Unfolding on their terms
Province to defer to First Nations communities on criminal investigations
Staffers with the province’s Indigenous relations secretariat were asked on July 16 whether they agree with assertions that residential schools should be treated by the P.E.I. government as crime scenes.
Christopher Gillis, deputy minister of priorities and intergovernmental affairs and Helen Kristmanson, director of P.E.I.’s Indigenous relations secretariat, spoke before a meeting of the standing committee on health and social development on July 16.
Following a presentation, Liberal MLA Robert Henderson, whose riding includes Lennox Island, asked whether the province would agree that residential schools should be considered crime scenes. Newly elected Assembly of First Nations Chief RoseAnne Archibald told reporters on July 15 that crimes were committed on residential school grounds and that they should be investigated.
“I would share that opinion,” Henderson said.
“What is the province doing to try to come to some sort of conclusion to determine whether these were crime scenes or not?” Henderson asked.
In response, Gillis said the province would support First Nations. But he did not say definitively whether the province is considering the involvement of law enforcement in cases of Prince Edward Island residents who may have attended residential schools.
“Much of the trauma that’s been experienced to date by the First Nations is the result of paternalistic and colonial style intervention by government,” Gillis said.
“I don’t think that it would be our role to take — yet today — a paternalistic approach to what we think the First Nations need in order to heal from this experience.”
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission documented rampant abuse and neglect at residential schools. It identified 6,000 missing children who attended the schools. But recent discoveries of unmarked graves of children who identified several of these schools, including over 215 found at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in B.C., suggest this number may have been higher.
An unknown number of P.E.I. Indigenous people attended the Shubenacadie residential school between 1929 and 1967. The Sipekne’katik First Nation is currently coordinating a search of the site of the former school using ground penetrating radar.
Kristmanson said Henderson’s question was the subject of a recent three-hour meeting of the Indigenous working group, composed of representatives of the Lennox Island First Nation, Abegweit First Nation, Native Council of P.E.I. and the Aboriginal Women’s Association of P.E.I.
“We’re very mindful of the fact that this is a long legacy in Canada and has left deep impacts on Mi’kmaq and Indigenous society in P.E.I.,” Kristmanson said.
“We understand that this has to unfold on their terms.”
For Lennox Island First Nation Chief Darlene Bernard, residential schools are clearly crime scenes.
“If there’s an unmarked grave and there’s children in those graves, and these deaths haven’t been reported, then it’s a crime,” Bernard said in an interview.
But as for the next steps, Bernard’s comments echoed those of Kristmanson and Gillis.
“I think what I would expect from the province is (to) give us some time, the Indigenous people, to figure out what our plan is,” Bernard said.
Bradley Cooper, a political advisor with the Native Council of P.E.I., said the federal government should take the lead on any investigation of abuse or neglect at residential schools.
“The focus needs to be towards a federal call to action on this, to follow the (Truth and Reconciliation Commission recommendations) and to have P.E.I. focus on the Indigenous population that it has here, supporting them with programs,” Cooper said.
On the issue of identifying records of Prince Edward Island residents who attended Shubenacadie, Kristmanson said this would require research into the records of who were then referred to as Indian agents. They worked with the federal government decades ago.
Kristmanson said she has been in touch with a colleague who has been examining these records.
“There are records there. There wasn’t a lot for P.E.I. that she encountered,” Kristmanson said.
“But that doesn’t mean that it’s not worth researching. So that work can be done.”