Stop weaseling

Survivors of Canada’s notorious residential schools have suffered plenty at the hands of Ottawa and church groups. They shouldn’t have to endure the added insult of seeing more than $20 million disappear from healing programs because of a legal bungle that let Catholic groups off the hook for funds they were supposed to raise.

It’s a modest amount measured against the $3 billion in payments made by Ottawa and church groups to survivors under the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement. But it engages the honour of the Crown, and speaks to the ethics of the church.

“I don’t know about legally, but there’s a moral obligation here,” Phil Fontaine, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, told the Globe and Mail. “We’re dealing with close to 80,000 survivors and it’s important for them that they be treated fairly and justly.”

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government should make up the shortfall, even as it presses the church groups to do the right thing and cough up.

Under the agreement, Catholic groups agreed to pay up to $79 million in compensation. They pledged $29 million in cash, $25 million in services, and promised to make a “best effort” to raise another $25 million. But the former Conservative government inadvertently let them duck part of their obligation in 2013 when they were coming up short. In the end they collected just $3.7 million through fundraising.

How did this happen? Basically, the Catholic groups proposed to Ottawa that they make a $1.2-million payment to resolve a dispute over the $29-million cash portion of their obligation, provided they were released from all other unmet pledges including fundraising. In what Ottawa calls a “miscommunication,” a federal lawyer led them to believe they had a deal. And a Saskatchewan court confirmed as much last year. That left the church off the hook.

This was a screw-up by the Crown, in accepting the Catholic groups’ proposal. But no one comes off looking good. One thing is certain: First Nations survivors shouldn’t have to wear this one. If the church won’t make them whole, Ottawa should.

Ottawa should make up the shortfall in compensation if church groups won’t step up