The Supreme Court has upheld a federal law affirming that Indigenous peoples have a right to self-government under Canada’s Constitution, which includes the authority to write their own child-welfare laws.
“For most of Canada’s history, lawmakers have wrongly imposed a policy of assimilation” on Indigenous peoples, the court said in an 8-0 ruling, citing intergenerational trauma caused by the residential schools and Sixties Scoop of Indigenous children. “Nothing prevents Parliament from affirming. . . that Indigenous peoples have jurisdiction to make laws in relation to child and family services,” the ruling said. “It is equally open to Parliament to affirm that the laws of Indigenous communities, groups or peoples will prevail over other laws in the event of a conflict.”