Last week marked one year since the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation announced the tragic discovery of unmarked graves at a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia. This led to the discovery of hundreds more unmarked graves at other residential school sites across the country, confirming this painful history known to survivors and their communities. One year has passed, but what work has been done by the Canadian government toward healing the trauma that Indigenous communities carry?
Governor General Mary Simon and Prime Minister Trudeau both delivered remarks at a memorial in Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation last week. Canada’s first Indigenous Governor General spoke directly to the intergenerational pain endured by Indigenous communities noting that while the unmarked graves found around residential schools in Canada have been called a discovery, for survivors it is the experience and knowledge passed down from generation to generation. The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation has acknowledged that determining the number of children who died at residential schools is a long and challenging task. To date, the Centre has documented 4,118 children who have died at residential schools, as part of its work to implement the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Call to Action to create a national death register and public-facing memorial register.
The Prime Minister acknowledged that these tragedies are part of Canada’s dark history, and cannot be ignored: “this is a moment for us to realize that as great as Canada is as a country, we made some terrible mistakes in the past and we have to make them right.” Indigenous reconciliation has been at the forefront of the Trudeau government’s commitments since forming government in 2015.
This year’s federal budget made several commitments to respond to these concerns, promising to support Indigenous communities through this difficult process. The budget outlined a new building for the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation – with a goal of complete disclosure of federal documents related to residential schools. Funding was also allocated to support the appointment of a Special Interlocutor who will work collaboratively with Indigenous peoples and make recommendations for changes to strengthen federal laws and practices to protect and preserve unmarked burial sites. The budget also included funding to support community-led responses to unmarked burial sites, digitization of documents relating to the federal Indian Day School System and the memorialization of former residential school sites was also promised in the Budget. This week, Bill C-19 (An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget) will proceed to clause-by-clause consideration at the Finance Committee of the House of Commons, and one step closer to receiving Royal Assent and implementation,Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Chief Rosanne Casimir told the crowd at the memorial that she hopes the events over the past year will lead to reconciliation for Indigenous Peoples. She said that “non-Indigenous are now wanting to know about the real hidden history of this country….we know [this] is a good thing. Those conversations, as hard as they are, are going to lead to steps that we all need to make towards our collective history.” With knowledge of Canada’s true history comes great responsibility; and all of us must hold the government accountable to follow through on these commitments. This is only the start of the difficult journey toward reconciliation.
