Today on the Rachel Parker Show, Rachel is joined by Caylan Ford for an update on her defamation case against the Alberta NDP. Caylan explains why the party recently had to pay her over $22,000 in legal costs.
Also on the show, Canadian Taxpayer Federation Alberta director Kris Sims breaks down her epic performance at the Canadian Heritage committee.
Finally, Rachel addresses a major controversy. Tune in now!
An Ontario doctor who has been embroiled in legal proceedings for years over her critical commentary on the government’s response to COVID-19 in 2020 has sought leave to appeal with the Supreme Court of Canada to have “cautions” lifted from her otherwise spotless record.
Dr. Kulvinder Kaur Gill is challenging orders by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario to place cautions on her record as a physician based on her anti-lockdown social media posts made in the summer of 2020.
Gill is a physician practicing in Milton and Brampton, Ont., specializing in clinical immunology, microbiology, virology and vaccinology. She previously worked in the National Microbiology Laboratory, Canada’s highest security level-4 biosafety lab.
“The orders were made despite Dr. Gill providing the College with ample evidence in 2020 to support her position against catastrophic lockdowns,” lawyer Lisa Bildy of Libertas Law said in a statement.
In October, a divisional court denied her leave to appeal to the Ontario Court of Appeal to allow her to challenge the cautions ordered against her by the college in 2021.
The appeal cites that Gill’s freedom of expression and conscience guaranteed under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, was “barely mentioned” by the committee when it issued the orders of cautions-in-person.
“A brief comment about the Committee having ‘no interest in shutting down free speech’ was made before proceeding to do exactly that,” Bildy’s statement said.
Gill faced seven complaints in total, all revolving around just a few posts. The complaints were levied by members of the public, not by any of Gill’s patients.
According to Gill, the posts were about ending lockdown measures regardless of COVID shot availability, and the necessity of the lockdowns. She also shared a post from a Harvard professor who questioned the measures in general.
Though the CPSO dropped a disciplinary hearing against Gill in September 2023, the orders of caution, are still in place. Though the CPSO has not yet cautioned her, while the matter proceeds through the courts.
Bildy said that this case goes beyond Gill’s professional reputation and ordeal and has lasting consequences for medical professionals’ ability to challenge the status quo of government medical policy.
“Regulatory overreach into professionals’ speech is a growing problem. Publicly censuring professionals for expressing counter-narrative opinions comes at a cost,” Bildy told True North. “The costs are borne by the rest of the medical profession, as they prudently choose to keep silent in these censorious times on matters of medical, scientific and/or political controversy.”
She said that the public’s Charter right to hear opinions contrary to the government line are also endangered by the “regulatory overreach,” even if they “never appreciate the value” of the silenced speech.
After the Divisional Court’s decision to side with the college and leave the orders of caution in place, the Supreme Court of Canada released a decision in another case that Bildy thinks will help Gill’s appeal.
The case found that it’s “insufficient” for a regulatory body to just mention a Charter right violation but must demonstrate a “clear acknowledgement and analysis of that right,” Bildy noted.
Bildy argues that the college’s committee “didn’t even mention the charter” when it ordered the cautions against Gill.
“That’s not good enough. Administrative decision-makers must fully analyze and justify infringements of Charter rights, or else the courts should not be deferring to them, as the Divisional Court did here,” Bildy told True North. “Courts should apply a more stringent standard of review where the Charter is involved and fulfill their role as guardians of the Constitution.”
Courts will typically defer to the administrative decision-makers if it is found that its decisions were “reasonable.” Gill will argue that her comments should be argued on their merits and assess if the college was correct rather than acting within reason.
“We hope that the Supreme Court of Canada will use Dr. Gill’s case to restore the historic role of the courts as guardians of the constitution,” Bildy said in a statement.
Social media company X is funding Gill’s legal costs, following a pledge made by CEO to support people facing legal action over comments made on the platform.
The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario did not respond to True North’s requests for comment.
After previously pausing the introduction of new photo radar systems for traffic enforcement on Dec. 1, 2019, the Alberta government has introduced new measures to remove the majority of existing equipment in the province.
Alberta’s Minister of Transportation, Devin Dreeshen, announced that the province would end using photo radar as a revenue generator at a Monday press conference.
Starting Apr. 1, 2025, photo radar usage will be restricted to schools, playgrounds, and construction zones. Photo radar will also be removed from intersections where drivers were ticketed speeding on a green light; however, red light cameras will remain.
“These changes will once and for all kill the photo radar cash cow in Alberta,” said Dreeshen. “Albertans can be confident that photo radar will only be used to improve traffic and roadside worker safety and not to make money.
Every photo radar site in Alberta will be reviewed over the next four months. The changes are anticipated to bring the current 2,200 photo radar sites down to 650 locations– a 70% reduction.
The reduction will put Alberta more in line with other provinces. Approximately 70% more photo radar sites are used in Alberta’s 24 municipalities compared to the next highest province.
Municipalities will have the ability to request photo radar outside of the three key areas on a case-by-case basis if they can provide evidence of a high frequency of collisions. These exceptions would come on an “exceptional basis,” according to the province’s press release. The exceptions would be subject to an audit every two years to prove they’re reducing collisions.
Municipalities can also request funding for re-engineering to physically alter unsafe locations.
Dreeshen said that successful photo radar should slow drivers down immediately, not result in them being mailed a ticket weeks later. A ticket they aren’t receiving anyway, thanks to the Canada Post strike.
The Alberta government said it encourages municipalities to use other measures to improve traffic safety, like speed warning signs, speed bumps, and education campaigns.
Photo radar generated $145 million in the province in 2023. However, Dreeshen said that the revenue came at the expense of the public’s trust.
“Let me be clear. Our government has zero tolerance for dangerous or reckless driving. Traditional enforcement has always been and always will be important to keep our roads and communities safe,” said Dreeshen. “These changes ensure that enforcement focuses on where it matters most — protecting lives and enhancing safety on our roads.”
While some municipalities have claimed that photo radar has resulted in fewer tickets and collisions, Dreeshen argued that the data show mixed results. For example, he said that some municipalities have also removed photo radar and seen fewer collisions.
Alberta previously banned photo radar “fishing holes” that focused on revenue generation instead of traffic safety on ring roads in Edmonton and Calgary in Nov. 2023.
Dreeshen highlighted Camrose as a successful photo radar program. He said they lose money on photo radar, but nobody speeds through the city.
“And that’s something that we want to work with municipalities to make sure we can help them use photo radar as a traffic safety tool and not as a revenue generator,” he said.
While photo radar will decrease, Dreeshen said cities could install more red light cameras. However, he said that, at least with those, the data are clear: drivers slow down because of red light cameras.
Alberta’s most recent fiscal update brought its surplus to $4.6 billion in 2024-25, a further increase from the updated $2.9 billion after the initially forecasted $367 million surplus.
The photo radar changes are expected to negatively affect the province’s and municipalities’ bottom line. The province recently faced backlash for its proposed auto insurance reforms.
Two Canadians were busted while attempting to traffic over $40 million worth of cocaine in the United States.
Illinois State Police pulled over a semi-trailer truck near the Iowa state line last week that carried the illicit cargo.
“Vanshpreet Singh and Manpreet Signh were taken into custody and transported to the Henry County Jail pending a pre-trial release hearing. ISP notified Homeland Security Investigations, which responded and is providing assistance. There is no further information available at this time,” reads the IPS press release.
According to police, a trooper conducted an inspection of their vehicle early Friday afternoon on Interstate 80 in Henry County, Illinois.
The two men were transporting the drugs in a Volvo semi-trailer.
The trooper discovered “numerous indicators of criminal activity” during the inspection and a complete search of the truck revealed 1,146 pounds of cocaine, worth an approximate street value of over $40 million.
Both men have been charged with felony counts of possession of cocaine, possession with intent to deliver cocaine, and cocaine trafficking.
“ISP’s coordinated focus on trafficking is helping keep dangerous drugs out of our communities,” said Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly in a statement.
“From commercial motor vehicle inspections, to daily patrol, to targeted anti-violence and trafficking details, ISP is making communities safer.”
News of such a large drug bust comes on the heels of president-elect Donald Trump announcing plans to impose a 25% tariff on all imports from Canada, citing loose border control and drug smuggling as reasons for their implementation.
“On January 20th, as one of my many first Executive Orders, I will sign all necessary documents to charge Mexico and Canada a 25% Tariff on ALL products coming into the United States, and its ridiculous Open Borders,” Trump declared.
Trump noted that the tariff will “remain in effect until such time as Drugs, in particular, Fentanyl, and all Illegal Aliens stop this Invasion of our Country!”
Trudeau attended Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida late Friday to discuss the incoming president’s pledge to impose the tariffs.
Following his meeting with Trudeau, Trump referred to their meeting as “very productive.”
“We discussed many important topics that will require both Countries to work together to address, like the Fentanyl and Drug Crisis that has decimated so many lives as a result of Illegal Immigration, Fair Trade Deals that do not jeopardize American Workers, and the massive Trade Deficit the U.S. has with Canada,” said Trump in a social media post.
Representatives of the Trudeau government were allegedly told that the US tariffs could not be avoided in the short term because the Trump administration was adamant about their effectiveness. However, they added that if border security is tightened, the tariffs could possibly be lifted in the long term.
The two also discussed NATO, Ukraine, China, the energy sector and the importation of fentanyl into both countries.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump jokingly told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that if he didn’t like his proposed tariffs on Canadian imports that the country could become the 51st US state and Trudeau could reign as its governor.
Trudeau attended Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida late Friday to discuss the incoming president’s pledge to impose a 25% tariff on all Canadian imports once he takes office in January.
Fox News reported that according to two sources present at the dinner, the prime minister told Trump that such hefty tariffs on all Canadian imports “would kill the Canadian economy.”
Trump reportedly responded by saying that “If Canada can’t survive without ripping off the U.S. to the tune of US$100-billion a year, then maybe Canada should become the 51st state,”
This quip garnered a “nervous” laugh from Trudeau and the others at the table, Fox said its sources reported, which Trump followed with another joke that Trudeau would have to be demoted to governor, if the U.S. were to annex Canada.
After someone at the table allegedly pointed out that Canada would be a very liberal state, Trump suggested splitting it in two, saying the two should join separately as liberal and conservative entities.
Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, who was present at the dinner, said Trump’s remarks are clearly not to be taken seriously.
“In a three-hour social evening at the president’s residence in Florida on a long weekend of American Thanksgiving, the conversation was going to be light-hearted. The president was telling jokes, the president was teasing us, it was, of course, in no way a serious comment,” LeBlanc told reporters in Ottawa on Tuesday.
“The fact that there’s a warm, cordial relationship between the two leaders and the president is able to joke like that, we think, is a positive thing,” he said. “It wasn’t a meeting in a boardroom with 10 bureaucrats keeping notes. It was a social evening. And there were moments where it was entertaining and funny, and there were moments where we were able to do, we think, some good work for Canada.”
Trump previously cited Canada’s loose border control as a reason for wanting to implement the tariffs, accusing the Trudeau government of not doing enough to prevent illegal immigrants and illicit drugs from entering the U.S. via Canada.
Trump called the importation of fentanyl a “drug epidemic,” and said that “Prime Minister Trudeau has made a commitment to work with us to end this terrible devastation of U.S. Families.”
Representatives of the Trudeau government were allegedly told that the U.S. tariffs could not be avoided in the short term because the Trump administration was adamant about their effectiveness.
However, they added that if border security is tightened, the tariffs could possibly be lifted in the long term.
At the dinner, the two also discussed NATO, Ukraine, China, the energy sector and the importation of fentanyl into both countries.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he felt bad for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s “position of weakness” regarding his recent visit to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort to discuss tariffs on Canadian imports.
Plus, amid the ongoing Canada Post strike, United States Postal Service has halted mail to Canada.
And a True North exclusive reveals immigrants in Canada sent $12 billion worth of remittances abroad in 2023.
Tune into The Daily Brief with Cosmin Dzsurdzsa and Noah Jarvis!
Activists with Independent Jewish Voices, a group of anti-Israel Jews, have taken over the entrance to the Confederation Building in Ottawa, where many MPs from various parties have their offices.
The group showed up around 9 a.m. Tuesday to demand a two-way arms embargo against Israel and to call for a ceasefire between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas.
Hamas still refuses to release the hostages it has held in captivity since the Oct. 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, which killed an estimated 1,200 and took hundreds more captive.
Parliamentary Protection Services officers began removing activists within the hour.
Footage shared by IJV shows several of the demonstrators being removed from the building by Parliamentary security while singing Jewish religious songs. The organization said over one hundred Jewish-Canadians joined the demonstration.
According to the IJV’s Instagram page, police had arrested 14 demonstrators by 9:45 a.m.
“The Parliamentary Protective Service (PPS) is aware of the situation which took place earlier this morning at the Confederation Building,” a spokesperson for the security unit told True North. “As such, PPS has significantly adjusted its security posture on Parliament Hill and within the Parliamentary Precinct, and is ready to intervene as required.”
The group boasted that NDP MPs Heather McPherson and Matthew Green joined the protest, expressing their support for the movement and reportedly calling for an arms embargo.
Speakers at the event ranged from secular or non-religious Jews to religious Jews against Israel. Rabbi David Mivasair was one of the key speakers, making a religious argument against Israel in its war against Hamas, invoking Jewish teachings on justice and peace.
“Everyone knows what Israel is doing. Everyone sees it. There’s not one single member of parliament that doesn’t know,” Mivasair said. “If they read the Torah, they would know you don’t give weapons to a country committing genocide.”
According to a May survey by York University, 91% of Canadian Jews are Zionists, meaning they believe Jews have a right to a homeland in Israel. Only 3% of Canadian-Jews surveyed said they were anti-Zionist.
During the sit-in, other speakers spoke of Canada as “Turtle Island.”
“Too many of the spiritual leaders in mainstream Jewish institutions are choosing a path of profound destruction and dehumanization, the annihilation of a land and people in the name of alleged Jewish safety. Shame,” one speaker said. “We are here to make another choice, to make it visibly and loudly.”
Since Oct. 7, the largest massacre of Jews since the holocaust, Israel has been attacked by Hamas, Hezbollah, sometimes Ansarallah or the Houthis in Yemen and twice now, the IRGC has directly launched hundreds of missiles at Israel’s iron dome. All of which are listed terrorist entities in Canada.
Hamas, the terrorist group that governs Gaza and the primary benefactor of the proposed arms embargo and ceasefire that IJV is advocating, has slaughtering Jews written into its guiding charter. It calls on the entire Arab world to “vanquish” its supposed “enemy,” the “Jews.”
The Liberal government dished out an estimated $3.5 billion from the Canada Emergency Business Account to businesses that did not meet the program criteria.
The Auditor General tabled a report on Monday criticizing the Liberal government’s management of the CEBA program, highlighting flaws in oversight and spending.
According to the report, $49.1 billion in loans were distributed to small businesses to cover expenses that could not be deferred during COVID-19’s business closures.
“Of those loans, 91% went to eligible businesses. As of 31 March 2024, approximately 83% of the total loan amounts originally disbursed had been repaid, with a portion forgiven. Based on our audit work, we estimated $3.5 billion went to ineligible recipients,” reads the report.
Karen Hogan, the Auditor General, highlighted some of her concerns during a press conference on Monday.
“Regardless of the situation, and I’ve said that before, the pandemic wasn’t a reason to throw rules out the window,” she said. “I would expect a basic level of due diligence and monitoring of expenditures, regardless of whether a pandemic exists.”
She said there were positives, given that $49 billion was quickly rolled out to small businesses. However, she was concerned that Export Development Canada relied too heavily on one vendor—Accenture—to deliver the program, and the two departments monitoring it failed in their oversight responsibilities.
Hogan said that 92% of the noncompetitive contracts were awarded to Accenture at a value of $342 million. She added that Export Development Canada gave Accenture too much control over key aspects of the contracts, like the scope of work and pricing.
“We identified several problems with this process, including the fact that Accenture had a commercial interest in the outcome of the selection but was designing criteria and evaluating vendors. In our view, this was a conflict of interest that EDC did not manage,” reads the report.
The Auditor General said that the Department of Finance Canada and Global Affairs Canada did not effectively oversee that the program was managed with “due regard for value for money.”
“As a result of unclear roles and responsibilities, neither department took accountability for the program, leaving many basic program elements, such as program lifecycle planning, either delayed or incomplete,” said Hogan, “Further, the Department of Finance Canada did not provide effective oversight of EDC’s administrative spending. No overall spending limits were set, and it did not challenge administrative spending on the program.”
Initially, one in five Canadian restaurants faced closure over their inability to repay CEBA loans.
CEBA loans initially offered interest-free loans up to $40,000 for small businesses and not-for-profits. The amount was increased to $60,000 on December 4, 2020.
Approximately 25% of the 898,271 CEBA loan recipients missed the deadline to repay the loan by Dec. 21, 2023.
The government’s decision not to extend the CEBA deadline was “the straw that broke the camel’s back,” said Simon Gaudreault, chief economist and vice president of research at the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses.
Hogan said that CEBA is a loan program unlike others because it will continue for several years. As of Mar. 31, 2024, $8.5 billion in loans remained outstanding.
“Some repayments are ongoing, while taking action on defaulted loans has just started. We found that EDC’s plan to collect defaulted loans lacked forecasted costing, performance management, and other key elements,” said Hogan. “The Canada Revenue Agency, which is supporting EDC in collection efforts, had a more detailed plan but was missing targeted timelines.”
The interest-free loans of $40,000 to $60,000 were provided to eligible businesses. Up to $20,000 was forgiven if the rest of the loan was repaid on time.
Across the country, 898,000 small businesses received $49.1 billion in loans. Of the total, around $45.6 billion went to recipients that the Auditor General deemed eligible.
The bureaucratic costs to administer CEBA were $853 million as of Mar. 31, 2024, including $575 million to financial institutions and $248 million to Export Development Canada to administer the program.
Only 57.2% of the loans, or $28.1 billion, have been repaid. Over a quarter, $12.4 billion, was forgiven, while 17.3%, $8.5 billion, remains outstanding.
Hogan said 77,160 ineligible recipients, or an estimated 9% of total loan recipients, received around $3.5 billion.
The Auditor General offered various recommendations in her report.
“Export Development Canada should work with the Department of Finance Canada to consider appropriate actions, including legal implications and options to recoup loan forgiveness from ineligible small businesses. Export Development Canada should then identify the full population of ineligible recipients in the non-deferrable expenses stream,” reads one recommendation.
“I am concerned that EDC only partially agreed with our recommendation that it should carry out additional work to identify all ineligible recipients and recover the amounts involved,” said Hogan.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has called for a hard cap on asylum seekers entering Canada, adding that applicants whose claims are eventually denied burden Canadian taxpayers while falsely claiming refugee status.
The comments came from Poilievre’s press conference held on Dec. 1.
“We need to shut off the flow of false refugee claims who are in no danger in their country of origin, but who are sneaking in either through our porous border, through our weak visa system, and then when they land here, are making a false claim,” said Poilievre.
He added that it’s ultimately the Immigration and Refugee Board that determines false claims but that while false claimants remain in Canada for five to seven years, they strain the country’s housing market, healthcare system, and job market by working under the table.
“I love real refugees. Our country was built in large part by real refugees who were genuinely fleeing danger, like my wife,” said Poilievre. “But I have no time for people who lie to come into our country.”
In 2015, the year that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took office, a total of 16,592 asylum claims were sent to the IRB for processing. When excluding the 8,596 applications that were accepted and those that were rejected, abandoned or withdrawn, 9,999 remained for processing by the end of the year.
On the other hand, as of the third quarter of this year, a whopping 146,828 asylum claims were sent for consideration by the IRB, 33,583 of which were approved. When counting other finalized claims, the IRB was left with a backlog of nearly 250,000 claimants who have yet to receive an asylum status determination.
In retrospect, throughout Trudeau’s time in office, asylum claims being referred to the IRB have spiked by almost 785%, and the backlog has grown by around 2,400%.
Asylum claimants are costing Canadians $16.35 billion a year in expenses like housing and healthcare.
Conservative MP Arpan Khanna revealed that despite the Liberals’ promise to reduce immigration, Immigration Minister Marc Miller confirmed that 3 million more temporary and permanent residents will come to Canada over the next three years.
However, asylum seekers aren’t Canada’s only immigration concern, according to Poilievre.
He cited the fact that up to 500,000 people are living in Canada illegally, according to government documents revealed by Blacklock’s Reporter.
Miller previously admitted that Canada’s immigration system was “out of control.” Later, he said he expected Canada’s nearly 5 million temporary migrants with visas expiring to leave voluntarily.
Poilievre said that one of the biggest contributors to Canada’s broken immigration system is its weak border, allowing for the flow of illegal immigrants, drugs, and weapons.
“Justin Trudeau is a weak leader who has lost control of spending, lost control of immigration, and lost control of our border,” said Poilievre. “Don’t take my word for it. Look at the facts.”
He said that fentanyl confiscations have tripled at the Canada-U.S. border in the last year. Poilievre added that U.S. border guards caught ten times more people sneaking into the United States from Canada compared to 2022.
In 2023, six times more individuals on the terrorist watchlist were apprehended at the Canada-U.S. border compared to the U.S.-Mexico border.
Canada’s premiers demanded improved border security following President-elect Donald Trump’s threat to impose 25% tariffs on Canadian imports if the border security issue is not addressed.
Poilievre said that the Conservatives demand Trudeau support a “Canada First Plan” which calls for increased border patrols and collaboration with provincial police forces. The plan also calls for deploying new technologies like helicopters, scanners, and drones to combat illegal drug trafficking.
Poilievre echoed the call made by Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe to expand CBSA’s mandate to help with border security.
“Since Trudeau became prime minister, there have been massive increases in illegal border activity. It is his job to immediately introduce action to solve it. Now. It’s not just for Donald Trump,” said Poilievre.
To fund the increased security, Poilievre urged the Liberals to cut “high-priced CBSA consultants” and to cancel the upcoming GST “two-month tax trick” that will cost $6.2 billion.
The Conservative leader said that the border security issues have contributed to the 47,000 overdose deaths, more deaths than the country saw in World War II. He said that a briefing note revealed that 350 organized crime groups are actively involved in the illegal fentanyl market.
“A ten-cent savings on a bag of pretzels will not mean anything to a mother who has lost her child to an overdose of drugs,” said Poilievre.
“Canada must protect its own citizens. We must put our country first. We must be responsible. We will. My goal and my raison d’être is to fix what Trudeau broke and restore the promise of Canada,” Poilievre said in French.
A November 29 Blacklocks Reporter post revealed that Kimberly Murray, Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools, advised Canada’s cabinet that she accepts that some Canadians are skeptical that thousands of children were buried at Indian Residential Schools.
But she qualified this assertion by claiming “accusations of deliberate deception are hateful.”
“It is one thing to say you don’t believe there are burials. That’s your opinion and you can have freedom of speech to say that. But when you say there are no burials, that First Nations people or the Indians are lying because they want you to go burn down churches or they want to take away your cottages, that is inciting hate against Indigenous people. That’s the type of speech we need to stop.”
“Hate speech is not protected by the Charter and it is getting worse in the country,” said Murray. “We need to ensure survivors and communities are safe. We need to send a clear message to Canadians that it is not okay to incite this kind of hate.”
Testifying at the Senate Indigenous Peoples Committee, Murray said she was personally convinced there are mass graves at Indian Residential Schools. “Cemeteries were part of the Indian Residential Schools from the very outset,” she said. “The government planned for the deaths of the children.”
“When the children died, government and church officials did not return the children home for burial,” said Murray. “They were buried in cemeteries at the institutions, often in unmarked and mass graves which were sometimes dug by the other children.”
Murray’s assertions about the death and burial of students in dedicated Indian Residential School graveyards are so grossly exaggerated that they might be termed both libellous and inciting hatred against the various Canadian Churches and their personnel, many of them indigenous people, charged with running these schools.
Murray even endorsed a private New Democrat bill introduced on September 26 in the House of Commons to criminalize public commentary critical of “mass graves” accounts. Bill C-413, An Act To Amend The Criminal Code, would outlaw public remarks “condoning, denying, downplaying or justifying the Indian Residential School system in Canada or by misrepresenting facts related to it” under threat of two years in jail.
“We have lots of death records,” said Murray. “There are lots of death certificates of the kids who died at Indian Residential Schools that say they are buried at the Indian Residential School cemetery. Many of those death records are signed by the Indian agent or the principal who said what the cause of death was.”
Contrary to Murray’s assertion, most of the extant provincial death records establish that the children’s bodies were returned to their home reserves for burial, where they were interred by family and community members.
Moreover, a mountain of evidence in Grave Error, a best-selling collection of articles written by seasoned academics, lawyers, and editorialists, has thoroughly discredited the following assertions about the Indian Residential Schools:
Public scrutiny and questioning of these groundless or exaggerated assertions followed a premature 2021 announcement by the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation of Kamloops, B.C. that it had discovered 215 children’s graves. The claim was later revised to 200 “potential burials” based on the discovery of soil anomalies using an inconclusive technique called ground penetrating radar that cannot determine the contents of sub ground disturbances.
Likewise, no human remains have been recovered to date despite $7.9 million in federal funding for field work at Kamloops, thereby enhancing public skepticism.
The 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Commission estimated that 4,100 children died at Indian Residential Schools. The number has never been verified through coroners’ files. In a July 25, 2024 report, the Senate committee acknowledged the figures were unsubstantiated.
Countering the assertions of Murray and her followers are the findings in Grave Error and hundreds of articles found here, here, here, and here. These studies have conclusively shown that:
Hymie Rubenstein, editor of REAL Indigenous Report, is a retired professor of anthropology, University of Manitoba, and a senior fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
