EDMONTON, Nov 19 (LSN) – On Tuesday, Alberta’s Social Services Minister Lyle Oberg relayed his decision not to amend Alberta’s policy barring homosexuals from acting as foster parents for children in provincial care. However, a lesbian activist who has foster children in her care thanks to her former heterosexual relationship which she abandoned for a lesbian partner, says she will challenge the decision in the courts.
Alberta’s foster-care policy states no foster children will be placed “in a family living in a non-traditional arrangement or with a single person if it is known within the community that they are a practising gay or lesbian.” The woman who identified herself only as Ms. T, wants Alberta’s Court of Queen’s Bench to review Oberg’s decision and order the department to award foster custody to homosexuals. She noted that Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba already allow homosexual foster parents.
As part of a campaign to get the policy to change, homosexual activists presented the minister with “studies” claiming homosexuals make good parents. But Oberg retorted that those same studies also suggest homosexual families are sometimes subject to discrimination and public ridicule and this would not be in the best interest of the children.
Dr. Mark Genuis, executive director of the National Foundation for Family Research and Education in Calgary, told reporters, “As scientists, we can’t say what this would do to children. It would be a reasonably prudent approach if you don’t know something not to jump in.”