To Open The Sky

I am not at all familiar with the history of Canada's First Nations, nor with the problems they have faced under the Harper government. I do know that in Canada, as in the United States, aboriginal people have been marginalized — basically treated as second-class citizens.

Since learning of Ashley Callingbull-Burnham's win of the Mrs. Universe contest, I have been looking into the matter further. It seems Canadian aboriginal peoples have some unique problems. Or at least they have problems which no longer afflict Native Americans, though they did in years past.

The Residential Schools

Up until the early years of the twentieth century, Native American children were commonly removed from their families and placed in schools run by whites. There, they were forbidden to speak their native languages and practice tribal customs. The intent was assimilation into American society — which meant, of course, European society as it had developed on this continent. As far as I know that is no longer the policy of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in the United States.1 For First Nations it is a modern problem. Reportedly, at least 50,000 children were taken from First Nations and never returned to their families. The Ottawa government is alleged to have kept the records of this under lock and key since the 1970s.

Shortfalls in Education and Living Standards

In many First Nations communities, only half the children graduate from high school. The graduation rate for Canada as a whole is 81 percent. First Nations schools need work badly. The Kelowna Accord, negotiated in 2005, was supposed to provide $5 billion over multiple years to upgrade education and other infrastructure on the First Nations. But after Paul Martin's liberal government was replaced by Stephen Harper's conservatives, progress has stalled.

When the Accord was negotiated, infant mortality in Aboriginal communities was almost 20% higher than in the general Canadian population. Moreover, Aboriginal people were three times more likely to have Type 2 diabetes, and suicide rates were 3 to 11 times higher than in the non-Aboriginal population.

The Harper government announced its own educational initiative in early 2014. According to the Canada Press, "Ottawa is to provide funding for core education, which includes language and cultural instruction, of $1.25 billion over three years starting in 2016. There's a provision for a 4.5 per cent annual increase. Another $500 million over seven years is to go toward infrastructure and $160 million over four years is set aside for implementation." First Nations are to retain local control of the schools. Members of the NDP and some First Nation leaders expressed cautious optimism. Other FN leaders denounced the plan as inadequate.

Problems of Aboriginal Women

Aboriginal women in Canada struggle with poverty, unemployment, single parenthood, high rates of infant mortality, and poor housing, especially in isolated communities of the far north.

The Indian Act of 1869 created legal discrimination against Aboriginal women who married a partner without Indian status; essentially, their rights provided under the Act were annulled. This issue came under international scrutiny during the 1970s and 1980s. The Indian Act was amended in 1985 to fix this problem; but the amendment brought problems of its own.

Foremost among women's problems is the matter of some 1,200 missing and murdered women. Aboriginal women have historically suffered more domestic violence. In addition, the dominance of European culture left them vulnerable to abuse by white men. In 2009, 13 per cent of all Aboriginal women aged 15 and older living in the provinces stated that they had been violently victimized, almost three times the rate for non-Aboriginal women.

Amnesty International brought increased attention to the issue when it published Stolen Sisters: A Human Rights Response to Violence and Discrimination against Indigenous Women in Canada (2004) and No More Stolen Sisters (2009). Research conducted by the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC) established a database of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls. In 2011, the NWAC database included 582 known cases, most of which had occurred between 1990 and 2010. The federal government committed $10 million (over two years) to improve the safety of Aboriginal women and to ensure that the justice system and law enforcement agencies would improve their response to cases of missing and murdered women.

An RCMP investigation launched in 2013 probed the problem of missing and murdered Aboriginal women in Canada. The 2014 report revealed that from 1980 to 2012, a total of 1,181 Aboriginal women were murdered or were considered missing. As of September 2013, 164 Aboriginal women were considered missing, 11.3 per cent of all missing women in Canada — a disproportionally large number since Aboriginal women comprise 4.3 per cent of Canada's female population. More striking was the revelation that 1,017 Aboriginal women had been murdered in this period — 16 per cent of the total homicides of women in Canada.

Councillor Nola Wanuch of the Enoch Cree Nation mentioned the persistent problem of missing and murdered Aboriginal women in connection with Ashley Callingbull: "I think having her as an advocate will definitely bring it to the forefront," she said. "She is definitely not afraid to speak out and tell you where she stands."

REFERENCES

1. The Kelowna Accord (Canadian Encyclopedia)
2. Aboriginal women's Issues (Canadian Encyclopedia)
3. Idle No More (Canadian Encyclopedia)
4. Canada, first nations have a road map. It was the Kelowna Accord (Terry Mitchell & Lori Curtis, Toronto Globe and Mail, 11 Jan. 2013)
5. Harper unveils retooled First Nations education plan (Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press, 7 Feb. 2014)
6. Stephen Harper Is Failing Indigenous Canadians (Rachel Giese, 11 June 2015)
7. Influence in America: A Report on TransCanada Corporation's Keystone XL Lobbying Activities (Kevin Grandia, DeSmogBlog, October, 2013)
8. Dissecting the cuts to Canadian Science (Jean-Patrick Toussaint, September 2015)