NDP MP Calls 'Bullshit' on Lack of Government Spending for Indigenous Children

An NDP MP is calling on the government to comply with two warnings from a Human Rights Tribunal that found Canada is actively discriminating against Indigenous children.

Twice since January, the tribunal has ordered the government to comply with its ruling, which found the government spends significantly less on First Nations children on reserve versus other areas of Canada—a disparity NDP MP Charlie Angus told VICE News is “systemically racist.”

He’s not the first to issue a condemnation—on Wednesday the Manitoba legislature passed a motion condemning the federal government’s inaction, and executive director of the First Nations and Family Caring Society Cindy Blackstock has said she is “profoundly disappointed” in the federal government.

Manitoba legislature condemns the lack of action. It’s time the Feds do the right thing and equally fund social services for First Nations — Wab Kinew (@WabKinew)October 26, 2016

In a motion tabled Thursday, Angus also called on the government to immediately commit $155 million to end this year’s funding shortfall to the Indigenous child welfare system.

But Indigenous Affairs minister Carolyn Bennett said Thursday the government is indeed complying, and is right now focused on a “systemic overhaul” of the child welfare system.

“I call the whole thing bullshit,” Angus told VICE News in reaction to her statement.

“I love Carolyn Bennett, and she’s telling us all the great things that children need and how they gotta get into the school systems and they gotta start from scratch, but they’re not doing that. That’s not what Indian Affairs is doing. Indian Affairs is deciding what bills they will pay and which bills they won’t pay from the provinces. That’s how the child welfare system’s broken, and they refuse to pay [for] all manner of things.”

In Canada, with no hard-and-fast rules, provincial, territorial and federal governments often quibble over who is responsible for the health of Indigenous kids, leaving those children in the lurch while they wait to find out who will provide mental health, dental and critical care services, among others.

Six percent of on-reserve children are currently in state care—a number eight times higher than children living off-reserve. And that number is as high as 11 to 14 percent in some areas of Canada. There are now three times as many First Nations children in state care versus at the height of residential schools in the 1940s, according to a 2004 report cited in the tribunal’s decision.

Indigenous families on those reserves don’t have the same resources as families elsewhere in Canada to raise their children. A 2006 report found there were 257 reserves across the country with no access to child care, and many reserves didn’t have enough resources to raise 20 percent of their children from birth to age six.

Bennett said Thursday the government is working to “upright the canoe” and has provided an additional $382 million over three years in new funding to close the gap—although Bennett didn’t detail exactly what that money would fund. The minister added that the government had added another 900 Indigenous kids under the expanded definition of Jordan’s principle—a principle adopted by the government in 2007 after the death of an Indigenous child, Jordan River Anderson.

“Budget 2016 also made historic investments in First Nations child welfare, with nearly $635 million over five years in new funding,” Indigenous Affairs said in a release. “This includes $71 million this year for immediate relief for additional prevention services to address the most pressing concerns.”

Bennett explained that the government is focused on working with provinces and territories to reform the child welfare system, and that a summit to listen to children in care will happen “early next year.”

Meanwhile, children’s lives are at stake, Angus said. In the northern part of his constituency, which includes Attawapiskat, 700 Indigenous kids have attempted suicide since 2009.

“Suicide is the public manifestation of this completely failed system,” Angus said.

In another case that Angus often uses as an example, on four occasions Health Canada denied a 14-year-old Indigenous girl access to dental coverage, even though she risked losing her teeth.

Angus’s motion, which will be put to a vote on Tuesday, also calls for the government to stop fighting Indigenous families in court when they seek but are denied access to government-funded services, and asks for the government to release “all pertinent documents” on the overhaul of the system and the implementation of Jordan’s Principle. Angus’s motion also calls on the government to implement the full definition of Jordan’s Principle—a definition he said Bennett had changed.

The issue of the failing First Nations child care system is one that crosses party lines, with Liberals, Conservatives and the NDP all agreeing it is broken and must be fixed—but disagreeing on how best to fix it. Angus said it was similar “passing of the buck over responsibility” that led to the death of Jordan River Anderson.

“As it stands now, they’re passing the buck. And children die when you pass the buck.”

Follow Hilary Beaumont on Twitter.