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“Weeks after the tribunal’s decision, the First Nation Child and Family Caring Society submitted documents outlining what the federal government could do to address the lack of services for child welfare systems on reserves, including steps that could immediately be taken.
These first steps — outlined on the Caring Society’s website — include an injection of $109 million for First Nation child welfare agencies across Canada and a public announcement that the federal government will begin working with agencies to reform the on-reserve child welfare system.
However, Blackstock claims the federal government has only sent a letter that indicated that they’re studying the issue first.
“What’s really important is not what government says. What’s really important is what government does when it comes to First Nations kids,” said Blackstock.
The Assembly of First Nations said they will also by filing submissions on immediate relief to the tribunal, however, they wouldn’t say what those recommendations will be.”
– Yahoo News, Canada still discriminating against First Nations kids, advocate says.
“Even with a recent landmark ruling, Canada hasn’t done anything to stop discriminating against First Nations kids, child advocate Cindy Blackstock says.
On January 26 the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal found that the federal government discriminates against children living on reserves by failing to provide them with the same quality of welfare services available to children elsewhere in the country.
That decision came with an order to stop the practice and was followed by a vow from the government not to appeal the decision.
But Blackstock, executive director of the First Nation Child and Family Caring Society — which launched the initial human rights complaint against Ottawa in 2007 — said nothing has happened.
“The federal government doesn’t want to do anything in the short-term,” Blackstock said. “They want to just continue with study and that makes me nervous.””
– CBC News, Canada still discriminating against First Nations kids, advocate says.
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Download the 18″x24″ poster (.pdf), Indian Country 52 #10 – To Discriminate (is a Crime).
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Indian Country 52
Indian Country 52 is a weekly project by David Bernie that uses the medium of posters that promote issues and stories in Indian Country.
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This work by David Bernie is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. You may download, share, and post the images under the condition that the works are attributed to the artist.
