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VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Aug. 30, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — On September 12, 2022 a trial regarding the collective losses suffered by Aboriginal communities as a result of Canada’s Indian residential school system will commence before the Federal Court of Canada in Vancouver.
325 First Nations from across Canada have joined this class action and are standing together and asking that Canada be accountable to the nations it worked so hard to destroy in its attempted assimilation of Aboriginal peoples through the residential school system.
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This case is intended to address the reality of the destruction of the languages and cultures of the Aboriginal peoples of Canada. Canada has now recognized in public statements the damages it caused the Aboriginal peoples of this country through its residential school policy, but has nonetheless left them alone to rehabilitate their languages and cultures which have been so impacted by Canada’s conduct.
When this case was commenced on August 15, 2012, then Chief Garry Feschuk of shíshálh Nation stated:
The government has acknowledged that it set out to remove the culture of our people, and the harm it caused by forcing our people to turn away from their traditions. The residential schools were an attempt to destroy our traditions and cultures for day students as well as residential students. As our people and our communities work to rebuild from the effects of the residential schools, the government must step forward and take responsibility.
Former Federal Court judge Justice Harrington referred to the stated intention to destroy Aboriginal languages which was a foundation of the Indian residential school policy at paragraph 63 of his decision certifying the lawsuit as a class action:
The Annual Report of the Department of Indian Affairs of 1895 deems the acquisition of the English (or French) language to be a necessity: “So long as he keeps his native tongue, so long he will remain a community apart.” The policy was to be executed “with as much vigor as possible”. Educated English speaking Indians would be enfranchised, and become accustomed to the ways of civilized life. This would bring about rapidly decreased expenditures “until the same should forever cease, and the Indian problem would have been solved.”
In June 2015, Justice Harrington found that the Band Class claim was an appropriate means to seek the collective damages for loss of language and culture to Aboriginal Nations arising from Canada’s residential school policies.
In the last two years, Canada’s Prime Minister and Minister of Indigenous Relations have spoken out repeatedly about the need for reconciliation and to redress the wrongs of the Indian residential schools.
On June 25, 2021, Prime Minister Trudeau on behalf of the government of Canada stated:
“[the residential school policy] was an incredibly harmful government policy that was Canada’s reality, for many, many decades and Canadians today are horrified and ashamed of how our country behaved. It was a policy that ripped kids from their homes, from their communities, from their culture and their language and forced assimilation upon them.”
On January 27, 2021, Minister of Indigenous Relations, Marc Miller, acknowledged:
“To suggest that residential schools were anything other than to assimilate, layered with a religious fervour at the time to convert peoples who still have vibrant cultures-in some cases that have been ripped away from them, the trauma has been passed on for generations – not to acknowledge that that exists and there are carry-on effects, is the product of a twisted and closed mind.”
Former Chief Shane Gottfriedson of Tk’emlúps te Secwe̓pemc has responded to the support of 325 First Nations who have joined the court action as class members:
“With over half of the First Nations in Canada now being part of our court case, Canada now needs to recognize the collective damages to our Nations caused by Canada’s efforts for over 100 years to destroy our Nations’ languages and culture.”
Former Chief Garry Feschuk asks:
“When is Canada going to stop denying in the court what we have suffered? When will Canada provide the support needed to First Nations to allow us to take charge of language and cultural revitalization and provide us with the means to rehabilitate our language and culture?”
It appears that 12 years after shíshálh Nation and Tk’emlúps te Secwe̓pemc first sought a remedy for the damages caused to Indigenous peoples across Canada, that Canada is still, in Justice Harrington’s words “talking the talk but not walking the walk”.
Kúkpi7 Rosanne Casimir of Tk’emlúps te Secwe̓pemc says:
“325 First Nations have joined with us to demand that Canada repair the damage done by residential schools by providing compensation to help restore and revitalize our rich languages and cultures which were decimated by residential schools. Canada has already recognised in public statements that it caused this damage; now it needs to stop denying it in the courts. Reconciliation demands that action be taken to restore what was lost.”
Hiwus Warren Paull of shíshálh Nation says:
“Intergenerational harms that are the direct result of residential school policies continue to decimate our communities today. Our communities are being ravaged by drug and alcohol abuse and overdoses, lateral violence, and suicides, all of which are a direct and continuing result of the abuse, displacement, and mistreatment suffered by survivors of residential schools. It is a continuing genocide. It is time that Canada take action to repair the damage done.”
For further information please contact:
Councillor Selina August, shíshálh Nation: saugust@shishalh.com
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