This is kind of a grey area it seems. Manitoba IS one province that specifies a legal minimum age of supervision (12) but it applies only to being left at home

This is kind of a grey area it seems. Manitoba IS one province that specifies a legal minimum age of supervision (12) but it applies only to being left at home or in a car (edit: I was wrong about these specifics. They leave it more generalized in the actual law) and is still left with a clause about "unless reasonable situations exist". Meanwhile the age to allow kids to walk to school, while unofficial and no limit exists across canafa, seems to be 9 years by majority opinion agreements. Sounds like this social worker stepped out of bounds. If Canadian government is by and large okay with kids walking to school themselves at 9, surely walking a block with a 9 year old is reasonable enough. It's clear the parent was still aware of where they were so I'd say it's an arguable case, but IANAL. Tbh I don't know if this is just one isolated case, but it kinda sounds like it. Edit: here is the law and I linked the subsection that is relevant. It more clearly states what I paraphrased above. https://web2.gov.mb.ca/laws/statutes/ccsm/c080e.php#17(2) https://web2.gov.mb.ca/laws/statutes/ccsm/c080e.php#17(2)