Auditor general finds Nunavut foster care failings persist

Nunavut’s Department of Family Services did not provide timely and effective foster care to protect children’s safety and well-being, Canada’s deputy auditor general said Tuesday as the auditor general’s office tabled a new report in the territory’s legislature.

Deputy auditor general Andrew Hayes said “many of the fundamental weaknesses” identified in earlier audits remain, more than three years after the office issued an urgent call to action. He told a news conference in Iqaluit the department has known about the problems for the better part of 15 years, since the first audit in 2011.

The report, titled Foster Care in Nunavut, covers the period from November 2024 to this past March. Auditors reviewed documents, interviewed department workers, met foster caregivers and examined a sample of 40 foster home files, but said they could not draw a representative sample of all children in care because the department’s data was unreliable. The audit did not look at children placed in homes outside the territory.

In more than 90 per cent of the files reviewed, there was no evidence of the required monthly in-person contact with children or caregivers, Hayes said. In five cases there was no documented contact with a child for more than a year, including one gap of more than 17 months. The report said the department failed to meet monthly with caregivers in 98 per cent of the cases it examined, and that officials were “unaware of the whereabouts of some children,” CBC News reported.

About 400 children are estimated to be in foster care, Nunatsiaq News reported, but the department still does not know the exact number or where they are. It launched a centralized information system in 2023, yet three years later the report says the system is not a reliable source of information, and staff continue to rely on manually compiled lists.

The audit also found gaps in screening and monitoring. Family Services completed 52 per cent of home studies before placing a child, and annual reviews confirming a foster home remained safe were missing or incomplete in 62 per cent of the cases examined. Caregivers did not receive important information about a child, such as health, family or trauma history, in 32 of 44 files. The foster caregiver manual had not been updated in more than 10 years, and training for caregivers was infrequent.

Auditors found payment problems as well. The department spent about $9 million on caregiver support payments in 2025-26, but some homes were underpaid and others overpaid. In one case a caregiver was underpaid about $100,000, roughly a year’s worth of payments for multiple children, and the money arrived more than a year after the children were placed. Another caregiver had been underpaid about $10,000, and the issue was unresolved during the audit period.

The report recommends that the department make its new information system accurate and up to date, review caregiver payment rates regularly, set clear criteria for identifying children in care with special needs, develop a caregiver training program and ensure social workers document individual care plans when a child is first placed. Hayes said the department agreed with all of the recommendations and provided timelines. He called for a “whole-of-government approach” and said he hopes legislators will use the report and the department’s responses to hold it accountable.

Family Services Minister Gwen Healey Akearok thanked the auditor general for the report and said it validates many of the actions already under way. In a Government of Nunavut news release issued after the report was tabled, she said her department is strengthening prevention and family supports, improving oversight, equipping staff with tools and training, and supporting foster caregivers. “Meaningful change requires accountability, consistent follow-through, and sustained action,” she said.

Earlier audits in 2011, 2014, 2023 and 2025 found similar problems. After the October 2023 report, then family services minister Margaret Nakashuk apologized for the department’s failure to protect children in its care. Hayes said the auditor general will release another report in spring 2027 on the department’s quality assurance work.

Scrutiny of public services is a recurring issue in the North. We have also reported on an appeal court’s decision to deny a First Nations child welfare class action, on N.W.T. MLAs seeking an audit of Housing NWT spending, and on Nunavut elder vans still parked two years on.

The report is based on coverage by CBC News and Nunatsiaq News, which attended the Iqaluit news conference.

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