Evidence of meeting #121 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was support.
A recording is available from Parliament.
NDP
Edmonton Griesbach, CPC
I want to throw it open to all of you. You've all given us a lot of food for thought and some great suggestions. Is there anything else that any one of you think might make our system better, and might get us on the right track?
Mr. Pelletier.
Managing Director, Les amis du crépuscule
We talked earlier about a telephone list. That would be an idea to keep in mind, still in the context of a single point of contact.
There should also be enough funding for the work of people who give their time and who don't have sufficient financial means to do more.
Edmonton Griesbach, CPC
Maybe we could go next to our video conference folks.
Jens.
October15.ca - British Columbia Childloss Support Network
There was a question earlier in terms of experts in this field. I wanted to point out that Canada has six pediatric palliative care hospices that do amazing work in this area. They don't cover miscarriages or stillbirths, but after the birth and terminal illness of children, they provide a lot of support to parents. They do a lot of research. They have a lot of experts and expertise in this area. That might be another area where you could get information from experts on this topic.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
Thank you.
The bells are ringing. I need to ask for unanimous consent to continue for a few more moments and finish up this session.
Edmonton Griesbach, CPC
Again, I'll just open it up to anybody to suggest any other things that we might have missed, any other suggestions to help the system.
Director, Gardens of Grace
I think it would be helpful to remove the need to have the medical certificate signed by a physician in the case of bereavement. I don't feel that physicians should have the choice of whether or not you are entitled to have this 15 weeks off just because they don't think it's a legitimate reason to need to grieve for your child.
Executive Director, H.E.A.R.T.S. Baby Loss Support Program, BriarPatch Family Life Education Centre
Something I'd like to add is bringing up the awareness campaign. I love this idea. I think that when we look at mental health and addiction, when you go back to the root cause of some of those issues, we often see it's grief, many times and most times, I would say. I work at a hospice and I work with families in that situation. Grief is the catalyst for those experiences. I know that anything that you bring forward is going to cost the government some money, but I think if you invest in some of the root causes of things happening, and the other money that is spent on other programming may not have to be spent in the long term.
Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, Lib.
Thank you.
I'll follow up on what my colleague Blake Richards mentioned about a family having to tell their story 17 times—I believe that is what you said. We talked a lot about a guichet unique, a one-stop shop. Given we're in 2018 now, could leveraging technology help in that regard?
What I'm trying to get to is we're much more comfortable now using online platforms, whether it be Facebook, support groups, to reach out. Would it assist people to have the option of using technology to perhaps file the requests for various benefits and services, and to do everything online? They would do it once. Some people want to use the phone. They want to talk to people and tell their story as part of the healing and so on. I know Philippe is probably going to jump in here, but I'm just thinking of that. What if we had an online portal where you put your story in once and various organizations pop up, almost an aggregate of what's available based on your postal code and so on.
Now I have a whole bunch of ideas, but Philippe, if you could jump in, that would be great.
As an Individual
Sure. Wendy had some ideas, but she has a cold so she can't talk.
We recently had a new daughter who you met. When a child is born, you're given all these little forms to fill out, and at the end of the form it lists the URLs you have to go to to ask for this card or that card or the SIN to be issued. To have something similar, upon the passing of a child, that would be given to you by the hospital, just a piece of paper with different URLs, or even just the one central URL like you're proposing now that would link to everyone else, I think would be immensely beneficial to all of us.
We can't even count how many times we've had to tell this story, and not just for the purposes of these hearings, but in general. Telling it once would have been great.
Founding Director, Gardens of Grace
In the hospitals there are kiosks where you fill out the information to get the birth certificate, the social insurance number and the health card all at once. It would be similar to that, especially if you're in a NICU or PICU situation. If something does happen, it can be done right there, with the help of medical staff. The technology already exists.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bryan May
I'm afraid we don't have any time left for you, Gordie. I'm sorry.
I want to thank everybody both here and coming to us via video conference today, for contributing to this study. It's hard for us on this side to hear some of these stories, so I can only imagine the challenges you are facing telling these stories. Thank you very much.
I would like to remind my colleagues that on November 6 we have committee business. Committee business will be in room 228, Valour, on November 6.
On November 7, from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., we're going to start clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-81. That's going to be in room 415, Wellington Building.
On November 8, at our normal time, 8:45 a.m. to 10:45 a.m., we'll go again to clause-by-clause study of Bill C-81. We could potentially have an afternoon meeting at 3:30 p.m. on November 8, if necessary, to finish the clause-by-clause considerations. Hopefully, we don't need to use that, but that is an option if needed.
Thank you very much, everybody.
The meeting is adjourned.
