TRC Takes Ottawa To Court to force release of residential school documents
Residential Schools Lawsuit: Truth And Reconciliation Commission Takes Ottawa To Court
CP | By Colin Perkel, The Canadian Press Posted: 12/03/2012
TORONTO - Years of mounting frustration over access to government records has prompted the commission of inquiry into Canada's residential school system to turn to the courts for help, The Canadian Press has learned.
In court filings, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission accuses Ottawa of stymying requests for documents the inquiry says are vital to its core mandate: "delivery on truth, reconciliation and ultimately healing."
Documents filed with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice show the commission worries that Ottawa's alleged intransigence will make it impossible to complete its work as required by July 1, 2014 and within budget.
"If the parties, through incompetence, delays or deliberate stonewalling (or a combination thereof) sabotage the work of the commission, then Canadians are certain to forget (and never fully learn) what has happened," the commission's factum states.
The application asks the court to clarify the government's obligations under a settlement with victims of the Indian residential school system that set up the commission led by Justice Murray Sinclair.
"The commission is taking this step very reluctantly and with a sense that it has been left with no alternative," Sinclair said in a statement.
Under the agreement, the government of Canada and churches are obliged to provide all "relevant documents in their possession or control" to the commission.
Court filings show years of government squabbling over the word "relevant."
For its part, the government maintains it has done its best to co-operate, providing one million documents already.
A spokesman for Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan said the government was "committed to bringing closure" to the legacy of residential schools.
"Canada aims to disclose all of its remaining documents relevant to the TRCs mandate by June 30, 2013," Jan O'Driscoll said in a statement Monday.
The commission says it would cost far more than its entire $60-million budget if it is forced to find and digitally organize the materials still in federal archives by itself.
"What is at stake here is control over history," lawyer Julian Falconer, who represents the commission, said over the weekend.
The Superior Court has set aside two days later this month for Stephen Goudge, a justice with the Ontario Court of Appeal, to hear the case.
The residential school system, which ran from the 1870s until the 1990s, saw about 150,000 native kids taken from their families and sent to church-run schools under a deliberate policy of "civilizing" First Nations.
Many students were physically, mentally and sexually abused. Some committed suicide. Mortality rates reached 50 per cent at some schools.
In the 1990s, thousands of victims sued the churches that ran the schools and the Canadian government. Following settlement of the suit, Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued a historic apology in June 2008.
"There is no place in Canada for the attitudes that inspired the Indian residential schools system to ever prevail again," Harper said.
"You have been working on recovering from this experience for a long time, and in a very real sense we are now joining you on this journey."
The $1.9-billion settlement also led to the creation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to research what had occurred and to make recommendations.
Part of the commission's mandate is to help in a process of reconciliation, while yet another is the "creation of a legacy" that includes collection of records, taking statements from those involved, and classifying and preserving the materials.
A national research centre was also to be set up as a permanent archive.
Affidavits filed in support of the application show the government only started providing the material - an initial 38,000 documents - in April 2010.
However, it took until November 2011 - about six years after Ottawa first signed the settlement in principle - for the government to hand over the bulk of what's been provided so far.
In an interim report issued in February, Sinclair took the government to task for its lack of co-operation - to little effect.
"This is a court-ordered settlement and it seems odd that the commission now has to go to the courts to get access," said Jean Crowder, New Democrat aboriginal affairs critic.
"Why is the government afraid of letting a little sun shine on our history?"
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Federal government prepared to release millions of records on residential schools
By Christopher Curtis, Postmedia News
December 3, 2012
Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan.
Photograph by: THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand , Postmedia News
OTTAWA - The federal government will release millions of files documenting the abuse suffered by aboriginal children who attended Canada's Indian residential schools, Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan said Monday.
His statement comes as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission prepares to take the government to court on Dec. 20 to gain access to the files.
Although the government has released 937,000 documents to the commission, millions of records are still sitting in archives across the country. The commission says it wants the remaining files in order to fulfil its mandate of recording the controversial and tragic history of Canada's residential school system.
In a lawsuit filed in the Superior Court of Ontario, Toronto lawyer Julian Falconer states the commission has encountered "serious difficulties" in obtaining the enormous amount of paperwork it requires.
By withholding millions of records, the government is reneging on its promise to create a national residential school research centre, according to Falconer. In a statement Monday, he dubbed the court case a battle over "control of history."
"The Commission is taking this step very reluctantly and with a sense that it has been left with no alternative," Falconer said. "Put simply, a 'half loaf' in the form of one million documents isn't going to do it."
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was created following Prime Minister Stephen Harper's 2008 apology to the survivors of Indian Residential Schools. The commission has travelled across Canada, meeting with survivors' groups, recording their harrowing stories and providing them with appropriate counselling.
Historians say that during the 150 years Canada and various churches ran the residential schools system, their explicit goal was to assimilate aboriginals. About 140,000 aboriginal children were removed from their homes and placed in residential schools, where they were isolated from their culture, their language and - in the worst cases - subjected to sexual and physical abuse.
By gathering millions of government files and survivors' accounts, the commission hopes to table a comprehensive report on the effect of residential schools by July 2014. But representatives of the commission say it will be impossible for them to meet their mandate in time and within the $60-million budget without improved co-operation from Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada.
"Years of mounting frustration over access to government records has forced the (commission) ... to turn to the courts for help," said Jean Crowder, the NDP's aboriginal affairs critic. "Who is holding up these documents?"
The millions of remaining documents will now be available by late June 2013, according to a spokesperson for Duncan.
"This is a court-supervised process, it involves the churches, all of the other stakeholders and it involves 22 other governmental departments," Jan O'Driscoll said. "We remain committed to bringing closure to the legacy of residential schools."
Under the Residential School Settlement Agreement, the Conservatives have awarded hundreds of millions in payouts to residential school survivors who suffered abuse and maltreatment. An estimated 20,000 abuse claims have yet to be heard by the courts.
"It's a dark, painful part of our history that we need to preserve, that we need to learn from," said Joe Norris, executive director of the Indian Residential School Survivor Society. "It left thousands feeling worthless, suicidal and unable to ever really re-adapt to life after residential school."
When Norris was seven, police forcefully removed him from his grandparents' custody and brought him to a boarding school on Vancouver Island. To this day, he has trouble speaking of the decade he spent as a ward of the federal government.
"There's 150 years of history that needs to be fleshed out in those documents," he said. "What we have now is not enough, this needs to be (comprehensive)."