Seven years after the TRC released its final report, Canada has much work to do, Yellowhead Institute says.

The Toronto Star: Canada has completed only 13 of 94 calls to action outlined by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, seven years after its final report, a new update shows.

“Survivors (of residential schools) are ageing, and many of them are passing away,” says Eva Jewell, the research director of Yellowhead Institute, an Indigenous-led think-tank at Toronto Metropolitan University.

“And we know that some of the ongoing structural issues that are still in place in Canada are continuing to harm yet another generation.”

The Yellowhead Institute’s report, released Thursday, is the fourth edition of its annual brief, featuring analyses from, among others, Cindy Blackstock, the executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, and Douglas Sinclair, the publisher of Indigenous Watchdog, a non-profit dedicated to monitoring and reporting on how reconciliation is advancing.

In 2022, two calls to action have been fulfilled, the institute says — 67 and 70, which both relate to Canada’s museums and archives.

At this pace, the report says, it would take about 42 years, or until 2065, to complete all the calls to action.

“It took this country over 150 years to come into being in a colonially violent way, and amending that is going to take a long time,” Jewell said.

Call to action 67 urged the Canadian Museums Association to undertake a national review of museum policies and best practices to determine the level of compliance with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and to make recommendations.

Call to action 70 called for the Canadian Association of Archivists to undertake a national review of archival policies and their compliance with UNDRIP and the United Nations Joinet/Orentlicher Principles and produce a report with recommendations for a reconciliation framework for Canadian archives.

The papal apology earlier this year could have crossed call to action 58 off the list, but it fell short of expectations, the report states, as the call to action explicitly “called for an acknowledgment of the Roman Catholic Church’s role in the ‘spiritual, cultural, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis children’ and for the apology to align with the 2010 apology delivered to Irish victims of abuse.”

Instead, Pope Francis placed blame on individual members of the church, which Yellowhead called a “missed opportunity” to accept responsibility for the church’s role. Plus, the call was for the apology to be made one year after the final report was issued, making it six years late.

“We do want to celebrate the success that survivors fought for, so we were willing to put that technicality aside,” said Jewell. “But that technicality is really important,” especially as survivors put their harrowing testimonies on display for nearly a decade before the TRC’s final report was released, Jewell explained.

“The fact the Pope didn’t complete it within the year says something about the lack of attention paid to survivors.”

Among the 94 calls to action are “legacy” calls to action and “reconciliation” calls to action, the former seeking to redress ongoing structural inequalities in child welfare, education, health and justice, and the latter to advance reconciliation through inclusion, education and policy.

“Despite support within Indigenous communities and calls for swift action among Canadians, there continues to be dismal progress on the kinds of Legacy Calls to Action that, if implemented, would significantly improve the quality of life for Indigenous peoples across the country,” the report reads. “Those Calls that address structural change in this country remain largely unfulfilled.”

There’s also a lack of data being released in those key areas, said Jewell.

Still, there was progress in 2022 for the advancement of reconciliation, Yellowhead says.

In October, Yellowhead wrote, NDP MP Leah Gazan urged the government to recognize what happened in residential schools as genocide, gaining unanimous consent in the House of Commons after a failed previous attempt.

And in June, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations Marc Miller introduced Bill C-29, the National Council for Reconciliation Act, which could fulfill call to action 53 and others afterward. Call to action 53 urges the creation of “an independent, national, oversight body with membership jointly appointed by the Government of Canada and national (Indigenous) organizations, and consisting of (Indigenous and non-Indigenous) members.”

The minister was unable to respond to a request for comment by deadline Thursday.

“We’re just not entirely sure how that’s going to roll out,” Jewell said, with the report featuring critiques of the bill from Assembly of First Nations Chief RoseAnne Archibald, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami president Natan Obed and Métis National Council president Cassidy Carron.

“While the government dragged its feet waiting for this — what we fear to be toothless — reconciliation oversight body, Indigenous Peoples are still experiencing harm every day,” Jewell said.