“It's heartbreaking,” says Carmant about the scandal at the Cité-des-Prairies youth center

Photo: Jacques Boissinot The Canadian Press “It's illegal, it's unacceptable, it can't be done,” he insisted. Actions like that must have significant consequences,” Lionel Carmant responded Friday.

Jessica Nadeau

Published at 12:03

• Québec

“It's heartbreaking, there are no other words. It's heartbreaking. Sexual abuse by people in power is intolerable. Intolerable. In all walks of life.” Minister Lionel Carmant did not mince his words on Friday, reacting to the new scandal rocking the Cité-des-Prairies youth centre.

“It's illegal, it's unacceptable, it can't be,” he insisted. Actions like that must have significant consequences, we'll wait until the end of the investigation, but I think that the people who do that, they destroy the lives of young people, they destroy the lives of families, they must have legal consequences, there.”

The Minister responsible for Social Services claims to have been informed of the situation last week, while the people involved had either been suspended or fired.

“What I asked is that in addition to an administrative investigation, there be a police investigation. Because what these people did is criminal and it's important that there be an investigation and that the consequences be commensurate with the actions that were committed. »

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The minister also does not understand why managers would have turned a blind eye to such actions committed by staff members. “It's incomprehensible, that's why they were suspended. We're going to wait for the investigation's conclusions to see what needs to be done, but it's also unacceptable that people turn a blind eye to things like that.”

Psychosocial support is offered to Cité-des-Prairies centre staff, victims and their families, he told reporters on the sidelines of an announcement on major investments to prevent overdoses.

Asked how parents could still trust the system in the face of all these scandals, the minister tried to be reassuring. “I tell parents that most people are there for the good of their child, that’s fundamental,” he said. “It’s important to tell yourself that we’re there for the good of our children, and if we have to investigate other youth centres, we’ll do it.”

Scandals that pile up

Faced with “the scandalous stories [that] continue to pile up in the DPJ network,” the Quebec Liberal Party accuses the minister of having “completely lost control.”

“With each new episode, the minister reacts. He says he is deeply affected by the tragedies that are discovered one by one, like the torture of gout, and then nothing more happens. It is negligence,” says MP Brigitte Garceau, spokesperson for the official opposition on youth protection.

“This story makes my blood run cold,” she added. “If we no longer feel our young people are safe in these rehabilitation centres, where do we send them?” she asked, calling in the same breath for an external investigation into all youth and rehabilitation centres.

The minister assures that he is still in control of the situation. “No, we have not lost control of the network, I want to say that,” he told journalists Friday morning. “Most of the people involved are well-meaning, are there for the right reasons.”

He does not close the door to a broader investigation and asks for the public's cooperation to shed light on what is happening in this center, or elsewhere. “If there are people who are aware of events happening elsewhere, it is important that they say so, and yes, investigations will take place elsewhere if required.”

He also says he is “taking action on practices in youth centers”, in particular with the major project to review practices in these establishments that was launched this summer by the national director of youth protection. “Yes, we need to change things in youth centers, that's for sure,” the minister repeated.