Shift of health care to First Nations step towards sovereignty

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 11/07/2024 (499 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If you want a better understanding of why the provincial and federal governments are transferring control of health care services to First Nations in southern Manitoba, I highly recommend you read a report that was released this week by the Southern Chiefs’ Organization.

It is one of the best and most concise documents I’ve ever read on how colonialism has impacted the health and well-being of First Nations people.

It’s titled Decolonization: Recognizing First Nations Sovereignty 2024 and it comes two weeks after SCO and the federal government signed an agreement-in-principle on health governance. The agreement is expected to lead to further negotiations and legislation that will result in the transfer of heath care services to 34 Anishinaabe and Dakota Nations.

Even if you only read the executive summary and the first 34 pages of the 100-page report — which includes a well-researched, clearly written overview of the numbered treaties and the impacts of colonialism on Indigenous people — you will gain a better understanding of why health care services are being transferred to First Nations.

First Nations never agreed to relinquish their sovereignty to colonial governments. That is the first and arguably the most important thing Canadians must learn if they want to “unlearn” the inaccurate version of history they’ve been fed.

When First Nations chiefs negotiated treaties, including Treaty 1 in 1871 in southern Manitoba (the first of 11 numbered treaties Canada negotiated with First Nations), there was no talk of First Nations giving up control of their own affairs. In fact, Crown negotiators promised the opposite: while Queen Victoria (the reigning monarch at the time) wanted Indigenous people to live more like “white people,” she would not force them to do so.

Among other treaty promises, land would be allocated to First Nations for their exclusive use (reserves) based on a per capita formula and Indigenous people would be free to live their lives as they always have. They agreed to share the rest of the land with new settlers and their colonial governments in a peaceful, mutually respectful society.

At no time was there any agreement that First Nations had to give up their way of life or relinquish their sovereignty. That is well documented in historical records and in Indigenous oral history.

The problem is colonial governments violated that pledge almost immediately. They took control of Indigenous peoples’ lives and refused to make good on many of their treaty obligations, including land allocation. Canada attempted — through coercive assimilative policies such as residential schools, the banning of cultural rituals, community relocations, deliberate starvation policies, and the ’60s Scoop — to eradicate an entire people.

Over a century and a half later, as Canada embarks on a path towards reconciliation, it is now attempting to restore that sovereignty to Indigenous communities.

If you can begin to understand that, you have a much better chance of comprehending why vital services (and the funding that goes along with them) are being repatriated to Indigenous communities. It’s an example of “decolonization,” which Canadians are going to hear a lot more about in the coming years.

“Decolonization means returning control of First Nations health, health care, and health care delivery to First Nation citizens and rebalancing the power structure of decision-making where First Nations ways of knowing and doing are recognized as equally as valid as Western ways of knowing and doing,” the report says.

It won’t be easy. No one can undo 150 years or more of harm overnight. The new structures must include new fiscal arrangements and a recognition that First Nations have a constitutionally protected, inherent right to self-government and are equal partners in the Canadian federation.

It can’t be a “dump-and-run” approach either, where the federal government transfers authority to First Nations but deprives them of the taxation revenue needed to fund it, the report says.

Wealth in Canada was amassed over generations at the expense of Indigenous people, who were marginalized and dehumanized in the process. Indigenous communities are owed access to those resources, including to fund health care and other vital services that can be delivered in a culturally appropriate and more holistic way.

“The unique reality of the Canadian federation is that there are multiple sovereign nations living on the same land mass,” the report says. “Recognition of this reality is unique in the world and requires a unique approach.”

If you want to read it, the report can be found at wfp.to/ykI.

tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca