CANADA
The Canadian Human Rights Commission reports that the
government violated its judiciary duties and special position
of trust that obliges it to protect the interests of natives.
The report stops short of endorsing Inuit claims for
compensation.
In the fall of 1953, a boat load of Inuit from northern Quebec
arrived at Elsmere Island, several thousand kms from their old
homes on the shores of Hudson Bay. Some of them were left on
a desolate beach with a few personal belongings. The boat went
to a nearby island and the rest of the Inuits were deposited
there, at an airbase and weather station. During the 50's, two
more groups of Inuits were moved to the High Arctic. In all,
about 20 extended families were brought to a land they had
never seen before.
One of them tells a familiar story of the time: In 1955, he
was living on the shores of Hudson Bay when two RCMP told him
he had to move. They loaded him on a boat and took him. He
said it felt like travelling to the moon. The federal
government claimed the Inuit were starving in their old
hunting grounds, so it moved them.
Nearly 40 years later, the surviving Inuit and their families
say the Canadian government misled them. They say they were
used to establish sovereignty over the High Arctic islands and
the RCMP forced them to move. Life in their new homes, they
say, was far from an improvement. Most lived in tents for
years before houses were available.
Reine Flaherty arrived in Elsmere Island in 1955. She too
arrived in Aug and it was dark all the time. Ice was covering
the walls. Her son, Peter, almost died of starvation when they
first arrived because there was no food anywhere.
The Inuit claim they were told they could move back anytime
they wanted, but it wasn't until the 1970's that the
government offered to pay for some people to go back to their
old homes. Most of them moved back in 1988.
But the Inuit involved still demand an apology from the
federal government and some kind of financial compensation.
Those demands have been supported by the House of Commons
standing committee on aboriginal affairs. In 1990 it held
hearings into the Inuit relocation. It heard from some of the
relocation survivors who said that in the early years their
mail was censored and they weren't paid for work they
performed. Some told stories of sexual abuse.
The federal government responded to the standing committee's
recommendations with its own study. It concluded the
government at the time did no wrong, the Inuit participated
voluntarily in the relocation and there was no need for an
apology, let alone compensation.
It was then discovered the consultants who authored the
government report worked for the Department of Northern
Affairs in the Arctic in the 1950's. The standing committee
and the groups representing the Inuit appealed to the Canadian
Human Rights Commission. Last year, the commission hired a
Queens University law professor to investigate and make some
recommendations. Prof. Daniel Silverman travelled through the
north to interview families that had been moved.
Silverman finished his report just before Christmas. It was
sent to all parties involved. Details were leaked to the
press. It is believed Silverman's recommendations will ask the
government to apologize and establish a travel fund for the
families that were relocated. It is not expected that it would
recommend financial compensation. (R. Canada Int'l)