BC bands launch day scholar class action

Joan Jack is confident that another class action launched in federal court will only strengthen the position of day scholars and day school students as they seek recognition and compensation for the abuse they suffered in federally-funded schools.

Jack’s law firm has been acting on behalf of day scholars and day school students since filing the McLean Day School Class Action in federal court in Winnipeg in 2009.

In August, the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc Indian Band and Sechelt Indian Band filed a joint claim class action in federal court in British Columbia on behalf of both bands’ students who attended Indian residential schools as day scholars.

“We must remember there were four national class actions in the residential schools and 17 individual ones before Canada would even step up to the negotiating table,” said Jack, referring to the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement (IRSSA), which was signed in 2007.

“We’re seeking justice for our people,” said Tk’emlups Chief Shane Gottsfriedson. “We’re tired of the government dancing around the issue.”

After years of lobbying the federal government with letters and resolutions from both the Assembly of First Nations and provincially, Gottsfriedson said the two bands are taking the final step.

“Now the only action we have is to fight for our people through the court system, and Canada should be ashamed of itself for doing that,” he said.

Gottsfriedson said the decision was made not to join the McLean Day School Class Action because “our strategy is different than other ones.”

Both Tk’emlups and Sechelt Indian Bands were sites of Indian residential schools that were included by the federal government on the prescribed approved list of schools under the IRSSA. However, children who attended these residential schools during the day and went home in the evenings–referred to as day scholars–are not eligible for Common Experience Payments, unlike their residential school counterparts.
They could qualify, though, for compensation under the Independent Assessment Process. Many day scholars suffered physical, sexual and emotional abuse. All were exposed to loss of their culture, language and way of life.
“When our day scholars went to school, that was not the type of education we envisioned that they would receive,” said Gottsfriedson.

The class action filed by Tk’emlups and Sechelt bands names three classes: day scholar survivors, descendants of day scholar survivors, and the bands. The last class “speaks toward healing for our communities,” said Gottsfriedson.

He is confident that support received from the AFN, the First Nations Summit, the Union of BC Indian Chiefs, and the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations will help the cause.

“I can say there’s one hell of a movement going across the country now because there’s lots of class action suits. We’re working hard to bring more awareness about who was left out,” said Gottsfriedson.

Canada has 30 days to respond to the Tk’emlups and Sechelt Indian Bands class action.

Meanwhile the McLean Day School Class Action is gathering more information before it proceeds.
Jack says after the claim was filed, the federal government’s response was to ask for more information on the students involved and what schools they attended.

Jack filed the class action at the direction of Ray Mason, president of Spirit Wind, an organization in Manitoba that supports all Indian school survivors. Mason was one of the residential school survivors who was part of the Canada-wide action that led to the IRSSA.

“When we set out, our original personal mission was to help all survivors. It was Canada that separated us,” said Mason, who attended three different residential schools over a 12-year period. He has friends and family who are day scholars and day school students–students who attended schools that operated solely during the day and had no residences–and knows they suffered like he did.
The apology issued by Prime Minister Stephen Harper in 2008 did not acknowledge day school students or day scholars.

The McLean Day School Class Action is the only national class action suit and has 11,000 signatories to date. More survivors are expected to sign up. Until recently when Jack began requesting new signatories ante up $25 for administration costs, all the work undertaken had been at Jack’s expense. The recent AFN national chief candidate said she has borrowed $150,000 to keep her law firm operating and cashed in her Great West Life pension.

She points out that as part of the IRSSA settlement, lawyer Tony Merchant, who represented the survivors, “negotiated $45 million as a pre-settlement amount for his firm, because for 20 years he worked without pay.”

To raise the $350,000 needed to keep moving forward, Mason sent out letters asking “every local First Nation/Inuit/Métis government in this great country … to contribute a minimum of $500 to our cause (so) we would meet our goal and have our day in court!”

“There was very little that came forward,” he said. “I’m very disappointed. After all, we’ve been working at this for years and years at a volunteer basis.”

Jack said she will continue to push for the federal government to take responsibility.

“No justice, no peace,” said Jack. “It’s not going to go away. The fact (is) that the … purpose of the day schools was the same as the residential schools, which was to kill the Indian in the child, to assimilate us, to fill us with cultural shame.”