The final National Event of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is wrapping up this weekend in Edmonton. NDP Aboriginal Affairs Critic Jean Crowder is attending the event today, hearing stories from residential school survivors.
The MP for Nanaimo-Cowichan says the TRC has done some important work, but there’s more to do. She says she’s concerned that progress wll stall once the TRC completes its mandate next year.
Cowder also says she’s disturbed by news that Health Canada’s scrapping a mental health support program for survivors. Justice Murray Sinclair, who’s heading up the TRC, says the Resolution Health Support Program is being terminated. Sinclair says that essentially leaves people who have told their stories of abuse to find their own form of treatment.
Meanwhile, BC government has given the Truth and Reconciliation Commission 4,900 death certificates of First Nations youth who died between 1870 and 1984.The TRC will use the data to determine which of the deaths happened in a residential school. So far BC is the first province to hand over that information but the TRC has requested it from every province and territory.
