UN report - Canada places 48 out of 174 countries for treatment of Native people
The United Nations report entitled "INDIGENOUS ISSUES - Human rights and indigenous issues - Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, Rodolfo Stavenhagen" was released in December 2004.
Canada would be placed 48th out of 174 countries if judged solely on the United Nations' human development scale for the economic and social well-being of its First Nations people, states an April 11 CBC report.
Excerpt from attached study
33. Among the 174 countries included in the United Nations Development Programme Human Development Report 2003, Canada ranked eighth, with a score of 0.937 (it had ranked first in 1999). When the Human Development Index (HDI) is calculated for Registered Indians, however, it reveals a substantially lower score for this population, which would be ranked about forty-eighth among the countries in the report, according to the information received by the Special Rapporteur from the Aboriginal organizations in Canada. Canada recognizes that key indicators of socio-economic conditions for Aboriginal people are unacceptably lower than for non-Aboriginal Canadians.
"Poverty, infant mortality, unemployment, morbidity, suicide, criminal detention, children on welfare, women victims of abuse, child prostitution, are all much higher among aboriginal people than in any other sector of Canadian society," said the report issued by the UN Human Rights Commission.
"Economic, social and human indicators of well-being, quality of life and development are completely lower among aboriginal people than other Canadians," said Stavenhagen, who also warns the housing, health and suicide situation is reaching crisis proportions.
He said the condition of aboriginal people in the country was "the most pressing human rights issue facing Canada."
Among the problems highlighted in the report:
- Poverty affects 60 per cent of aboriginal children.
- The annual income of aboriginal people is "significantly lower" than other Canadians.
- Unemployment is very high among aboriginals.
- 20 per cent of aboriginal people have inadequate water and sewer systems.
- Aboriginals make up 4.4 per cent of the Canadian population but account for 17 per cent of the people in prison.
- Cases of tuberculosis are six times higher than the rest of Canada.
- Life expectancy among the Inuit is 10 years lower than the rest of Canada.