Indigenous leaders had a candid meeting with Canada’s premiers on Monday in Halifax, where they addressed a strained relationship and pushed for more inclusion.
The discussion kicked off the first day of the Council of the Federation’s annual summer gathering.
The conversation was supposed to focus on health care but Indigenous leaders also called for changes to the way the federation meetings work.
“We were able to say very frank things and we [had] an open conversation,” said Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami president Natan Obed.
This was Obed’s first meeting with provincial and territorial leaders since the June 2016 Council of the Federation meeting in the Yukon.
Since then, all of the provinces and territories have elected new leaders. Obed said he returned to deliver a message.
“We just respect each other and our jurisdictions,” he said.
Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami president Natan Obed and Métis National Council president Cassidy Caron told reporters they discussed how Canada’s premiers can improve relationships with national Indigenous leaders.
National Indigenous leaders have been at odds with the premiers over the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and a federal law affirming Indigenous jurisdiction over child and family services.
“I would say in the last year the relationship with provinces and territories has regressed,” Obed said.
The other challenge, he said, is that the council doesn’t seem to respect the national institutions that represent the interests of First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities: the Assembly of First Nations, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami and the Métis National Council.
The Congress of Aboriginal Peoples and the Native Women’s Association of Canada were invited to Monday’s meeting. Obed said these organizations should not be at the table discussing jurisdictional and governance issues that affect Inuit.
“We don’t want to be at a table where there’s a purposeful ignorance of the respectful relationship between premiers and leaders of Indigenous Peoples,” he said.
The council’s chair, Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston, selected health care as the topic of discussion for a scheduled two-and-a-half-hour luncheon meeting.
The conversation ended up lasting three hours, with Indigenous leaders confronting the premiers over tensions in the relationship and calling for more involvement.
Indigenous leaders ask to be treated as equals
Although the leaders didn’t receive any firm commitments, Métis National Council president Cassidy Caron said there was a sense that the premiers understand their position better now.
“I do feel as though there is openness,” she said.
Caron said her ultimate goal is to see the Métis National Council, Assembly of First Nations and Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami participate in all of the federation’s meetings.
She called for a reset last year and sent followup letters to all 13 premiers, but received responses from only British Columbia Premier David Eby, Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe.
The conversations the premiers have are important to Métis communities, Caron said, especially when it comes to health care. Unlike Inuit and First Nations individuals, Métis citizens don’t receive federal health coverage.
Caron said many Métis governments often have to fill the gap and pay for services, such as medical travel for Métis citizens who live in remote communities, but their funding is unstable.
The Supreme Court of Canada’s 2016 ruling in Daniels v. Canada said Ottawa has jurisdiction over all Indigenous people.
But complications between the federal and provincial governments over Métis health care remain despite three memorandums of understanding that her organization signed with Ottawa — and have since expired — to advance discussions on the issue.
Manitoba’s premier seen as possible ally
Caron said she wants the premiers to help her push for Métis-specific health benefits at the federal level.
Obed said he wants to work with the premiers on sorting out jurisdiction issues since more Inuit than ever before now live in urban centres, particularly in Ontario and Alberta.
Both Obed and Caron said they see an ally in Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew, the first provincial premier of First Nations descent.
“I’m hoping that he … will be able to champion our cause,” Obed said.
He acknowledged that the federation’s meetings are primarily for the premiers.
But Obed said national Indigenous leaders need to work with provincial and territorial leaders, and they should at least be developing the federation’s meeting agenda together.
“I want to make this country a more respectful place,” Obed said.
“I know that the premiers are smart enough to understand this. It’s whether or not they’re willing to accept and to be true partners with leaders of Indigenous Peoples rather than play us off one another, invite whoever they feel like.”
Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations Gary Anandasangaree says he’d be proud to put his government’s record on reconciliation up against Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s ‘any single day of the week.’ Poilievre is scheduled to speak at the Assembly of First Nations annual general assembly on Thursday in Montreal.