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Baby Passing

June 1, 2011 permalink

London CAS workers demanding more funding were met by counter-protesters. The CAS staffers passed a real baby around as a prop for their demands. According participants, the baby was under eight months old, and was handled inexpertly by the social workers. The London Free Press posted a video report on the event that we could not copy. (If you can copy it, please forward it to fixcas, or post it to YouTube).

Pictures of 1 CAS workers, 2 baby (is that the mother?), 3 passing baby around, 4 opposition group,

Source: Facebook (Catherine Frei)

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CAS Protest met with Counter-Protest

Overworked and tired of funding cuts local Children's Aid Society workers took to the streets this afternoon.

Members of OPSEU local 116, representing CAS workers in London and Middlesex protested outside of their Oxford street headquarters over the lunch hour.

Union President, Michelle Halle, says the provincial governments funding model for the agency is broken, making it impossible for them to eliminate their deficit.

Halle says the protest was meant to highlight how overloaded workers are, as well as draw attention to the funding cuts that will see London's last two group homes close.

During the protest, a group protesting the original rally showed up with megaphones demanding greater oversight of the CAS.

At one point London police were called to the protest but no conflicts erupted.

Source: CJBK

Another gathering of CAS workers took place in Sudbury, without the opposition.

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CAS employees face workload worries

Christine Rutherford
Christine Rutherford and about 50 other child protection workers took part in an “information demonstration” downtown Sudbury June 1. Photo by Jenny Jelen.

Christine Rutherford was joined by about 50 other child protection workers from the Children's Aid Society (CAS) June 1 for an “information demonstration” outside the government offices at 159 Cedar St.

She said workers decided to rally to address the workload facing child protection workers.

In Sudbury, there are about 200 front-line workers dealing with 20 to 30 families each.

Rutherford said having such an exhausting caseload means workers can't always give families the attention they need, which is a problem.

“It's trying to do quantitative work in a qualitative environment,” she said.

Due to the different complexities of each case, Rutherford said there isn't an “ideal” number of cases each worker should have, but less than 20 would be a good place to start.

Reducing workers' caseloads would be a step in the right direction to deal with the “crisis” currently facing CAS workers.

Rutherford said the goal of the demonstration was to encourage government involvement in redistributing workloads.

“We don't have all the answers,” Rutherford said. “But we do have suggestions we want to consult with the ministry about.”

At the end of the day, Rutherford said the organization simply wants to “put children first,” and have the time and resources to do so.

Source: Sudbury Northern Life

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