Vision

Ontario is building a child and family services system that ensures more families stay together and that children and youth in care have the support they need to be safe, succeed and thrive.

Goals

Working in partnership with the child welfare, residential and community-based services sectors to build a coordinated range of services that strengthen families, focusing on community-based prevention and early intervention services. These services will be high quality, culturally appropriate and truly responsive to the needs of children, youth and families.

When children and youth cannot remain at home, they will be supported through family-based placements wherever possible. The overall quality of care they receive from children’s aid societies and residential services, such as foster care or group care, will be improved. The system will provide children and youth in care with the supports they need to be safe, succeed and thrive as they transition from care to adulthood.

Outcomes

The strategy looks to achieve the following outcomes for families:

  • Safety: children and youth are safe, achieved by the least intrusive means
  • Voice: children, youth and families are respected, have their voices heard and their needs met
  • Permanency and stability: children and youth are safely connected to their families, communities and cultures
  • Wellbeing: children, youth and families are supported in their communities to thrive while meeting key developmental and educational milestones

The redesign also seeks successful outcomes for the child welfare system, including:

  • Quality: children and youth are supported to grow through high quality, consistent services that meet their needs
  • Decreasing disparities for overrepresented groups: such as reducing the number of days in care for Black, racialized, First Nations, Inuit, Métis and LGBT2SQ youth
  • Sustainability: the sector is sustainable, efficient, effective, accountable and flexible enough to adjust to the new reality following COVID, like digital service delivery

Learn more about the progress so far in transforming Ontario’s child welfare system.