We are failing our children.
That’s about the only conclusion that can be drawn from some startling statistics from Child Find Ontario, that show 20,526 children missing in Ontario in 2008.
The vast majority —15,489 — were runaways. Even more startling, however, is the fact that nearly 5,000 cases have been classified as “unknown or other,” meaning that police were not given enough information by caregivers to determine exactly what had happened to the missing child.
This really boils down to one thing - there are thousands of children in Ontario who feel they are living in such horrible conditions that running away seems like a good alternative.
Is that not a frightening thought?
As for the 5,000 “unknown or other” children who go missing, this speaks to situations where the parents, foster parents or other caregivers don’t care enough about those missing children to know where they are — or are conducting illegal, criminal activities where these children are living.
While we often hear about the cases of stranger or parental abduction, we don’t often hear about the runaways, the children that the world has forgotten, the ones who slip through the cracks.
That is unspeakably sad.
What is even sadder is the realization that children’s aid societies across Ontario are facing cutbacks in their front-line staff — the workers who actually go and investigate homes of at-risk children.
How in the world are we going to intervene and help these children before they run away from home, and become easy targets for drug dealers and pimps in our cities?
We need to do more for the children who are being raised by those who care more for the welfare cheque than the welfare of their children.
It’s either that, or sit still while another 42 children run away from home, each and every day.