Outgoing Prime Minister Stephen Harper was nearly universally viewed by First Nations (known in the US as “indigenous” or “native” people), Métis and Inuit peoples as, at the least, insensitive to their concerns and, at worst, actively hostile towards Canada’s indigenous populations.
Pamela Palmater, Associate Professor and Chair in Indigenous Governance at Ryerson University, declared, “In ten short years, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has set the relationship with First Nations back a hundred years. While all past governments have had a hand in the colonization and oppression of First Nations, the Harper government stands out as one of the most racist and aggressive governments that First Nations have had to work with in many generations.”
It is no coincidence that Idle No More, Canada’s largest, most coordinated social protest movement, whose stated vision is “to honour Indigenous sovereignty, and to protect the land and water” formed during Harper’s tenure.
It is also no coincidence that the recent election saw the largest turnout of First Nations, Métis and Inuit voters, so high that some communities ran out of ballots. Their votes helped Liberal Justin Trudeau to become Canada’s next Prime Minister. The 2015 election also saw a record ten indigenous MPs elected to the House of Commons.
Although at the national level, scant attention was paid to aboriginal issues during the 12-week campaign, Liberal party leaders and candidates did make efforts to do so at the local level. Trudeau, the 43-year-old son of the late Pierre Trudeau, Canada’s 15th Prime Minister, spoke to the Assembly of First Nations and participated in the Aboriginal People’s Television Network’s (APTN) “Virtual Town Hall” broadcast.
Canada’s roughly 1.4 million indigenous people, the most overlooked demographic in Canada, face serious issues that are frankly shocking in a country recently ranked fifth in the world on the Legatum Prosperity Index. Among the most critical:
- Poverty and Standard of Living
- In 2005, the Census estimated the Aboriginal poverty rate at 18.7% for families and 42.8% for unattached individuals, as compared to 5.9% for non-Aboriginal families and 26.9% for non-Aboriginal singles.
- A 2013 study by Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives indicated that the average child poverty rate for all Indigenous children in Canada is 40%, compared to 15% for non-Indigenous children.
- Reserves are not included in official Canadian labour statistics, but their residents may have an unemployment rate as much as five times that of the non-aboriginal population.
- 5% of homes on reserves need major repairs, compared with 7% in non-aboriginal households outside reserves, and that rates of overcrowding are six times greater on reserve than off.
- Two thirds of all indigenous water in Canada has been under an arcane “boil water advisory” at some point since 2004, with 400 out of 618 First Nations communities without a secure supply of drinking water.
- The Justice System
- While Aboriginal people make up about 4% of the Canadian population, they constitute 23.2% of the federal inmate population, with a 43.5% increase since 2005-06.
- Aboriginal women are almost three times more likely than non-Aboriginal women to be a victim of a violent crime, regardless if the violence occurred between strangers or acquaintances, or within a spousal relationship.
- In the last 20 years, there have been nearly 1200 missing and murdered Aboriginal women, prompting a UN expert committee to charge Canada with “grave violations” of human rights.
- Health and Wellness
- In 2017 the life expectancy for the total Canadian population is projected to be 79 years for men and 83 years for women. For indigenous peope, the figures range from 64-74 years for men and 73-80 years for women.
- Twice as many First Nation adults living on reserve experienced major depression as among the general population; surveys also show most see alcohol use as a significant problem in their communities.
- Suicide and self-inflicted injuries are the leading causes of death for First Nations youth and adults up to 44 years of age, at a rate several times that of non-Aboriginal youth.
History of Residential Schools
The Indian Residential School System was a state-sponsored, church-run network of residential schools that operated between the late 1800s and the 1990s. It was designed to teach Aboriginal children the English language, as well as the religion, values, and work skills of Canadian society. The overall goal, as set by the Canadian government, was to “get rid of the Indian problem.”
In the words of Georges Erasmus, President of the Aboriginal Healing Foundation, “The ‘Indian problem’ consists in the fact that Aboriginal people, given the choice, prefer to be Aboriginal people, and not something else… the residential school system came to represent both in theory and practice a deliberate systemic effort to sever generations of Aboriginal children, one by one, from family, community, language, culture, and, broadly speaking, Aboriginal ways of living in the world.”
Although exact figures are unknown, it is estimated that more than 150,000 children were sent to 130 schools. The intergenerational effects of the systematic removal of seven generations of children from their homes has been devastating. In the early 1990s, survivors came forward with disturbing disclosures of physical abuse, such as beatings, bondage, electric shocks and needles pushed through tongues as punishment for speaking Aboriginal languages; sexual abuse; forced eating of rotten and/or maggot-infested food; use of students in medical experiments; forced labour and more.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) examined the residential schools saga and released a comprehensive and critical report in June of this year, from which Stephen Harper distanced himself. In sharp contrast, Trudeau immediately endorsed the report and the Liberals pledged in their election platform to enact its recommendations. In at least one speech, he mentioned that implementation would start with the UN’s Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
At the core of the declaration is land restitution, Article 26, which stipulates that “Indigenous Peoples have the right to the lands, territories and resources which they have traditionally owned, occupied or otherwise used or acquired.”
Justice Murray Sinclair, chair of the TRC was quoted in the Ottawa Citizen as saying “I’m much more hopeful” now that Trudeau has been elected Prime Minister.
Many First Nations people found hope and encouragement in Trudeau’s campaign promise to deal with them at a “nation to nation” level. Trudeau promised to review all Harper-era legislation on First Nations and repeal those that contravened Section 35 of the Constitution respecting aboriginal and treaty rights.
The introduction and swearing in of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet on November 4 provided further hope for a new direction for Canada. PM Trudeau’s cabinet is comprised of half men and half women. Additionally, the new cabinet reflects Canada’s ethnic and religious diversity and includes Hunter Tootoo as New Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, the second Inuk to ever be appointed to a cabinet position; and Canada’s first aboriginal federal Justice Minister, Jody Wilson-Raybould.
Assembly of First Nations Chief Perry Bellegarde welcomed Trudeau’s appointment of two indigenous MPs to cabinet as a “new era of reconciliation.”
“It sends a powerful statement about inclusion and it sends a powerful statement about the reconciliation that is going to be required in rebuilding a new relationship between Canada and Indigenous Peoples… One of the most important things is to start rebuilding the relationship we have in a co-operative and a collaborative manner.”
That kind of hopeful reaction is sweeping through the country among indigenous people. But former Assembly of First Nations national chief Phil Fontaine offered words of caution, “We have to be careful, at least on our part, the indigenous community — that we temper our expectations somewhat, so that we give the government the time and space to do its job.”
Berenice L. Ruhl is a consultant and educator who specializes in diversity and inclusion issues and an Illinois native. She currently divides her time between Illinois and Canada and enjoys being a volunteer and airshifter at WEFT 90.1 FM in Champaign.