When it comes to child welfare, social work experts and parents in B.C. say we’re investing in the wrong end of the system — pouring money into foster care instead of offering adequate support to vulnerable families, many of whom are Indigenous.

“We’re willing to give strangers just about anything to look after kids,” says Jeannine Carriere, a social work professor at the University of Victoria, who is Métis. “But we have this blockage when it comes to supporting families.”

As part of a collaborative investigation into B.C.’s child-welfare system, journalists from the Discourse, The Tyee and Star Vancouver asked parents whether they felt they were getting adequate support — financial and otherwise — before their kids were apprehended by B.C. social workers.

Of the 30 parents who filled out our questionnaire, 29 told us they weren’t getting the support they needed. Only one parent told us the question wasn’t applicable because she and her husband were “financially stable” and had “no issues.”