Customary Care

Customary care arrangements are intended to reflect First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples’ unique practices of caring for your children and youth. One of our core goals is for every child and youth to have a safe, loving and stable home, surrounded by their culture and community.

Customary care arrangements often involve children and youth being cared for in their home community or with kin. This allows them to remain closely connected to their families or extended families as well as their heritages, cultures and traditions helping build a sense of belonging, safety and security. This is preferred to placing children in other settings that could be far away from their home, culture and support networks.

Customary care is generally viewed by First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples as an alternative to foster care. In customary care:

• a child or youth is typically not in the care of a children’s aid society
• the band or First Nations, Inuit or Metis community has more direct involvement in caregiver arrangements

In the Child, Youth, and Family Services Act (CYFSA) customary care is defined as the ‘care and supervision of a First Nations, Inuk or Metis child by a person who is not the child’s parent, according to the custom of the child’s band or First Nations, Inuit or Metis community.’

First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples typically describe customary care as a traditional system of care for children and families, where all community members have a collective responsibility for the well-being of others. Customary care is an approach that prioritizes prevention and community-based support, so that families can live in a good way.