Maskwacis, Alta. Chiefs celebrate Supreme Court ruling on Indigenous child welfare law
Global News
First Nations Chiefs in Maskwacis, Alta., about 90 kilometres south of Edmonton, gathered Saturday morning to celebrate with a victory song.
Indigenous communities in Alberta say they are pleased with a recent decision by the Supreme Court of Canada. The country’s top court unanimously upheld a law giving First Nations, Metis, and Inuit people jurisdiction over child welfare.
First Nations Chiefs in Maskwacis, Alta., about 90 kilometres south of Edmonton, gathered Saturday morning to celebrate with a victory song.
Residential school survivor and former Grand Chief of the Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations, Chief Willie Littlechild, has been advocating for Indigenous peoples for decades. He said he’s proud to see this milestone and how far Indigenous rights have come.
“It’s a very important and serious cause for, reflection, not only to look at where we’ve been and where we are today,” Littlechild said. “The main message throughout all this journey, all this legislation, the court arguments and so on is that we need to work together. We need to work together to advance reconciliation.”
The act respecting First Nations, Metis and Inuit Children and families was first passed in 2019. In 2022, Quebec won a Court of Appeal, which found parts of the act overstepped federal jurisdiction.
But in a ruling Friday, the Supreme Court of Canada stated in a lengthy document that ‘the act as a whole is constitutionally valid’.
Littlechild said implementing their laws solves a problem the community has faced for decades.
With Indigenous affairs and land reserves falling under federal jurisdiction, and child and family services falling under provincial jurisdiction, it left Indigenous children in what Littlechild describes as a ‘legislative vacuum’.