Canada to pay billions in reparations to indigenous peoples

The Canadian government agreed to pay nearly $2.1 billion to some indigenous communities in order to "address the collective harm" suffered by thousands of native children who were forcibly placed in religious schools for a century.

The new agreement, which has yet to be approved by a court, would settle the latest in a series of lawsuits filed since 2012 by 325 indigenous communities seeking compensation for the alleged erosion of their cultures and languages as well as other abuses endured. According to a statement from the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations:

Announcing the agreement at an event on Saturday, Marc Miller, minister of crown-indigenous relations, said it will not "erase or make up for the past," but "what it can do is address the collective harm caused by Canada's past."

A "cultural genocide"

From the 19th century until the 1990s, thousands of indigenous children and youth were compulsorily educated in some 130 boarding schools Canada, almost all of them run by churches. The plaintiffs claim that they were prohibited from speaking their ancestral languages and practicing their traditions. They also claim that on many occasions they were separated from their families by force.

In 2021, unmarked graves containing the remains of 215 former students were reportedly discovered on the grounds of a former boarding school in British Columbia. Subsequently, further searches at other former schools found similar grave sites.

Thousands of students are believed to have died in these schools due to disease, malnutrition, neglect, accidents, fires and violence. A national commission of inquiry in 2015 called the event a "cultural genocide."

The fifth major agreement

If approved, the new agreement would be Canada's fifth legal settlement related to schools. In total, the government will have have contributed a total of about $7.5 billion (10 billion Canadian dollars) in cultural reparations.

The first settlement of this kind, called an Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA), was granted to former students in 2006. The agreement resulted in the creation a National Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which issued a list of recommendations to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who promised to implement them in their entirety.

Indigenous communities may use the compensation for educational, cultural and linguistic programs, as well as to develop projects that support former students and help them "reconnect with their heritage," the government said in a statement.

The government settled part of the lawsuit in 2021, but the part of the case was scheduled to go to trial. Minister Miller noted that the decision was made last fall but that it was better to negotiate a settlement than to go to court: