The B.C. government has launched talks with social service providers on how to better integrate its programs—a move that could end up leading to the merger of the ministries of social development and children and youth.

“As you all know, and have expressed over the past years, we consistently hear that social services can be hard to navigate and at times require duplicative processes,” wrote a letter by a government deputy minister to employees inside the ministries and at outside social services organizations on Friday.

“This is not about your individual efforts or devotion to the people we serve, but rather a result of how the social sector system has evolved over many years. We have heard from you that services are often disconnected across ministries and programs, making them hard both to access and move between especially during major life changes.”

The engagement will draw in frontline workers, community organizations, the private sector, organized labour and First Nations, according to the email.

“At the same time, we will be mapping social services across government to understand how programs connect today and where gaps, overlap, and potential opportunities for better alignment exist,” read the email.

One option being considered inside the government: fold the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction into the Ministry of Children and Family Development.

The resulting super-ministry would then become a centralized place for the youth, poverty and disability programs that can overlap at-need British Columbians.

The decision has not been finalized, but the ministry merger idea has been talked about inside government for several months.

The government spends more than $10 billion annually on the social services of child welfare, social assistance and community living. That does not include additional expenses in health care and public safety.

The ministry merger proposal flows out of the findings of two reports by independent watchdog agencies, which found program silos inside the government led to failed information sharing in critical cases.

A 2024 report from the Representative for Children and Youth into the torture and death of 11-year-old Colby at the hands of extended family caregivers found systemic failures on the many missed opportunities to help him earlier.

Another report by the coroner’s service in 2025 found an urgent need for more integrated and co-ordinated data on intimate partner violence because of fragmented and siloed systems for rural, Indigenous and marginalized communities in particular.

The deputy minister’s email Friday acknowledged “what we have consistently heard through independent reports past engagements, service providers and people with lived experience.”

“The results will help inform the next steps to better organize our services and improve the experience of the people we serve,” read the email.

The government was quick to point out that it will not be changing the income assistance or disability programs themselves, which are the social safety net for the province’s most vulnerable people. And during the consultation there won’t be any changes to employee roles, or existing services.

But, it’s clear, the potential for big change is in the air.

That may include a merger of two of the government’s biggest ministries. Which would be no small feat indeed.

Rob Shaw has spent more than 18 years covering B.C. politics, now reporting for CHEK News and writing for BIV. He hosts the weekly show Political Capital and has a NEW daily podcast, Political Capital Daily.

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