Dear Friends and Allies,
We need to get rid of the sex discrimination in the Indian Act now!
Please help by: 1) signing on to the letter below and 2) circulating this email and letter to all your friends and all the organizations you work with. We need both organizations and individuals to sign on. Send your sign on to communications@fafia-afai.org ASAP.
Shocking as it is, Indian women still do not enjoy the same entitlement to full Indian status and the same ability to transmit their status to their descendants as Indian men. This discrimination has existed since the Indian Act was first introduced in 1876. We believe that 143 years of sex discrimination is enough.
Since 1970, this discrimination has been condemned repeatedly by Canadian commissions and inquiries, United Nations treaty bodies, and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Canadian courts have ruled in case after case that the Indian Act violates s. 15 of the Charter. Despite this, Canada’s amendments to the Indian Act have been narrow, and have never eliminated the structure of discrimination that is embedded in the Act. In 2017, because of the insistence of the Senate, and the Famous Six, the Government of Canada included provisions in Bill S-3 that can eliminate the discrimination completely, but these provisions are not in force.
Now we have a new development. On January 11, 2019, the United Nations Human Rights Committee issued its decision on the petition filed by Sharon McIvor, and ruled that Indian Act sex discrimination violates the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. As a signatory to this treaty, Canada is directed to ensure that all First Nations women and their descendants are granted the same status as their male counterparts. We want to see this ruling implemented immediately.
We are coming up to an election. If this 143-year-old discrimination is not removed by May 2019, we will head into an election period, and the opportunity for groundbreaking change will be gone. PLEASE HELP US REMOVE THE SEX DISCRIMINATION FROM THE INDIAN ACT, COMPLETELY, NOW!!
1. Please sign on to this letter addressed to the Prime Minister of Canada, the Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations, and the Minister of Justice asking them to remove the sex discrimination from the Indian Act now; to sign on, send us an email at communications@fafia-afai.org by February 22 with your name, if you are signing as an individual, or the name of your organization, and/or the name of all the individuals at your organization that would like to sign on. We will keep a continuous list and post it on our website.
2. For background information on Indian Act sex discrimination, please go here.
3. To see the UN decision, please go here.
Thank you for your help and support.
Sharon McIvor, Pamela Palmater, Shelagh Day, and Lynn Gehl
--------------------------
The Right Honourable Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada
The Honourable Carolyn Bennett, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations
The Honourable David Lametti, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada
February 13, 2019
Dear Prime Minister and Ministers,
We write to request the immediate implementation of the United Nations Human Rights Committee’s ruling on the petition of Sharon McIvor and Jacob Grismer. The Committee held that the sex-based hierarchy between s. 6(1)(a) and s. 6(1)(c), introduced by the 1985 Indian Act, and continued by the amendments of 2011 and 2017, violates the right to the equal protection of the law without discrimination based on sex, and violates the equal right of men and women to the enjoyment of Indigenous culture, guaranteed by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The Committee has stated that Canada is obligated to provide full reparation. This obligation includes:
· ensuring that all persons, including Sharon McIvor and Jacob Grismer, who were previously not entitled to be registered under s. 6(1)(a) solely as a result of preferential treatment accorded to Indian men over Indian women born prior to April 17, 1985 and to patrilineal descendants over matrilineal descendants, born prior to April 17, 1985 be given full 6(1)(a) status; and
· taking steps to address residual discrimination within First Nations communities that arises from sex discrimination in the Indian Act.
Because the Government of Canada included provisions in Bill S-3 that would eliminate the discrimination against First Nations women and their descendants, once and for all, no new legislation is needed. The discrimination that remains, and that still excludes, or provides lesser status to, approximately 270,000 First Nations women and their descendants can be erased from the Indian Act by Order in Council (s. 15(1) of Bill S-3).
We understand that meetings of Cabinet take place on Tuesdays. This means that any Tuesday, Cabinet could eliminate the sex discrimination against First Nations women and their descendants that has been on the law books for more than one hundred years.
We urge you to wait no longer. On September 21, 2017, Prime Minister Trudeau told the United Nations General Assembly that “the world expects Canada to adhere strictly to international human rights standards … and that’s what we expect of ourselves too.” That is what we expect: that Canada will live up to its human rights obligations, and do it now.
We look forward to an immediate response.
Sincerely,
Sharon McIvor, Dr. Pamela Palmater, Senator Lovelace-Nicholas, Ellen Gabriel, Cindy Blackstock, Jeannette Corbiere Lavell, Dr. Lynn Gehl, Les Femmes Autochtonnes du Québec/Quebec Native Women, Ontario Native Women's Association
Send your sign on to communications@fafia-afai.org ASAP.
---
Le très honorable Justin Trudeau, premier ministre du Canada
L’honorable Carolyn Bennett, ministre des Relations Couronne-Autochtones
L’honorable David Lametti, ministre de la Justice et procureur général du Canada
Le 23 janvier 2019
Monsieur le Premier Ministre, Mesdames et Messieurs les Ministres,
Nous vous écrivons pour demander la mise en œuvre immédiate de la décision du Comité des droits de l’homme des Nations Unies sur la pétition de Sharon McIvor et Jacob Grismer. Le Comité a conclu que la hiérarchie fondée sur le sexe entre les alinéas 6 (1) (a) et 6 (1) (c), introduite par la Loi sur les Indiens de 1985 et maintenue par les amendements de 2011 et 2017, viole le droit à l’égale protection de la loi sans discrimination fondée sur le sexe et viole le droit égal des hommes et des femmes à jouir de la culture autochtone, garanti par le Pacte international relatif aux droits civils et politiques.
Le Comité a déclaré que le Canada a l’obligation d’accorder une réparation intégrale. Cette obligation comprend:
· veiller à ce que toutes les personnes, y compris Sharon McIvor et Jacob Grismer, qui n’avaient auparavant pas le droit d’être inscrites en vertu de l’alinéa 6(1)(a) uniquement en raison du traitement préférentiel accordé aux hommes indiens par rapport aux femmes indiennes nées avant le 17 avril 1985 et aux descendants patrilinéaires par rapport aux descendants matrilinéaires, nés avant le 17 avril 1985 obtiennent le plein statut 6 (1)(a) ; et
· prendre des mesures pour s’attaquer à la discrimination résiduelle au sein des collectivités des Premières Nations qui découle de la discrimination fondée sur le sexe dans la Loi sur les Indiens.
Puisque le gouvernement du Canada a inclus dans le projet de loi S-3 des dispositions visant à éliminer la discrimination à l’égard des femmes des Premières Nations et de leurs descendants, une fois pour toutes, aucune nouvelle loi n’est nécessaire. La discrimination qui persiste et qui exclut ou accorde encore un statut inférieur à environ 270 000 femmes des Premières Nations et à leurs descendants peut être éliminée de la Loi sur les Indiens par décret (par. 15(1) du projet de loi S-3).
Nous croyons savoir que les réunions du Cabinet ont lieu le mardi. Cela signifie qu’un mardi, le Cabinet pourrait éliminer la discrimination fondée sur le sexe à l’égard des femmes des Premières Nations et de leurs descendants qui est inscrite dans les lois depuis plus de cent ans.
Nous vous exhortons à ne plus attendre. Le 21 septembre 2017, le premier ministre Trudeau a déclaré à l’Assemblée générale des Nations Unies que « le monde s’attend à ce que le Canada se conforme strictement aux normes internationales en matière de droits de la personne [...] et c’est ce que nous attendons aussi de nous ». C’est ce à quoi nous nous attendons: que le Canada respecte ses obligations en matière de droits de la personne et qu’il le fasse maintenant.
Nous attendons avec impatience une réponse immédiate.
Sincèrement,
Sharon McIvor, Dr. Pamela Palmater, Senator Lovelace-Nicholas, Ellen Gabriel, Cindy Blackstock, Jeannette Corbiere Lavell, Dr. Lynn Gehl, Les Femmes Autochtonnes du Québec/Quebec Native Women, Ontario Native Women's Association