Canada Repositions Itself on Indigenous Peoples

Vincent J. Curtis

10 May 2016

In removing Canada’s status as a permanent objector to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples the Trudeau Liberal government replaced principled objection with a patronizing lie.

As noted in the CP article of that headline, the previous Conservative government feared the 2007 declaration could not be reconciled with Canadian law.  The reason it cannot be is that Canada is a constitutional democracy.  Aboriginal rights are recognized in the Charter, but in a democracy everyone has rights and that would include the vast majority of Canadian citizens who are not aboriginal.  Parts of Canada have been settled by peoples of European descent for over 400 years, and their rights cannot be held absolutely for naught just because an aboriginal says so.  This would be the legal peril of Canadians in general if the UN declaration became law in Canada.

Article 19 of the declaration would require the government of Canada to secure Aboriginal consent regarding matters of general public policy.  Articles 26 and 28 would enable the re-opening or repudiation of settled land claims.

On November 12, 2010, Canada officially endorsed the declaration while holding that insofar as Canada was concerned the UN Declaration was aspirational.  Its spirit will be honoured when it make sense.  But the declaration cannot be pleaded in court.

The Trudeau government obviously has no intention of obtaining aboriginal consent for the conduct of Canadian foreign policy, defense policy, fiscal policy, infrastructure spending, and a host of other matters of general concern to Canada and to Canadians as a whole.  Yet the legal acceptance of the UN declaration would seem to require it.  Democratic rights are not balanced against group rights in the UN declaration, though they are in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In trying to obtain political credit for his sympathy for aboriginal matters, the Trudeau government are implying one thing to aboriginals and another to ordinary Canadians.

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It is not hard to find the reasons why Canada, along with the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, voted against the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  They are found in the Wikipedia entry on the subject.

But, as Ben Rhodes proved and bragged about, most journalists are 27 year old know-nothings who are too lazy to do their own research.  It is easy to fool them, especially if they like you and what you stand for.

The objections the Conservative government had in 2007 did not just disappear because Stephen Harper is a mean-spirited bloke.  Trudeau is lying, but it will take time and attention for non-aboriginal Canadians to realize it, if they ever do.