Court rules on AIP records

Ontario’s Court of Appeal has upheld a lower court ruling that evidence on the abuse of 3,800 of residential school survivors could be destroyed after 15 years. This period will allow time to notify survivors and ask whether they want their records archived.

The chief adjudicator of the Independent Assessment Process (IAP) wanted the destruction of the recordings, transcripts and decisions of compensation adjudications under privacy rules. The IAP argued for keeping the records only for two years.

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Ottawa,  however, argued that IAP records are government records, and therefore could be released 20 years after those identified in them have died.

In upholding the trial judge, the Appeal Court Chief Justice George Strathy wrote “Canada, the TRC and the NCTR challenge the overall reasonableness of the Supervising Judge’s order to destroy the IAP Documents. They say that the IAP documents are needed to preserve the historical record of residential schools.

“In my view, the Supervising Judge’s order was reasonable.”

The Appeals court ruled that the documents are not government records, so not subject to privacy and archival legislation. Appeals Court Justice Robert Sharpe did have a dissenting opinion, writing that, indeed, the records did fall within the legal definition of government records and should follow the legislation as such. But the majority wins the day.

The Court of Appeal did order the notification process be undertaken by IAP.