Minister to meet with Peguis chief over his call to scrap Indigenous-controlled child-welfare model

The chief of Peguis First Nation will meet with Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine after calling for the province to scrap an agreement that’s been touted as the model for decolonizing child welfare.

“When a leader like Chief (Stan) Bird speaks up, we’ve got to pay attention,” Premier Wab Kinew said Monday. “That’s why our families minister is speaking with him.”

The meeting is scheduled for next week.

The First Nation publicly called for accountability and oversight of Peguis Child and Family Services last week.

In 2023, Peguis became the first First Nation in Manitoba to assume legal control over a child-welfare agency after the federal government passed Bill C-92, an Act Respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis Children, Youth and Families in 2020.

The legislation recognizes the inherent right of Indigenous people to exercise jurisdiction over their child and family services and set out national principles to reduce Indigenous over-representation in the system.

Bird said a lack of transparency at Peguis CFS has resulted in children being turned away without receiving services.

“We’re getting calls from concerned family members, we’ve had children calling me… families are not being supported,” he told a news conference Friday. “Every day I worry that something terrible will happen.”

Peguis CFS executive director Clemene Hornbrook declined a request for comment.

Instead, she referred to a three-page open letter to First Nation members posted Monday on social media that explains what Peguis CFS is doing to help children and families, and how well their system of decolonizing the system with culturally appropriate services is working.

The letter points to an 80 per cent reduction in the number of children landing in care. It also says 99 per cent of the kids in care at the First Nation live with immediate and extended family members.

The letter directs members to audited financial statements on the First Nation’s website. It does not address concerns raised by the community’s chief.

Kinew said the province supports the federal legislation.

“It’s to return the sacred bond that was broken in residential schools in too many families and those families’ descendants,” he said, adding that if the federal legislation isn’t working for Peguis, “let’s have that conversation and figure out what will.”

“I’m not married to any specific ideological approach,” he said. “I just want to see that action happen. So if there’s another pathway that we can find with Chief Bird and his community, we’re open to them.”

During question period Wednesday, Progressive Conservative families critic Jodie Byram pointed to the concerns raised by Bird and Manitoba’s advocate for children about making sure children are safe.

She asked the families minister what measures her department has taken to ensure that First Nation communities have adequate resources and supports to oversee a safe, transparent transition of children and youth in care.

“What’s being done to mitigate and assess the risk that children and youth face during the transition from child and family services to First Nation jurisdiction?” Byram asked.

Fontaine said she took “great exception” to the question, saying that Byram needs to read the federal legislation.

“She is using colonial language that necessarily ensures that folks will distrust First Nation and Métis leadership from reasserting control over child welfare,” Fontaine said.

“It is a ploy to undermine what is a historic moment across Canada and that every jurisdiction is navigating right now.”

She said it will result in transformative change across the country.

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca