Photos showing rudimentary rooms with beds separated by screens and walls that do not go up to the ceiling raise eyebrows and raise many questions about the reality of young people who attend the rehabilitation centers of the DPJ.
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The photos obtained by TVA Nouvelles were taken in 2020 at the Edgar-Laforest rehabilitation center in Drummondville. Since then, bed bases have appeared and blue bins for storing personal effects have given way to plastic drawers.
In a letter addressed to the Director of Youth Protection for Mauricie-Centre-du-Québec last December and of which TVA obtained a copy, we can read that eight young people live in a weight room and a playground. Others have been installed in an appeasement room and a relaxation room.
If the CIUSSS-MCQ defends itself by saying that young people are only passing through, the president of the APTS union, Véronique Neth, says that they are sometimes there for up to six months.
At the Charles-Édouard-Bourgeois protection and rehabilitation center in Trois-Rivières, a young person even had to sleep in the living room, behind screens.
“Imagine if you were asked overnight to take your equipment, to put it in garbage bags, that you were brought between two screens and told that this is your new living environment, how you must be feeling?, Ms. Neth imagined. We are very, very touched for these young people who are ultimately in very difficult conditions.
The director of the youth-family program at the CIUSSS said that this space between the screens is only for sleeping. For Nathalie Garon, the important thing is that young people have access to services. “It is important for us that young people have access to different professionals. I am talking about psychologists, social workers, psychoeducators, nurses”, she listed.
Last week, at the end of its resources, the union went directly to the Minister for Health and Social Services, Lionel Carmant. In its letter, the union argues that these living conditions would never be accepted from a foster family.
Meanwhile, the CIUSSS does not believe in an outside group home for these young people. It is believed that the number of young people will decline as the pandemic wanes. However, retained reports have been on the rise for several years and experts agree that the harmful effects of the pandemic on our young people will be felt for several years to come.
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Reference-www.journaldemontreal.com