The Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations is calling on the Saskatchewan government to implement the Trudeau government’s Bill C-92 on child welfare legislation.
The legislation was introduced in the House of Commons last week and aims to give Indigenous communities more control over child and family services.
“The two areas that the province needs to work with us on is the implementation and the transition,” FSIN Vice Chief David Pratt said at a news conference Friday in Saskatoon.
Pratt says that the FSIN accepts the legislation in principle but they are pushing for some amendments to be made to the bill.
“We are pleased that it gives time for the province to come to an agreement with First Nations. We can’t be set up for failure. We have to be able to have the resources we need as we assert that jurisdictional piece and build capacity to bring our children home. We acknowledge the hard work of many on child welfare, especially our First Nations chiefs, elders and knowledge keepers and former ministers Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott, who worked tirelessly to support fundamental change for First Nations children, youth and families. While we are supportive of the bill in many respects, we have two urgent items we want addressed to improve this critical legislation. Without explicit funding mechanism in the bill and without implementing UNDRIP (United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People) as a framework for the task necessary to address systemic failures in policy and law for children and families, we do not believe it can result in the kind of transformational change needed.”
Indigenous children make up approximately one-quarter of the children in Saskatchewan but represent nearly 85 per cent of children in government care according to Statistics Canada.
“We call upon the Government of Saskatchewan to work on First Nations child welfare jurisdiction and recognize the Inherent and treaty rights of our peoples to care for our children; something we’ve never given up and never consented to pass to the province,” FSIN Chief Bobby Cameron says in a press release. “The federal legislation will be a chance to make change and we hope the Saskatchewan government will not oppose or reject this significant opportunity for our children and families.”
A 2017 report by the ministry of social services says that more than 5,000 children are in government care and that there was an annual increase of approximately three per cent over the past five years.
(PHOTO: Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations Vice-Chief David Pratt, left, speaking about the federal government’s Bill C-92 on child and family services. Photo by Brendan Mayer.)