It is going to take time and money, but there is a firm commitment from the Indigenous Affairs department to turn over child and family services to First Nations and Metis communities.
The promise was made at the end of a two-day summit in Ottawa involving dozens of stakeholders that included cabinet ministers, First Nations and Metis leaders, social workers and even foster children.
The overall theme of the meeting was: “What is happening now is not working”, and, in fact, is an extension of what the residential school system did to Aboriginal children.
More than half the foster children in Canada are Indigenous even though they represent about five percent of the population.
Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Carolyn Bennett says it is clear governments do not have the answer.
“What we are saying today is that communities have the solutions,” she said. “First Nation and Metis leadership want to be in control and making decisions for their children and we are going to help them do that.”
The national chief of the Assembly of First Nations Perry Bellegarde welcomes the support and commitment from the federal government, but he also urged them to start making changes immediately.
“But we have got to fix this now,” he urged. “We don’t want children lingering in care anywhere, in any province or territory, in any system, and that is what this is all about. And it’s not just feds, it’s not just provinces or territories……it’s collectively, find the processes that unite rather than divide.”
Indigenous Services Minister Jane Philpott called the current child welfare system a humanitarian crisis that is taking place under the guise of child protection.
(Photo courtesy Canadian child welfare research portal)