Forum gathers recommendations for Canada

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A three-day conference hosted by the Canadian Race Relations Foundation (CRRF) was held in Sherwood Park on Oct. 25 to 27 and was attended by about 100 people. Canadian anti-racism experts and officials from the federal government were at the gathering to discuss Canada's domestic agenda against racism.

CRRF is an agency that works with the federal government to create a future in which all Canadians are treated equally and fairly and recognizes the pervasiveness of racism in today's society.

The conference included discussion on righting historical wrongs for Aboriginal people in Canada, health, immigration, education, justice, poverty, hate crime and encouraging youth to speak out against racism.

Participants were asked to join caucus sessions where they worked together with other interested individuals on a number of topics. The priorities identified by each caucus will be presented to the federal government.

"We achieved what we set out to do," said Patrick Hunter, communications director of the conference. "We came up with a list of priorities that we presented to the federal government through the secretary of state, and hopefully we will see some action very soon. We will see what happens," he said.

According to Tim Thompson, an Aboriginal committee member with CRRF, the opening plenary sessions of the conference focused on Aboriginal issues. A panel of Aboriginal people included lawyer Willie Littlechild, Tony Belcourt of the Metis Nation of Ontario, Kenneth Deere of Kanawake Mohawk Territory, Marie Battiste of Eastern Canada and Jamie Koebel from the Canadian National Association of Friendship Centres.

"These people brought a huge range of issues which they expressed in a really nice way. From all the comments I received, the people were very impressed. The people who work with the CRRF are a great bunch of people. They work hard and they do their best," he said.

A package of 150 recommendations, 20 of which pertain to Aboriginal issues, was presented to Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Status of Women) Jean Augustine on the Saturday evening.

"There are so many issues of racism facing the Aboriginal people, it is hard to know where to begin. Do we begin with the racism slurs on the street? With the way the workers in a store look at us when we walk in? Do we begin with the landlords who deny our people a rental unit? Our struggle is huge. It seems that we have to struggle almost to the end of our lives, but I think that some of us can try to make a commitment to try and convince the government to recognize us as who we are. That we are original nations, that we have our own ways and that we require recognition of our territorial rights. We still have a lot of work to do," said Thompson.

Muriel Stanley Venne, a local woman who's been an advocate for women's right and issues for several years, found that this conference gave her a chance to address the issue of Aboriginal women murdered in Vancouver as well as in the prairie provinces, and the long-standing grievances of the Metis people in Canada.

"I thought that the conference was very timely and it dealt with the critical issues that pertained to the Aboriginal community. The Prime Minister of Canada has given us a statement saying that he is going to help Aboriginal communities so it is my sincere hope that he includes the Aboriginal women in that announcement. Aboriginal people at the conference had good representation there. It was excellent, just excellent. It was very encouraging to see Jean Augustine's response to the things that we are working on," she said.