Flags mark where ground-penetrating radar recorded hits of what are believed to be 751 unmarked graves near the grounds of the former Marieval Indian Residential School on the Cowessess First Nation, Sask.HO/The Canadian Press
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What next?
Re Hundreds Of Graves Found In Saskatchewan At Residential School (June 24): Not to investigate the probability of more such unmarked graves would be unthinkable. The government should be conscience-bound to fund the investigations and forensic studies required.
I believe compensation to survivors or their descendants will do little to change the lives of Indigenous communities. The money would be better spent on providing clean water to every Indigenous community, no matter how remote, and addressing the many housing problems.
Removing statues and names associated with the architects of the residential school system seems rather like cherry-picking the story’s villains. There was over a century of complicit prime ministers and other leaders, not to mention decade after decade of those inside and outside the schools who turned a blind eye to horrific abuses.
To remove a hundred years of statues and names would be quite a daunting task. Better to focus on the more salient aspects of this catastrophic history.
Jo Balet Mississauga
Indigenous partnership
Re Reconciliation Will Require A Paradigm Shift (Opinion, June 19): I agree that reconciliation will require a “paradigm shift.” However, I believe that shift should not include the “free, prior and informed consent” provision of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and a “veto” over development.
This would further exacerbate the proliferation of vague political slogans – such as “meaningful consultation” – that fuel uncertainties in the ”rights-based” Indigenous laws of Canada and the “intractable litigation” that currently stalls development.
Canada’s shift should be to boldly emulate, in the huge unceded lands of British Columbia, the extraordinary U.S. success in negotiating the 1971 Alaska Native Claim Settlement. It created 12 Indigenous corporations and paved the way for the previously opposed Trans-Alaska Pipeline System. The affected Indigenous groups were converted into supportive partners.
This outcome was achieved not by inspirational yet ambiguous words, but by clearly specified sharing of control over project-planning and resource income.
Gerry Kruk Calgary
Closed for now?
Re Federal Measures To Welcome More Refugees To Canada Will Include Higher Limit On Most Persecuted (Online, June 18): One should question why the Liberals are planning to increase the number of refugees entering Canada at a time of high unemployment, with large sectors of the economy shut down, social assistance expenditures and debt levels soaring, and a severe shortage of affordable housing.
Refugees admitted this year will be almost totally dependent on social services and direct government aid for some time to come, through no fault of their own. Given the current economic and health crises, including concerns over the Delta variant, it would be far better to declare a moratorium on refugee admissions for this fiscal year.
Focus on the health and employment of Canadians, permanent residents and the immigrants and refugees already in Canada.
Robert Passfield Ottawa
Foreign advantage
Re Spycraft (Letters, June 19): A letter-writer’s declaration, that the only intelligence success during the Second World War belonged to the Soviets, does a grievous injustice to the agents, including Canadians, who infiltrated German-occupied countries to gather intelligence.
The high costs associated with collecting foreign intelligence is often a myth perpetuated by opponents of an FI service. Government now spends many millions of dollars to collect FI, through a variety of disparate elements that resist amalgamation to create a unified service.
Host governments do not divulge secrets to diplomats. Finding out the hidden plans and intentions of foreign leadership is a role for an FI service using reliable human sources and clandestine methods.
Dismissing the necessity of FI services, such as our allies operate, seems a strange view, considering that foreign affairs is a major consumer of reports from those allies, and has occasionally collaborated with them to collect FI.
Alistair Hensler Assistant director, CSIS (Ret’d); Ottawa
Unlike the other
Re Has Putin Finally Met His Match In Biden? (Opinion, June 19): It is doubtful to me that any U.S. president could have altered what Vladimir Putin has done in the past 20 years. This reflects a belief in how powerful and influential the United States is, but certainly not with respect to Russia.
The Crimea issue has causation roots that go back decades, if not longer. Separatism in Eastern Ukraine should be viewed entirely as an internal matter. Syria has been supported by Russia for half a century. As for “the chaos Mr. Putin spreads in the Middle East,” it pales in comparison to the mayhem and destabilization the United States has rained on the Middle East.
Has Mr. Putin finally met his match in Joe Biden? It probably doesn’t matter – he will do what he considers to be in the best interests of Russia.
Robert Milan Victoria
Equal parenting
Re Why Unequal Parenting Leave Hurts Everyone (Report on Business, June 18): As the father who won EI benefits for all parents (Schachter v. Canada), I wholeheartedly agree with the authors. Aside from the psychological benefits accruing to children from fathers taking more active parenting roles, the economy will never reach its full potential until women no longer bear primary responsibility for raising families and maintaining households.
There should be accessible, affordable, quality child care that is also available to shift workers and those receiving income maintenance, whether through workplace or public programs. Low-income workers should also be able to take time off to raise their children.
Finally, it should be crucial that parents can return to work on a part-time basis, if that is how they intend to achieve work-life balance. This would encompass a requirement for employers to pay their part-time employees the same hourly wages and premiums as full-time ones, as well as provide equitable benefit packages.
Shalom Schachter Toronto
Key issue
Re It’s A Bad Year For Ticks, And They’re No Longer Just A Rural Menace (June 22): Indeed, just when we thought it was safe to head outdoors, here are more facts we may wish to ignore but to our peril.
Ticks are a menace and difficult to remove once imbedded in the skin. Tweezers and forceps tend to rip the body off, leaving the head in the skin. I know this from experience.
I have found that the TickKey is the only tool that works. I now carry it with me on all my outings. Safe travels.
Cheryl Hanniman Ottawa
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