Canada has a decentralized child welfare system in which over 300 provincial and territorial child welfare
agencies operate under the jurisdictions of 13 Canadian provinces and territories (Trocmé et al., 2010).
In addition, as summarized in Table 2, there were 121 Métis, First Nations, and urban Aboriginal child
and family services agencies either in operation or proceeding with provincially or federally recognized
planning processes as of 2011. Of these, 84 agencies have signed agreements with provincial
governments affirming their rights to apply provincial child welfare legislation and to provide the full
range of child protection services, including child welfare investigations (but excluding adoption services
for most agencies). The remaining agencies assumed a more limited range of responsibilities under
provincial or territorial child welfare legislation. There are currently no comprehensive estimates of the
proportion of the Aboriginal population served by Aboriginally governed agencies. However, the
Auditor General (2008) estimated that First Nations agencies provide at least partial services to about
442 of 606 First Nations groups. In addition, Sinha and Leduc (2011) recently estimated that 30% of
First Nations children live in areas where First Nations or urban Aboriginal agencies are responsible for
conducting child welfare investigations. Finally, it is estimated that 50% of the Aboriginal population
lives in urban areas (Statistics Canada, 2009), and Aboriginally governed agencies now serve the large