NationTalk: Okanagan syilx Territory, Westbank BC: The BC First Nations Justice Council (BCFNJC) denounces and strongly opposes a resolution that has been put forward by two Law Society of British Columbia (Law Society) members for consideration at the upcoming 2024 Law Society Annual General Meeting.
The resolution contains alarming Residential School denialism, calling for the Law Society’s Indigenous Cultural Competency Course to be revised to correct “false information,” specifically a reference to “the discovery of an unmarked burial site containing the bodies of 215 children on the former Kamloops Indian Residential School grounds.” Further, the resolution calls for the deletion of a passage that states, “the discovery confirms what survivors have been saying all along.” These so-called corrections seek to supplant countless testimonies, reports, and investigations with a factually incorrect narrative that is rooted in the silencing and dismissal of Residential School survivors.
Since the painful discovery in Kamloops in 2021, there has been a small but growing disillusioned sect in BC and across Canada that put forward spurious and harmful claims denying the horrors of residential schools and refer to the discovery of unmarked graves at former Residential School sites as a “hoax.” Such harmful Residential School denialism ignores the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Final Report (Volume 4) and the ongoing work of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation and other bodies such as the National Advisory Committee on Residential Schools Missing Children and Unmarked Burials and the Office of the Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools.
The resolution is distressing, painful, and disrespectful to survivors, as well as the First Nations communities who are continuing to discover unmarked burials and mass graves – only recently did Opaskwayak Cree Nation announce that cadaver dogs found evidence of unmarked burials at the McKay Residential School near their reserve.
The need for lawyers to be better trained on Indigenous people was called upon in the Truth and Reconciliation’s Calls to Action #27, which stated: We call upon the Federation of Law Societies of Canada to ensure that lawyers receive appropriate cultural competency training, which includes the history and legacy of residential schools, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Treaties and Aboriginal rights, Indigenous law, and Aboriginal–Crown relations. This will require skills-based training in intercultural competency, conflict resolution, human rights, and anti-racism.
The Law Society’s Indigenous Cultural Competency Course was developed to answer TRC Call to Action #27 and supports Strategy 20 of the BC First Nations Justice Strategy, through which BCFNJC is advancing the development of standards for cultural competency and a training program for all those who interact with Indigenous people in the justice system.
The course is integral to ensuring lawyers understand the truth of Residential School history, as well as the history and legacy of colonization. It is unconscionable that efforts be made to revise this history and sanitize the genocidal atrocities committed against Indigenous people in BC and Canada, including the Residential School System. BCFNJC supports Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc and other Nations working to identify and honour stolen children and calls for lawyers across BC to stand up against the grievous racism and discrimination being advanced by the resolution.
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About the BCFNJC
The BC First Nations Justice Council has been entrusted with the mandate to transform the justice system and create better outcomes for Indigenous people through implementation of the BC First Nations Justice Strategy.
Media Contact:
BC First Nations Justice Council
Natalie Martin (she/her)
Director of Communications
Email: natalie.martin@bcfnjc.com
Direct: 778-795-0582