– Child welfare services drove our daughter to Oslo to get high – Greater Oslo

– Twenty years ago you had to seek out the right environment to get an offer of drugs. Now they sit in bed and order on the phone, says a tearful mother.

On Tuesday, she was one of many mothers who told a gathering of Barnevern-Norge about children who disappear into the intoxication of child welfare.

In several online cases and a Brennpunkt document, NRK has revealed how many children end up as drug addicts in child care.

Following these revelations, the government has put forward a new strategy for Norwegian child protection going forward.

And on Tuesday, Minister for Children and Families Kjersti Toppe called in an emergency meeting to discuss measures to overcome the drug problems in the institutions.

There were institution owners, professionals, interest organisations, bureaucrats and relatives.

At the meeting, the mother of one of the young people NRK has spoken to said that one institution facilitated the daughter’s addiction:

– We have an absurd case of our daughter saying she was going to get drunk on the night of 17 May. It ended with employees driving her to Oslo, then at least they knew where she was.

One of the mothers present was Kirsti Skogsholm. She lost her daughters Mina and Mille to an overdose last year.

She was crystal clear at the meeting about what she believes:

– If my children hadn’t ended up in a child welfare institution, I wouldn’t be sitting here. Because then Mina and Mille would live.

Need to learn about drugs

The mothers were invited by Minister for Children and Families Kjersti Toppe (Sp). Together with, among others, several who run child welfare institutions.

The goal was to come up with ideas for solutions to help the children in question.

And everyone at the meeting agreed on the first step: child care must learn more about substance abuse.

Marcus Andersen, who has himself been in child protection, believes they must understand the language of the young. The code words for intoxication. Which emojis represent which drugs.

– If you search for them on snapchat, you will find people selling it in your area. It’s that easy to get hold of, he says.

Marcus was part of a committee that has come up with proposals for how child care can be changed.

And on Tuesday he was at the meeting to find solutions.

Parental contact and cooperation

There were, among other things, the following inputs:

• Better training about substance abuse for employees in child welfare.
• Own parent contact. The parents who were invited called for a relative contact in the institutions, who can also assist the parents in a crisis.
• More healthcare. Some of the actors believe that the healthcare system must be given a duty to help to a greater extent. Some want them to take over responsibility for the children who become intoxicated, others that they should work together with child protection in the institutions.
• Intoxication cannot stand in the way. Today, addiction is seen as a major problem, not a symptom. Children are, for example, refused psychological help or examination for other diagnoses if they become intoxicated. That must change, say the actors.
• Common rules. Several people at the meeting said that there are big variations in how rules and laws are interpreted. For example, when it comes to whether young people can be refused to leave the institution or meet certain friends. In addition, the State Administrator in several counties has reached different conclusions about the use of coercion.
• More resources. Many, but especially the elected representatives, believe that increased staffing is needed in child protection. Then there will be less replacement and more security for the children.
• Help with “coercion”. Today, for example, consent is required from the children even if they are to undergo drug treatment or be shielded from others at the institution. Both parents and staff believe that both parts must be made easier, even if the children themselves say no.

– Boundaries are needed

In a normal home, parents set boundaries.

For mobile use. Inside times. Which friends they can invite home.

This is lacking in child protection, according to several of those who were at the meeting on Tuesday.

– Many former foster children have said that «they should have stopped me when they knew I was going out to get high,» says the Secretary General Jasmin Agovic-Nordaas in the National Association for children in child care.

– These are young people who are unable to make good choices, and then we have to help them, said one of the mothers present.

But in practice, child protection has fewer tools than parents, believes Rune Midtgård in Humana. The company operates several childcare institutions throughout the country.

Smartphones and social media make it extra difficult, according to him.

– We need rules that give the opportunity to limit the use of social media, when necessary, he mentions as a possible measure.