Nova Scotia ministers silent on environmental racism report, to meet with authors
Global News
The minister of African Nova Scotian Affairs says she has read a report about environmental racism in her province, but she won't talk about what it says.
Nova Scotia government ministers say they will meet with a panel tasked with examining environmental racism in the province, although they remain tight-lipped on the panel’s findings, which were submitted a year ago.
Following a cabinet meeting Thursday, Minister of African Nova Scotian Affairs Twila Grosse confirmed the meeting, adding she will attend.
“We want to ensure that we collaborate and that we move forward,” she said on the report by the eight-member panel appointed in June 2023 to look at how racism affects a community’s natural environment. It was delivered to the province about a year ago.
The panel’s members included community leaders with expertise in subjects such as Mi’kmaw and African Nova Scotian history, law, health and environmental sciences. Environmental racism can occur in instances where landfills, trash incinerators, coal plants, toxic waste facilities and other environmentally hazardous activities are located near communities of colour, Indigenous territories and the working poor.
Last month, Becky Druhan, justice minister and minister response for the office of equity and anti-racism, refused to give any details about the report and wouldn’t confirm whether she had read it.
On Thursday, Grosse said she has read the report but refused under repeated questioning to discuss the panel’s recommendations. “I am not prepared to comment on the content of that report,” she said, adding that its findings are the responsibility of the anti-racism office.
Nor would Grosse discuss whether as minister of African Nova Scotian Affairs she was comfortable with keeping the findings under wraps, saying she would continue to be the government voice for her community. She added that she is well aware of the environmental effects of racism from “lived experience.”
Environment Minister Tim Halman told reporters he had been briefed on the report, but he too wouldn’t release any details on what he had learned. Halman said he would be one of the ministers meeting with the panel.
