Peguis daycare at the centre of child abuse allegations has been operating without licence By: Ryan Thorpe Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Friday, Jul. 13, 2018 Last Modified: 8:24 PM CDT Friday, Jul. 13, 2018 Updates

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The Peguis First Nation daycare subject to an RCMP probe into allegations children were being abused at the hands of employees has been operating without a license.

Three employees were implicated in a recent Child and Family Services investigation into the daycare, including a woman who served as the facility’s administrator and her son who also worked there.

Current and former staff have now come forward with accusations the administrator was covering up misconduct complaints against her son, despite his co-workers repeatedly bringing concerns to her attention.

“I didn’t care that was her son. I told her. She said, ‘I will deal with it.’ Obviously she didn’t,” a current staff member said.

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That comment came at a hastily called parent meeting Tuesday, where the daycare’s board of directors informed the parents of the alleged abuse for the first time.

At that meeting, Peguis First Nation Chief Glenn Hudson apologized for keeping the parents in the dark and hinted that more staff could be implicated depending on what the RCMP investigation turns up.

“We don’t know what (the RCMP) finding is going to be and who it’s going to involve. We know those three individuals were pointed out, but it could be more,” Hudson said.

The meeting came months after the board was first made aware of an allegation against at least one employee, and only after the Free Press began making requests for comment on the situation.

After the board of directors was made aware of the accusation against a staff member in April (triggering a CFS investigation), the accused employee was allowed to keep working with children at the daycare and the parents were left in the dark.

That CFS investigation eventually implicated two additional employees — the administrator and her son. The agency recently forwarded the matter to the RCMP. The Mounties have confirmed they are investigating.

At the parent meeting, a former staff member made clear she’d also brought concerns to the facility’s administrator.

“(The administrator) made clear to me that, ‘What happens in the daycare stays in the daycare,” she said, before adding the two men accused of misconduct spent significant time alone with children at the centre.

When asked how long the two men had been working there, members of the board were unable to provide the parents an answer.

The Free Press is not naming the three accused employees – all of whom were fired this week — since charges have not been laid.

According to Jodie Kehl, the Manitoba Child Care Association’s executive director, the fact the facility was operating without a license isn’t uncommon for daycares on First Nations in the province.

“Typically programs on First Nations aren’t required to have licensing. It wouldn’t be unusual. The oversight typically comes from the band and the board of directors and band council, which — obviously — is very different from a program licensed under the Province of Manitoba,” Kehl said.

It remains unclear whether the alleged abuse was physical or sexual in nature, nor how many children may be involved. The board of directors has been unable to answer the pleas of parents asking whether their children were targeted.

At the parent meeting Tuesday, Chief Hudson told the parents he was sorry the daycare had failed them and their children, admitting the way the centre was operated needed significant overhauls.

In particular, Hudson and the board members said changes needed to be made to the facility’s hiring practices, adding plans to get a license for the facility were in the works. In addition, they said new security cameras at the daycare were already being set up to address blind spots that existed in the previous system.

“I just, first of all, want to say sorry, in terms of not being able to come forward with this immediately when we were made aware of it,” Hudson said.

“The trust has been lost. It has been lost and I fully understand that. We will make changes here. I can guarantee that, because those things should not have happened here. Never. It is in the hands of the proper authorities. All I can say is I’m sorry for what’s gone on here.”

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @rk_thorpe

Ryan Thorpe
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Ryan Thorpe likes the pace of daily news, the feeling of a broadsheet in his hands and the stress of never-ending deadlines hanging over his head.

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