Inquiry / Investigation

Access the complete Final Report and associated scholarship here

Summary is an excerpt from the Introduction to the Final Report, VOL 1a, Page 49-50:

"Listening Deeply Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people in Canada have been the targets of violence for far too long. This truth is undeniable. The fact that this National Inquiry is happening now doesn’t mean that Indigenous Peoples waited this long to speak up; it means it took this long for Canada to listen.

Neil Stonechild, a seventeen-year-old Indigenous boy was found frozen to death in the outskirts of Saskatoon in 1990. Stonechild was last seen in police custody the night of his disappearance and his body had marks on his wrist, which were likely made by handcuffs. The Saskatoon Police ignored reports from Stonechild’s family and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix for months and eventually years. A Commission was created to determine the cause and circumstances surrounding his death over a decade later.

Abstract from the report, Page 1-2:

"In recent years, Aboriginal people in Canada have suffered from much higher rates of suicide than the general population. While the overall Canadian rate has declined, in some Aboriginal communities and populations, rates have continued to rise for the last two decades (Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, 1995).

Excerpt from Introduction, Page 2-3:

This report examines the following factors which, too long neglected, have contributed to a heightened - and unacceptable - risk of violence against Indigenous women in Canadian cities:

This book is a report of an investigation made in 1914 by American Frederick Abbott, secretary of the Board of Indian Commissioners under administration of the United States federal government. Pages 16-18 outline the contents of letter correspondence exchanged between George Vaux, Chairman of the Board of Indian Commissioners, and F.H. Abbott, Secretary of the Board of Indian Commissioners regarding Indian administration in Canada and the possibility of meeting with Duncan Campbell Scott, Deputy Superintendent General of Indian Affairs.

Excerpt from Executive Summary, Page 1-2:

"During the past 10 years, the Representative for Children and Youth has repeatedly raised deep concerns about the treatment of young people who are in the care of the British Columbia government and, in particular, the treatment of Aboriginal children and youth, who continue to be over-represented in the province’s care system.

Excerpt from Inquiry, Page v-vi:

"Specific Claim - In May 1996, the Red Earth and Shoal Lake Cree Nations jointly submitted a specific claim to the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, alleging that Canada had breached the terms of Treaty 5 and the 1876 Adhesion by not providing “farming lands”to the Red Earth and Shoal Lake Cree Nations. In June 2004 the First Nations requested that the Indian Claims Commission (ICC) conduct an inquiry into their claim, despite not having received a decision from the Minister on the claim’s validity.

Excerpt from the Introduction, Page iii:

"The Churchill River Board of Inquiry was appointed in January of 1977 to make recommendations as to whether the Wintego hydro-electric project proposed by the Saskatchewan Power Corporation for the Churchill River in northern Saskatchewan should proceed.

A comprehensive course of action was laid out for the Board in terms of Reference (see next section) for the Inquiry. -

The executive summary of the TRC's Final Report.

From Federal website: The Report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP) concerns government policy with respect to the original historical nations of this country. Those nations are important to Canada, and how Canada relates to them defines in large measure its sense of justice and its image in its own eyes and before the world. The RCAP was established by Order in Council on August 26, 1991, and it submitted its report in October 1996.