The argument over the closure of the Victoria Youth Custody Centre is over and we lost.
Many groups, including this newspaper, campaigned through May and June against the closure, but it took effect this month nonetheless.
There’s not much to be gained now from dwelling on it.
But there’s one aspect of the story that played out over the past few months that still rankles, and should be kept in mind.
It’s the misleading way the timing of the closure was framed by Minister of Children and Family Development Stephanie Cadieux.
There were rumours swirling for months that the 12-year-old View Royal facility was to be shut down. They reached the ears of some local MLAs and they asked the minister directly in the legislature about the issue.
To be precise, Cadieux was asked on March 24 by NDP MLA Carole James: “Are there any changes planned right now for the existing youth justice structure in the province, including any facility changes? Is there any consideration being given to any changes to programs and services or to facilities?”
Cadieux consulted briefly with the senior staff who were on hand beside her in the committee room and responded. She cited the 70 per cent decline in youth custody over the years, saying it was obviously good news, but did create some challenges. She said the ministry is “re-examining” how to provide services.
“But that said, at this point, we have no plan in place to make any significant changes because we’re still looking at what our options are to maintain the best service for the youth that we do have in custody.”
To be precise once again, that answer is completely misleading.
It sounded phoney when she said it, and newly surfaced paperwork shows unmistakably the decision was well in hand months before she reassured everyone there was no plan in place.
The B.C. Government Employees Union applied for the documentation on the closure decision, and as colleague Lindsay Kines detailed on the weekend, the paper trail shows the decision was well in the works and had been exhaustively canvassed by senior officials months earlier.
There was a lengthy briefing note prepared for the minister herself last winter, seeking final sign-off to close the centre on Dec. 4.
There was a memo from November, in which the deputy minister approved the form letter that was all set to go to employees outlining their options and the reasons for the closure.
They didn’t make the December target, but the memos show the ministry continued working toward getting final cabinet approval in February. It was finally made public on April 28.
The ministry’s response to the confirmation is nothing short of lame. It said the correspondence amounts to staff exploring options before getting cabinet approval, which didn’t happen formally until the spring. Therefore, there was no “official plan” until cabinet approved the closure.
So “no plan in place” is accurate, if you accept “in place” to mean formally approved by cabinet. If anyone decides to make an issue of this, that’s the defence they’ll offer and it will likely succeed.
But that kind of legalistic fallback is tiresome. Why can’t people expect a reasonably straight answer to a direct question?
There was nothing constraining the government from citing the remarkable drop in the custody rate and acknowledging that it was obviously considering operational changes to reflect it.
The ministry’s other point is easier to accept: It would have been premature to discuss the closure before the options had been considered.
But there’s a difference between needlessly alarming staff about career changes that haven’t been decided, and misleading them completely by denying that an important decision was well down the road and just needed the final approval.
The BCGEU asked exactly the same question in November and again in January and got the same misleading answer.
And all the options the province says it had to consider before making the final call appear to have been considered internally. There’s no record of any consultation with the community in all of this.
The unfortunate move was accomplished nonetheless. Troubled young people will bear the cost, but so will the minister’s credibility.
