THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON INDIGENOUS PEOPLES
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Wednesday, March 25, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on Indigenous Peoples met with videoconference this day at 6:45 p.m. [ET] to examine and report on the government response, dated April 26, 2024, to the committee’s fourteenth report (interim), entitled Honouring the Children Who Never Came Home: Truth, Education and Reconciliation, tabled in the Senate on July 19, 2023, during the First Session of the Forty-fourth Parliament.
Senator Michèle Audette (Chair) in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: I found the little chichiougan, the drum my son received at birth. It’s a way to “Innu-ize” the official opening of the committee meeting.
[Innu-aimun spoken] the Chiefs and the representatives of the Assembly of First Nations for being here with us.
[English]
There are amazing people who make sure that my strong accent is not too hard to understand when I speak French or English, the translator and interpreter, so we have to ensure that we do not get too close to the microphone with the earpiece, or if we don’t use it, we keep it on the sticker that we have here on the table.
[Translation]
I would also like to acknowledge the richness, knowledge and hospitality that the Anishinaabe people have demonstrated for millennia. This reminds us that they have never ceded these territories. Out of respect and in accordance with the protocols of many nations across Canada, it’s important to recognize this ancestral people who are still very much alive. Of course, First Nations from various territories, as well as Métis and Inuit people, still live in this region known as Ottawa.
[English]
My name is Michèle Audette from the Innu Nation, but also chair of this committee, and I welcome you. I will ask my colleagues to introduce themselves.
Senator Pate: Kim Pate. I live here in the unceded, unsurrendered and unreturned territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe.
Senator Karetak-Lindell: Hello. Senator Nancy Karetak-Lindell, Nunavut.
Senator McCallum: Senator Mary Jane McCallum, Manitoba, Treaty 10. Welcome. It is good to see you again.
Senator Tannas: Senator Scott Tannas, Alberta.
Senator Francis: Senator Brian Francis from Epekwitk, Prince Edward Island.
Senator Sorensen: Senator Karen Sorensen, Alberta, Banff National Park, Treaty 7 territory.
[Translation]
The Chair: Thank you very much. I would like to welcome our colleagues from the senators’ offices and our youngest Atikamekw and Cree intern, Patrick Awashish, who is with us for the week. He is a young leader in the making.
As you know, Canadians are listening to us — I hope so, at least — to hear the truth and the testimony of the witnesses, which will be important for our discussions over the next hour. Today, the committee is examining, in accordance with the order of reference entrusted to it by the Senate, the government’s response to the committee’s fourteenth report, entitled Honouring the Children Who Never Came Home: Truth, Education and Reconciliation, tabled in the Senate on July 19, 2023, during the First Session of the Forty-fourth Parliament.
We are privileged to welcome a female leader from the Tk̓emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation, Rosanne Casimir, Kúkwpi7, Assembly of First Nations, who is accompanied by Kyrie Tristary, Senior Director of Policy, Assembly of First Nations. We will also be joined via videoconference by Cadmus Delorme, former Chairperson of the Residential School Documents Advisory Committee and former Chief of the Cowessess First Nation.
Thank you for being here.
[English]
Before we hear your opening statement, and we proceed with questions and answers, I would like to remind everyone — and myself as well — that we are all on mute.
Also, because it is a sensitive discussion where we will share and listen to your truth, your stories and experiences and your message, maybe some of our relatives and families are listening. So there is — I will say it in French — somewhere people can call if they feel that the trauma is back, and we want to ensure that it is trauma-informed during this session.
[Translation]
We have a national helpline for addressing residential school issues. The phone number is 1-866-925-4419, and there is the Hope for Well-being Helpline too at 1-855-242-3310, which also has a website at hopeforwellbeing.ca.
To those watching or listening, there are resources available to support you if you ever feel the need.
We’re ready to hear from you, listen to you, and receive your messages. Of course, the senators will have a question-and-answer session with you.
Chief Casimir, you have the floor.
[English]
Rosanne Casimir, Kúkwpi7, Assembly of First Nations: [Indigenous language spoken]
Good afternoon. My name is Kúkwpi7 Rosanne Casimir, Chief of Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc.
I am honoured to be here on the unceded and unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin Nation.
Thank you, chair and honourable members of the Standing Senate Committee on Indigenous Peoples for the opportunity to speak with you as part of your important study. I am here on behalf of the Assembly of First Nations. And kukwstsétsemc to Senator McCallum for providing me with this tobacco. This is really good medicine and connecting me with that connection. Kukwstsétsemc.
Your committee’s previous reports — Honouring the Children Who Never Came Home, and Missing Records, Missing Children — provided a clear assessment of the barriers First Nations face. Many of those barriers persist today. They are structural, legal and governance related, and they continue to impede our community-led efforts to locate missing children and protect burial sites, including inadequate, short-term funding; restricted or inconsistent access to records; and conflicting legal regimes across jurisdictions.
These investigations are sacred. And they are made profoundly more difficult by fragmented legislation and limited access to records and decision-making frameworks that do not reflect First Nations authority or jurisdiction.
Indian residential schools have operated for 150 years. Investigating what happened to the children cannot be completed in a few years, or through short-term funding cycles.
Comparable investigations — in Canada and internationally — have taken decades. The B.C. government’s investigation into Robert Pickton involved 383 cubic yards of soil searched over 28 acres at a cost of $102.8 million over more than seven years. Holocaust investigations have continued for more than 75 years.
Truth takes time. Justice requires commitment. Canada must be prepared to support this sacred work for generations.
The Assembly of First Nations, or AFN, has consistently called for stronger legal protections against hate-motivated violence, particularly violence that targets residential school Survivors and First Nations communities.
The AFN resolutions reaffirm the need to combat racism and uphold the dignity of Survivors; the need to protect sacred and sensitive sites; and the need to address the rise in residential school denialism. We support the bill’s intent to criminalize hate-motivated acts and the use of hate symbols. However, Bill C-9 does not go far enough. It does not explicitly address Indian residential school denialism, which is a growing threat and a source of real harm to Survivors, their families but also the communities.
I’m raising four legislative and policy priorities that we wish the federal government to undertake: First, report on the Indigenous Peoples Committee recommendations. Like you, senators, we ask for an update on the six recommendations from the 2023 Honouring the Children Who Never Came Home report and the 11 recommendations from the 2024 Missing Records, Missing Children report.
We want to know what progress has been made, what actions have been taken and what barriers remain.
We want to see the federal government fully implement UNDRIP as well, particularly provisions relating to First Nations jurisdiction over children, sacred burial sites and First Nations control over stewardship of those records.
UNDRIP cannot be treated as optional guidance either. It must guide federal legislation and decision making.
The third point is we want to see reform of legal and policy frameworks. Canada needs legislation that protects burial sites, recognizes First Nations laws and protocols and respects decision making by First Nations in all aspects of this work.
The fourth is improving education and public awareness. Public education must reflect First Nations voices and also their lived experiences. Education is essential to prevent denialism and advance accountability. We must ensure the history and ongoing impacts of residential schools are understood, while supporting accountability and reconciliation.
Records related to Indian residential schools, Indian hospitals, and sanatoriums exist across federal departments, provincial governments, churches, hospitals and sanatoriums, universities and archives and Library and Archives Canada.
First Nations continue to navigate complex and fragmented systems just to access information about our own children and our ancestors.
The facts are very clear: These records are dispersed, incomplete and often inaccessible. External institutions still hold control over those records that belong to our people. UNDRIP affirms our right to access, steward and govern our own data.
Without full and timely access, community-led investigations are slowed or prevented.
Record access is not simply an administrative issue. It is a matter of truth, healing, responsibility and justice.
The right to the truth is not only a legal principle. It is a human obligation. When records are withheld, when facts are obscured and when denialism is allowed to spread, the dignity of victims is violated again. That’s our Survivors. Truth is the first step toward justice, and justice is the foundation of reconciliation.
First Nations are leading this work. My community is also one of those nations. This is long-term intergenerational work, and progress depends on a continued commitment to truth, accountability and justice for Survivors, families and communities.
But we cannot do this alone, and we should not have to fight for the records and tools required to find our own children.
We call on the Senate to make the following recommendations as your report to this study: to ensure sustained, long-term funding supporting the work in finding the truth with Indian Residential Schools; introduce legislation to hold federal departments accountable for withholding records; advance Bill C-9 with an amendment to address Indian residential school denialism; review governance at the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, or NCTR, to address barriers, delays and unnecessary bureaucratic processes to accessing records by First Nations communities; strengthen legal frameworks that protect burial sites; and support First Nations jurisdiction, governance and data sovereignty.
For us, let us honour the children, support the families but also ensure that Canada never turns away from the truth again and really does provide those actual steps moving forward and to support true reconciliation.
Kukwstsétsemc.
[Translation]
The Chair: [Indigenous language spoken] thank you very much.
[English]
Thank you for mentioning Bill C-9. It was presented to us today. It is a very important comment that you made. Thank you, Chief. Now I would like to invite Mr. Delorme. And then we will go with questions.
Cadmus Delorme, Former Chairperson of the Residential School Documents Advisory Committee and Former Chief of the Cowessess First Nation, as an individual: Good evening. Madam Chair, senators, Chief, all the people in the room, I come to you from Saskatchewan in our Canadian perspective and Treaty 4 territory in our respected Crown nations. I’m in Cowessess First Nation. It’s really an honour to be here and to speak for the next few minutes.
I was a prior Chief of the First Nation, and I worked very well, hand in hand, with Chief Casimir during 2021. It wasn’t an easy time when you had to explain to Canadians why there were unmarked graves in Canada beside the 140 once-funded residential schools across our country. A lot has happened since then.
I transitioned to chair of an organization helping the Government of Canada, the federal government and the Residential School Documents Advisory Committee. I was chair of that committee from March 2023 until July 2025, when we paused our role due to funding. I am here to explain how important documents are on this journey.
I want to say why we do this and whom I represent today. I am independent today, just a proud citizen in Canada and a proud First Nation person, but residential school Survivors and their families are watching us. This is our way of helping them heal from what they went through and what we all inherited.
The Residential School Documents Advisory Committee was struck to help the federal government provide strategic direction with recommendations. We had a very good ongoing operation, but due to funding, we paused our role. The Government of Canada, working with Crown-Indigenous Relations, provided us with a budget, but it didn’t fulfill half of what we were hoping to fulfill. One of the things we wanted to fulfill was a scoping exercise. Internally, that’s when you provide for a third party to come in. In our instance, we brought John Holmes research in to do a scoping exercise, but that definition was not done with the committee. There was a committee of residential school Survivors who had lived through it, as well as experts from the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, the interlocutor’s office and so on.
With government officials, we had one representative from each department and agency. We created a new definition of what a residential school document would be in the government, with many different patterns, all differing from marching bands, to sports teams, to coffins, to cadets, to labour, to Indian agents and so forth. We brought patterns in, and we created a new definition.
We asked for a second scoping exercise for all of the departments, and that’s when our budget was reduced. We were advised that if we could do it with the minimal budget that we were offered that year, we might have been given a budget the following year too. We didn’t want to go on “maybe” or water it down, so we paused. We never quit. We paused and told the government, when you are ready to take this seriously, we will see what we can do again.
Some of the challenges internally, just in the federal bureaucracy and the government, is the duty of care. There are privacy and privileges that the government has, and the duty of care is to protect the government: things like access to information, privacy, legal barriers, solicitor-client privilege and redacted documents. We have more and more committees today that are doing research, like Chief Casimir and her team in Kamloops. We have many across the country that are getting a little bit of funding to start doing their research.
Our end goal was to transition these documents from the federal government to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation so that access had minimal barriers. It was a really good initiative. It was approved by the cabinet. It was an internal thing. There was no external body to account to. It was just the federal government wanting to do this.
In conclusion, there was a lot that I learned during this time. We talked about things like the Gomery recommendations from the 2006 report that created the Federal Accountability Act, what was in there and how documents were kept in the decades leading up to that time and the three barriers I just shared with you — solicitor-client privilege, the Privacy Act and so on.
In conclusion, I am honoured to share here tonight that I am advocating that these records need to have the easiest access by each research committee on behalf of their communities and teams. I met with these teams across the country when I was in the role of chair, and each of them, with the best interest, needed these documents to make sure they could help families identify unmarked graves and the missing children.
I’ll tell you one personal story. It is very personal to me. My mother is a residential school Survivor. When I told her what I did, she told me one day that she had these two friends who left and ran away from school when she was a small girl. She always thought they made it home, but after all these unmarked graves and stories came forward, she said maybe they didn’t. That’s just something that residential school Survivors have to live with today.
In conclusion, I just want to throw in a quick example of the Independent Assessment Process, or IAP. This is a very sensitive topic for certain people in this country. There was already a Supreme Court decision on this, but the IAP records are the last truly spoken words of residential school Survivors that the government has. Once these records are deleted or destroyed, Canada will only be able to move forward with just the minimal documents they have. I truly think it is not going to help our initiative and what we’re all doing here today.
Thank you very much for letting me speak.
The Chair: Thank you so much. Thank you for your powerful message and words shared with us and many other loved ones who are in our hearts.
Colleagues, we will turn to questions, starting with Senator Sorensen.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you all for being with us this evening.
My first question is for Chief Casimir. It is clear that you have significant experience with residential schools and searching for unmarked graves and missing children.
Can you share your experience working with the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation in accessing records?
Ms. Casimir: For sure. Thank you for the question.
The NCTR plays a very important role as the permanent archive of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. However, significant concerns have been raised by Survivors, families and First Nations, including that the current NCTR governance structure does not fully reflect First Nations’ decision-making authority. Also, the university and provincial legislation governing the NCTR creates barriers, delays and bureaucratic processes to accessing records, and it is not designed for First Nation communities. Some communities continue to experience difficulty accessing records needed for truth-seeking and burial site investigations. Governance must be community-focused and guided by Indigenous data sovereignty principles.
This committee’s work makes clear that the NCTR requires strengthening First Nations government and greater transparency, a review of the University of Manitoba’s administrative agreement and a system that is responsive to community needs, not institutional constraints.
For us at Tk’emlúps, why these records matter so deeply is because to us, the records are not just documents; they are the story of our children. For us, without full access to the student lists, admissions, discharge logs, medical files and church correspondence — those are just some of the areas, but it’s also about identifying the children — the families cannot be notified. The truth cannot be confirmed. Denialism is growing in the absence of evidence.
We are honouring the children who did not come home, and to do that, we need the truth preserved in government and church archives to be fully accessible without delay, without restriction and/or redaction beyond the privacy needs of Survivors and families and those who are leading investigations. Kukwstsétsemc.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you. I have a question for Mr. Delorme.
You were involved in Cowessess First Nation’s work with Saskatchewan Polytechnic to use remote sensing technologies to locate unidentified and unmarked gravesites. Can you explain that a little more? It is something I am not familiar with, and I was intrigued by that work.
Mr. Delorme: Thank you, senator, for the question. Radar penetrating systems are like a pushcart in golf — if I can give you a description — and it goes over land. It picks up disrupted soil up to 150 years ago. It doesn’t pick up bones or bodies, but it picks up disrupted land. So the machine was pretty simple to push and move around, but it is the data system. In Cowessess, when I was chief, we had the talent to do it, but we didn’t have the resources to understand. So we partnered with a higher‑learning institution. In Saskatchewan there is the Saskatchewan Polytechnic. They were our resource for data and understanding the patterns and so forth. Then we were able to GPS the marks as well. Say if something crashed and we lost some data, all the GPS was in there.
Senator Sorensen: Thank you very much. That’s interesting.
Senator Francis: Chief Casimir, on October 2024, the Independent Special Interlocutor, Kimberly R. Murray, issued a final report that identifies 42 obligations that governments, churches and other institutions must meet to implement an Indigenousness-led reparations framework for truth, accountability, justice and reconciliation. This came after more than two years of intensive engagement with Indigenous survivors as well as their families and communities.
Are you concerned that the federal government has taken no steps to respond to the obligations put forward by Kimberly Murray and will continue to disregard this work?
Ms. Casimir: Thank you for that question, senator. I am very concerned that the work has not progressed. A lot of time, money and resources have been invested to support her work — she worked with all First Nations nationally — to be able to provide support to communities to do this investigation but also to seek truth and justice.
My fear is so much time has already lapsed. To me, when it comes to reconciliation, when it comes to justice, this year cannot be left on the back burner, not at the expense of our survivors but also for future generations as well.
Senator Francis: The role of the Special Interlocutor was to independently engage with Indigenous Peoples, provide recommendations to the federal government and, in general, advance truth and healing. Are you concerned that the mandate of the Special Interlocutor was too short, that it has left a significant void, and should the mandate be extended?
Ms. Casimir: I fully and wholeheartedly believe that it should be extended. This work, to me, is incomplete, and there is still so much work to do. Anyway I can advocate and support, along with each and every single one of you, and I will gladly do this.
When it comes to implementing this incredible work, there is a lot at stake. My fear is, with this growing denialism, it is taking away from the important work that needs to get done. It is about having those resources as well for the communities that are leading the investigation. Again, it is about not having to do it alone. It is about having the resources and support of government. So having that accountability and holding them to account are critical.
Senator Tannas: Thank you to both Chief Casimir and Mr. Delorme for being here. I share, chief, your concern around denialism and the fertile ground that is there for it to continue for so long as we’re in the situation that we’re in right now.
Coming up on the fifth anniversary of the initial discovery that you were a part of, out of the 215 graves, how many people have you identified that you believe are within that 215?
Ms. Casimir: Thank you for that question. That is out of my realm right at this time. I can share that a lot of work has been taking place. Just like Cadmus Delorme had shared about the GPS work, our community has definitely taken those exact steps. It is a process that is recognized internationally and that supports investigations. That is the route that our team has utilized. There have been other processes, and there is still much more work to do.
Senator Tannas: How do we get to the truth and begin to take children home where their families want them to go home? How do we identify that? I’m trying to understand.
You mentioned in a statement that you made some time ago that you felt there were 38 nations that were affected, that had children there. The idea was to talk to them and to get their views. Is the idea to say to those 38 nations, “Look, if we find somebody, however we find them, what do you want us to do?”
That’s the question I am asking. How do you get to the spot where you say, “Okay, it is time for us to begin excavating and trying to start bringing people home”? How do you see that going? If you had all the data of all the children — and the point of all the data is to try and identify who those people might be, I assume, in the graveyards — then what? Could you walk us through how you see, over the next decade, five years, one year, how this all plays out, so that there is a pathway that those who want to confront deniers can say that this is where this is going and, in the meantime, there is no conspiracy? We are walking a path together to get there to do the right thing for these children.
It’s not clear to me. I would be keen to know, Mr. Delorme or Chief Casimir, how you see this process working.
Ms. Casimir: I definitely see this is not like a one- or three- or five-year process. I see it as a longer process that’s going to take some time. When we’re looking at the importance of sustainable funding, that’s going to be able to support that work moving forward — you mentioned 38 nations. Well, with the Kamloops Indian Residential School, 38 nations had children taken from their nations and their communities to the Kamloops Indian Residential School.
It is about diversity in cultural protocols. It is also about being able to have, again, access to information and records and being able to correlate them with oral truth telling. It is also about being able to identify them through the records as well. There is a lot of information in those records to provide that work moving forward.
It will take time. It will take a lot of collaborative effort. The right to truth is not only that legal principle. Again, it is a human obligation, so we have to take that time, and we have to take that moving slowly.
We know that it’s been more than 150 years of the impacts of colonialism and residential schools, and it will take time to advocate and support and also to work with the other nations. That work is definitely well under way. We have a very strong, diverse team, moving and advancing and communicating with First Nation communities right across Canada.
Senator Tannas: Mr. Delorme, do you have anything to add? Your community had significant evidence of graves. We’re just hearing that everyone will have a different approach. What has been the approach in your community? Is there a list of suspected people or children who would be there? Is that how you are taking the first steps? What steps are you taking to try to develop a path to get those children where they belong?
Mr. Delorme: Thank you, senator. There are three approaches. The first approach is technical. The ground penetrating radar, or GPR, that I explained in a prior question is stage one. There is the technical and scientific side of making sure we know where a body is. We did the GPR. We brought in the cadaver dogs as a sniffing technique, but one of our biggest successes was something called the S-4. It is a little pin that goes down. It does not dig anything up, but it has a camera and a sensor, and when you hit something, it can verify what it is, for example, if it is a body or something else equivalent. Then it comes back up.
That was probably one of our best technical tools. It doesn’t say age or gender or anything like that, but it does verify something is there. That was a huge step for us. I’m no longer directly a member of the team. I’m just a big supporter of it, and I’ve been reading a lot of documents today. That is the first one.
The second approach is research. I will talk about Marieval. From 1878 to 1974, when the documents were truly run by the church and funded by the government, they were dispersed. Asking for Tylenol was like asking for a Band Council Resolution, or BCR, letter, but when children would pass, we had to take the intake at the beginning of the year and the intake at the end of the year to match them. Governments could put whatever they wanted. Even if we could open up all the documents, that would not be the solution.
We had the church going. There was French as well, so we needed translators to translate some of the French documents from the church. There were other means of documentation, treaty payments and so forth.
The third approach is the people today: the Elders, the Knowledge Keepers, the experts of today. One of the things we were told was, “Do not dig up any graves. That is something we do not do.”
To sum up the answer to your question, because it was a Roman Catholic church at the time, there was a whole part outside the fence where people who were not baptized had to be buried. It is very devastating to the community when we try to talk about it. It was really important that we just kept giving updates. Those three streams, senator, are what is being funded, in a normal committee, to try to get this to the end goal.
Senator Tannas: Thank you. That’s very helpful.
Senator Pate: Thank you very much. Thank you to all of you for being here. You’ve seen the response of the government to the committee’s report. If you were in our shoes, what would you want us to say back to the government?
Ms. Casimir: That is a very, very good question. In my opening remarks, I shared about improving education and public awareness, especially when it comes to reflecting First Nation voices but also their lived experiences. To me, that is extremely important. Education is essential not only to prevent denialism but also to advance accountability. We must ensure that the history and ongoing impacts of residential schools are understood to not only support accountability but also take those steps toward reconciliation.
Denialism, again, is growing. It’s not just a First Nations issue or concern. This is a national issue, in my opinion. To me, the government has to do more when it comes to denialism. Also, it is in all spectrums. Not only is it traumatizing for our survivors, but it’s also traumatizing for families and communities, and when we have these conversations with local municipalities, as well. It’s growing. The government needs to do more. They need to educate more. They need to be sharing the true historical impacts. But there also needs to be more done to be able to advance this moving forward.
Kyrie Tristary, Lead Senior Director for the Assembly of First Nations: I would add to Kúkwpi7 Casimir’s response to flag that we’re coming to the end of a fiscal year. With that fiscal year, there are critical mental health supports that are going to be expiring, and we’ve got no indication of what will happen on April 1. This is an extremely delicate area, and these services are critical. Even to host this session, I’ve seen the disclaimers of the Hope for Wellness Helpline — how is that funded? Will that continue after this?
These are the questions that communities are asking. What will happen with those gaps in mental wellness supports, as well as other areas where funding is sunsetting? If we’re looking to the federal government, we are asking, “What is the plan?” What is the plan going forward to ensure that First Nations, Survivors, families and communities continue to have access to these critical services without any gaps?
Mr. Delorme: Thank you very much for the question, senator. What Chief Casimir and my other colleague just spoke of is very, very true: mental health and denialism.
I just wanted to add two things. You inherited this as senators and the government today. You didn’t create it, but governments that had that decision power that you have today and the responsibility, they had it. The First Nations trusted. Since treaties and relationships, the duty of care has always been toward Canada and the best interests of Canada. There has to be a paradigm shift that the best interest in this moment is truly to the First Nations people. That’s the challenge we face, and this is why it is so tough.
Canada feels that justice has been served in some cases. This is what I mean. There was an apology. There was a per capita payment. There was some research done. So Canada somewhat feels that maybe justice has been served, but for First Nations people, justice is far from done being served. They inherited mental health problems, family breakdown of kinship because of the impacts of residential schools, lack of governance funding for chiefs and councils, and the need to manage poverty. Unmarked graves and missing children are what we are talking about now, but the end goal is that First Nations should feel like we belong in this country, not just being fitted in.
There has to be core funding for this area. For these research teams, they don’t know if they will be funded next year. The committee that I chaired? Our funding got cut down by almost 70%, and the government said, deal with what you have for this year and maybe next year. I have seen the patterns of our budgets. We’re not going to be here and be your token. We want this to get done on your behalf. Ultimately, patterns change in government, and so does funding, and we have to identify core areas that shouldn’t have that big impact. That’s where I would add onto your question.
The Chair: Just before I pass to my colleague Senator McCallum, if it is possible, Ms. Tristary, if you have the specific names of those programs that might be cut, if you can send it, or you can respond. It is up to you. Then, in our report, we will know exactly which one.
Thank you very much.
Senator McCallum: I wanted to go back to the ancestral remains. As you know, when I was speaking to you, where I went to a residential school, I worked with the organization that was looking for the remains, and they organized a mock, where we went through the bush to see how you could spot a grave. They also brought in the cadaver dogs, and they identified 4 sites out of maybe 300.
I will just briefly go over that. When they do the cadaver dogs, they have to punch holes in the earth, and then when the body is there, the gas will come up. The cadaver dogs went all around and came to one site, and then they sat and barked.
The one that was in the bush, they — this was done through a pipe ceremony, and he saw the site, and he looked for it, because we both were there for 11 or 12 years, and he found it. They took the dogs there, and the dogs were very restless but couldn’t pinpoint. So they went, I guess, downwind — would it be — or upwind, and they came this way. She said the dog ran to the tree, and he just swiped it. I saw the claws, and then he sat.
I said, “How does this work?” He said, “The gas comes up.” I said, “How long does it remain?” And it is 150 years.
Because one of them was around a tree, the tree wraps its roots around the body, and the gas goes up the tree, and that’s what the dog smelled.
We have moved ahead to look at what we do now, because ours is a provincial park. It was not on reserve land. The major crime unit came. The province came because they have a heritage build, and we’re at that stage.
I started looking at the laws covering repatriation, because for me, I want those bodies taken home. They died there in violence. They were buried in violence, and we need to take them home and honour them so they can be with their loved ones, and we can remove them from that site where they were just disposed of.
My question is: When you are doing this work, has anyone looked at what happens now? Even if you leave the bodies there, are you going to do a ceremony, or what is it that we do?
We work with anthropologists, and it is interesting, because one of them is the daughter of the woman I went to residential school with, and they were both there, and she was helping.
I know the records are a big thing, but we’re there already. Do you agree that we need to start — or maybe you have started. What are all the areas that we need to consider?
Ms. Casimir: Thank you very much for that, Senator McCallum. I really appreciate you sharing your story and your community and the work that has taken place and the experience with the cadaver dogs and the findings but also the work that took place.
For us, it has always been about either exhumation and/or memorialization, knowing that we are also working at Tk’emlúps with 38 nations. We also know that we have to work with the other communities to fact find, responsibly share protocols, and honour that diversity and those who are no longer here and also how that is going to be moving forward.
You mentioned you worked with the heritage act —
Senator McCallum: It was in Manitoba.
Ms. Casimir: So that was not on reserve land?
Senator McCallum: No.
Ms. Casimir: With us, ours are on reserve land. But there are also areas, too, that have been identified off of the reserve area.
I know that in British Columbia, even looking within my own community of Tk’emlúps, there are chance finds. There is a lot of archaeological work that has taken place. We also know that there are a lot of discrepancies within the provincial heritage act from doing the work off of your reserve.
We also recognize that growing fear and denialism also impact and cloud the simplicity of how sacred this work is, moving forward. We know that because our lands have never been ceded, sold or given up, that there are those possibilities — very strong possibilities — that you are going to find ancestors and ancestral remains off our reserve.
Having cultural protocols in place also helps to support that work moving forward. With Tk’emlúps, we’re very fortunate to have our own cultural heritage bylaw. We’re also very fortunate to have a good relationship with the local municipality and the City of Kamloops, to be able to work together.
I also know that a huge question arises when it comes to private property interests, and so with us, we just want to ensure that any work moving forward is done in a good, respectful manner, but also to support that and not to fear it. For us, when we think about the simplicity of underlying title, so when we look at private property interests, it is not about creating fear that we’re going to take somebody’s private property or anything like that.
In your situation, it was on property that was not on reserve, so there were steps to work through with the Manitoba heritage act. With our situation in Kamloops, it is quite different because of the provincial heritage act and the gaps that it has.
We’re still working through those steps and those processes. We still have much work to do. When we’re looking at getting to the place within our area there, close to the Kamloops Indian Residential School, we have much work to do with all the local First Nation communities. We’re going through those protocols, knowing that it has to be something that we can all agree to do. We have many who say that this is their final resting place, so we need memorialization. We also know the investigation is extremely critical and important. For us, it’s about the truth for our Survivors but also to advance that, to get to a place of justice and reconciliation.
Senator McPhedran: I would like to understand better the situation with the documents. I believe, Mr. Delorme, you were involved, in 2023, in a scoping exercise. You had identified 23 million potentially relevant additional residential school documents held across 13 federal departments, including several warehouses of paper records at Public Services and Procurement Canada alone.
We are aware of the fact that, just about a year later, you and other members of the advisory committee stepped away because of a funding issue, funding that was needed to do your work. I’m hoping you can tell us a bit more about the significance of those 23 million documents in federal hands and also whether you see any other mechanism. The advisory committee didn’t work. You know much more about that than I do. But do you see another mechanism? Do you see a way to come back at this and not leave it so unresolved?
Mr. Delorme: Thank you, senator. There were identified 23 million documents. First, I want to explain how they were identified. Before I took the chair in March 2023, the government took it upon themselves to create a definition of a residential school document. It was through search engine searches and some internal hands-on work. That’s where the number of 23 million documents came from.
About 13 million documents — I will try to be precise, but I won’t be exactly — could easily be transferred to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. They are outside the scope of the client-solicitor privilege and outside the acts that protect documents internally. So, there are about 10 million documents internally that would be redacted if transitioned over, protecting Canada’s duty of care from the solicitor-client issue. They could be Indian hospital documents, or there could be other reasons, like the Privacy Act and so forth. Those are the ones that would take a little longer.
As a committee, we asked to do a second scoping exercise with our new definition, developed with input from First Nations and residential school Survivors, as well as the lived experience of experts who were there pre-government. That’s when we were advised that we would not be getting the budget to do a second scoping exercise.
Many documents are housed in warehouses, even though there is a legal case that you have to transition to digital now. A lot of them still were physical copies, and they were in disarray. They weren’t in chronological order. It would take an expert and a lot of human time to go through these. We wanted to ensure this would only be done once in the government’s history. We weren’t going to water it down to where, 10 years from now, someone would have to do it again.
If I can use a car analogy, we asked for the Cadillac. We were provided the Ford. But the budget offered us a bike. We were like, we cannot do this, knowing that you are thinking we will just ride a bike to do this. We did ask the government, “Can you at least increase our budget to this? We will do it with the Ford even though we know we deserve the Cadillac,” and they were like, “Maybe next year.” That is the scope of the documents that were identified as 23 million.
Senator McPhedran: Can you tell us more about the documents not held in federal departments but held in church records?
Mr. Delorme: Thank you, senator. Yes, each residential school, prior to around 1972, was run by a church, a majority of the 140 sites. Whatever church ran it, they pretty much held those documents until 1972. Some transitioned to warehouses. Some burnt down because of the infrastructure they were in. It is really up to each residential school. There is not just one holding church. For instance, in the Cowessess, ours ended up in Winnipeg. This is how it went; documents went from Cowessess, Marieval, to a local town called Grayson, to Yorkton, Saskatchewan, and ended up in St. Boniface, Manitoba. The boxes of documents kept moving. People had access to the boxes at many times.
When we got to St. Boniface, we expected the documents to be in somewhat of a chronological order. When they opened the door, it was just dusty boxes that had not been opened in decades. There was no chronological order. What we thought would be one visit to St. Boniface ended up being numerous visits. We still feel like we didn’t get what we were hoping to get. We had to translate some documents because they were in French. We had to find a translator who had that privacy approach because these were some pretty detailed documents.
There were other documents that we were trying to seek, but predominantly, it was through the government and through the churches.
Senator Prosper: Thank you to both of our witnesses and Ms. Tristary, for being here.
I can only imagine the course of all of this, the navigation of discussions within communities, outside of communities, with government, in trying, as mentioned earlier by Chief Casimir, to get to the truth of something, while at the same time dealing with denialism. People are calling, “Well, where’s the evidence?” You say, “There is a process here in order to establish that.”
I’m just curious. A number of recommendations were made both in the reports provided but also within your submissions. I want to focus on one and get both of your perspectives on it; I refer to First Nation governance and First Nation data sovereignty.
I know one can start in many areas, but is there a core or critical issue that you think may have a way of creating momentum? You know, you knock over one, and it has a way of creating momentum. Where do you think we would land on First Nation governance and First Nation data sovereignty? Do you consider that to be the core issue or one of many? More specifically to that, can you provide some detail on those terms, for my benefit? Thank you very much.
Ms. Casimir: Thank you very much for that question, Senator Prosper.
Looking at sovereignty, it’s really important for First Nation communities that are leading the investigation to be able to uphold their sovereignty through their customs, their culture, but also their protocols that they have in place. It is also important to be able to support and lead that work moving forward, and to be able to have the resources be available.
When we’re talking about First Nations governance, it is about including the traditional but also the governance that they also have in place, as well as working with other communities and their governance structures — everything from ceremonies to their cultural and traditional practices when working with those that have passed — also their shared knowledge and the history. There also needs to be support for how, where and when those discussions take place toward memorialization and/or exhumation.
It is all those various steps that take place in between all those steps.
Senator Prosper: Thank you.
Mr. Delorme, do you have any comments to the question?
Mr. Delorme: Yes. I just wanted to add in two things.
The OCAP — sorry, I’m going to use the acronyms — the OCAP is a really good teaching tool for First Nation governance to understand the sovereignty that they have with the records and so forth. I have been a big fan of the OCAP process. I am trained in it, and I have all my team trained in it. I continue to advocate for it. It allows a First Nation to understand the true sovereignty document understanding.
Second, there is a protection clause here. The Government of Canada has privacy acts and so forth. I heard Chief Casimir talk about her similar governance structures. Not all nations have these. They are not written yet. They may be in ceremony or in unwritten form.
That’s why the NCTR is so important. I’m not here to advocate that they are the solution, but they are one of the strongest organizations to hold these documents until nations are ready. Even though I think the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s challenge, as Chief Casimir said, would be the University of Manitoba — and they are a little intertwined — there are some challenges there. I’m not speaking on their behalf; I’m just sharing openly as someone who knows how this works.
First Nations do need to strengthen their governance because these documents will get there eventually. They will get there, and it is just a matter of whether there is a protection of privacy there, as well, because they have a standard that they have to hold.
Senator Prosper: Thank you.
The Chair: I just want to say thank you, Mr. Delorme. There was a young man with us this week. Things were too heavy for him, so he stepped out, but I will tell him that we have hope — just with you. I can see that you are very calm, but there is a big troupe behind you that gave us that warmth in our hearts. I will show Patrick that there are strong men with a future troupe of young men that will continue this fight with love. Thank you so much. Every one of us is enjoying your children. Thank you.
Are we okay to go beyond 8:00 o’clock? There are other senators who would like to ask a question or have an exchange with you.
Senator Francis: In the final report, the special interlocutor highlighted that Indigenous communities face significant gaps in accessing training and resources to effectively conduct investigations and searches. One of her recommendations called for the establishment of national ethical and professional standards for anyone working with Indigenous communities who are conducting investigations.
Do you agree that more safeguards are needed to better support those leading this work? Also, are you aware of any examples of mismanagement or exploitation by third parties offering technical and/or other services?
That’s for anyone who would like to answer. Mr. Delorme, would you like to start?
Mr. Delorme: Sure. Thank you, senator.
I’m going to start off with an example. And, please, I am not discrediting anyone or anything. We had a relationship with Sask Polytechnic, and still do today, and we trusted that their system was going to work well with ours — our system being our oral traditions and understanding. We somewhat had a disagreement at some point, and we wanted results. The results weren’t coming quickly enough, from our standards. We kept asking and asking. Finally, we felt almost — not cornered — but we felt like we had to understand more of their timeline rather than them figure out our timeline.
That’s when we realized that we needed to create something where we can control the science part of this. Again, I’m not discrediting Sask Polytechnic, but they did this off the corner of their desks, because they still had classes and the person who was helping us was still a professor. But that’s an example. I wouldn’t say that they treated us wrong; it is just that we weren’t a priority all the time when, to us, this was a priority.
Moving forward, I got to meet with a lot of search and research committees when I was the chair. I took it upon myself to call each of them, go meet with them and go to their sites. They were all working in silos, and they weren’t talking to each other. Marieval wasn’t talking to Kamloops. I didn’t know if they were talking to another one. There was one in the Blood Reserve, Brandon and in Ontario.
So, I started to tell them, “I think you should call this one because they are having a similar issue.” We could probably be stronger with somehow uniting them. Maybe this is from the interlocutor at the time because she was doing the same thing. Now that she is not there and I am not the chair of a certain committee, I don’t know if anybody is even doing that anymore.
Senator McPhedran: I would like to spend a bit of our remaining time on Bill C-9. Many of us were at a briefing today on Bill C-9. I think I could maybe summarize by saying there were a fair number of unconvinced senators in that room about the bill as it is proposed.
I’m very interested in you seeing that as a key vehicle to address denialism. Also, I want to ensure that I understand your approach on this: Is it to add to the current and proposed definitions of “hate” and have denialism rolled into that? Is it a separate standing category that you would like added to the bill? Thank you.
Ms. Tristary: Bill C-9 is actually part of the legislation that the AFN was looking to intervene on in the fall. The National Chief was scheduled to appear, and her appearance at a House of Commons committee was cancelled at the last minute. She was particularly seized with wanting to talk about Indian residential school denialism and hatred.
In our study of Bill C-9, I think what we were looking to introduce was an amendment that would look at incorporating something around the wilful promotion of hatred and to include that spectrum of Indian residential school denialism as well as, more broadly, racism directed toward Indigenous people.
But I will turn it over to Kúkwpi7 Casimir to talk because, in our preparation for this committee, she spoke a lot about what is being experienced on the ground in her community in B.C.
Ms. Casimir: Thank you for that, and thank you very much for bringing this forward and for being able to have this here conversation.
Free speech does not include the right to cause harm. When we look at denialism, it is causing harm and is retraumatizing our Survivors. It is affecting the families of Survivors. It is affecting communities. It is affecting relationships.
To me, those are all things that we have to hold strong and support because it has triggered so many, and it’s all the fear that has been triggering over and over. When I look at denialism, it is not a matter of debate in any shape or form, and the federal government should go as far as criminalizing denialism. It has to go that far. It is not about restricting free speech in any way. It’s about protecting the dignity and safety but also the humanity of Survivors and their families. I don’t think a day goes by that our community and our survivors haven’t been traumatized over and over by denialism.
Social media is probably the worst. That needs to be included. Social media is such an open space and has a negative rippling effect. We need to do more to uphold truth but also to share the truth. That’s where I see the government having a responsibility to support that moving forward.
Our offices, our places of work get phone calls and emails. They are all triggering and traumatizing. For myself, it’s not just me within the Tk’emlúps. Many of us receive numerous emails that are filtered, and our emails are monitored to send that to a safe place. Otherwise, there would be overload. To me, when I look at my responsibility to my community, but also the sacred responsibility of the investigation, that has to be the focus, without this denialism and fearmongering. It needs to be supported at the federal lever, every level and in every relationship and with allies across the board to be able to stand up for truth.
Senator McPhedran: I hope you are right about Bill C-9 being helpful in that way. We have enough lawyers around the table that we are maybe a little more skeptical about it as a vehicle. Is there a plan B if you don’t get the amendment that you want?
Ms. Tristary: Part of the presentation that was made today also focused on the role of education. In her remarks this evening, Kúkwpi7 Casimir talked about the importance of everyone being involved and raising that awareness.
In looking at the legislation, you can expect that AFN will be looking at an intervention to introduce an amendment to Bill C-9 but also continuing to advocate for the recommendations coming from the Office of the Independent Special Interlocutor, who called for specific legislation to deal with denialism. We are also monitoring Bill C-254, the private member’s bill of MP Leah Gazan, who is also looking to advance legislation that deals with Indian residential school denialism.
Senator Pate: Mr. Delorme, as you probably got the sense from us, it was delightful to see the children running around, but it is also a reminder that we are taking you away from your family. Thank you to all the witnesses for the time you devote to assisting us in a moment where you are struggling to find the resources to continue this.
As you were talking about the files and the frustration that Chief and Ms. Tristary were talking about, it reminded me of what has often been described as the current day residential schools — the incarceration rates of Indigenous people. I can’t tell you how many times we have gone to court to get files, and then we get a box full of materials that are all jumbled up, and we have to spend not just hours but sometimes weeks trying to put the files back together. It is like someone picked them up, threw them down the stairs, and then put them in a box and sent them to us.
It strikes me that there are horrible parallels between the way you are being treated in trying to get these documents and the way they treat the current attempts to try and have some justice in the prison system, where Indigenous people are overrepresented. I wish I had something more helpful to add than that observation. I don’t know if you have experience trying to get those kinds of records, but it strikes me that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is 10 years on; MMIWG has happened, but it seems like there is very little institutional impetus to follow through on the remedies that were called for and that our First Nations or Indigenous communities deserve.
If you agree with that, maybe we can try and strengthen our response, that not only has the report not ended up garnering the kind of response we might expect from the government, but it’s likely to get far worse if something proactive isn’t done at a moment when it’s very clear we have to do something.
I want to thank all of you again for coming. Seeing that we are now part of the government, I apologize on behalf of the government for the failure to act.
The Chair: Thank you, Senator McPhedran. For coming back on Bill C-9.
As I was listening to you, superdad and also an amazing person, Mr. Delorme, would you be comfortable if I recommended your name for the study on Bill C-9? This morning we were asked if we could define what hate is from a First Nations perspective or lived experience. I didn’t get an answer. We also need witnesses in that committee who are expert or passionate or strong, like you and Chief Casimir, so you can also bring your message to that committee. It is not on behalf of my amazing colleagues, but for me, I thought, “They should be witnesses.”
Senator Pate: I would move what our chair just suggested as a recommendation.
The Chair: It became a recommendation. Thank you so much. [Indigenous language spoken] Let’s have a beautiful thought for Patrick and all the loved ones, the people who are listening but not here, feeling emotions or having memories, that they are not alone, and we have strong, beautiful warriors who are standing for us and with us.
Mr. Delorme: Thank you all for the opportunity to share.
(The committee continued in camera.)