairly personal.

If I were to break it into two areas as I'm listening to what you'd like to see happen, number one would be to examine the existing supports to see what may need to be done with respect to them and whether they need to be added to, augmented, or changed. That can be done through taxation, direct funding, amendments to the EI act, and that kind of thing. I would say these fall into the category of trying to bring it into the new century here. It's not necessarily big thinking, but that is one part of it.