Research Seminar - The impact of service disparities on First Nations children with complex needs living on reserves, their families, and their communities: a case study

First Nations children experience denials, delays, and disruption of services ordinarily available to other Canadian children in similar circumstances. Service disparities are a result of geography (distance from a service hub), program administration and policy design (division of responsibilities, etc.), and funding disparities between provincially and federally provided services. The discrimination of First Nations children in the system for the provision of public services is a pressing social issue that violates First Nations children’s human, constitutional, and Treaty rights. In this seminar, we will present preliminary findings from a research project carried out in collaboration with Pinaymootang First Nation, an Anishinaabe band from Manitoba’s Interlake Region. We explore the services available to children with complex needs living in the community and to their primary caregivers, and argue that current policy forces the community’s service providers to function in a context of excessive burden, uncertainty, and risk. We conclude that severe service disparities remain a pressing human rights concern and argue that community-level data is the key to developing policies that better ensure that all Canadian children have access to the services they need regardless of their race, Status, or place of residence (on or off reserve).

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