Newly named Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller says he wants to get to the bottom of why Ottawa abandoned its appeal of a ruling releasing the Catholic Church from its settlement obligations to residential school survivors.
"I don't know what there is to do yet."
Today, the efforts made by Catholic bodies to relieve itself of responsibilities under the historic arrangement face renewed scrutiny as First Nations searching former residential school sites confirm the discovery of what are believed to be hundreds of unmarked graves of Indigenous children forced to attend them.
At the heart of the legal ruling was a dispute between a government lawyer and counsel for the Catholic entities about whether they had agreed to let the groups walk away from all obligations outlined in the settlement in exchange for $1.2 million, or only resolved a more specific part of those obligations.
By November, a government lawyer submitted another document to Saskatchewan's Appeal Court. This time, it contained a single sentence saying it was abandoning the appeal. Hours after being sworn into his new role, Miller said last week that land was at the centre of that relationship, and it was time to "give land back."
The Liberals' commitment to reconciliation has been tested over the past six months, not only by the discovery of unmarked graves, but also its ongoing court battle around compensating First Nations children who lived on-reserve without adequately funded child and family services or were separated from their families through foster care.
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