Did Canada cross the line with Blackstock?

Cindy Blackstock, executive director of First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, says she was shocked to learn that the federal government had accumulated close to 400 pieces of documentation about her over an 18-month period.

She is adamant, however, that Canada’s surveillance of her shouldn’t distract from the cause she is pursuing, equitable benefits for First Nations children in care on reserve.

“The major rights violation is not the violation of my privacy,” Blackstock told Windspeaker.

“The major rights violation is the violation of these children’s opportunity to get the same services as all other Canadian children enjoy,” said Blackstock.

She assumes that the passion she has for her “cause” is what brought her to the attention of the government in the first place.

In 2007, the society and the Assembly of First Nations filed a complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission alleging that the federal government was racially discriminating against First Nations children by providing less child welfare benefits on reserves.
The Canadian government funds child welfare on reserves at a lower rate than the funding provinces provide for child welfare services off-reserve.† The human rights commission referred the complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT). The federal government took legal action against the referral but lost.

Two weeks before the tribunal was to hear the case, the government appointed a new chair. CHRT chair Shirish Chotalia heard a motion from the government to dismiss the human rights complaint and subsequently ruled in favor of the federal government citing a legal technicality.
The caring society, AFN and the human rights commission each filed a judicial review of Chotalia’s decision, which is to be heard in federal court Feb. 13 to 15, 2012.

“As a public figure one can always expect the department will take an interest in what you’re doing, but I think as a private citizen there’s a fine line as to what they would find, as example, on your Web pages and court submissions versus using their power to go the extra step … to monitor and follow what I am doing,” said Blackstock.

An incident in late 2009 caused Blackstock to question her treatment at the hands of Aboriginal and Northern Affairs Canada officials and pushed her to file under the Privacy Information Act for documentation the federal government had concerning her.

In December 2009, Blackstock accompanied the Chiefs of Ontario to a meeting with Aboriginal Affairs ministerial staff to discuss First Nations child welfare funding. Blackstock had been invited by the chiefs as an expert.
Blackstock successfully cleared the regular security procedures but then was told by an Aboriginal Affairs staff member that the department would not meet with the Chiefs of Ontario if she was present in the room.
She volunteered to stay in the waiting room. A security guard was present.

Blackstock immediately wrote then-Indian Affairs minister Chuck Strahl to find out why she had been excluded from the meeting. A staff member responded stating Blackstock had not been invited by the department.

However, the chiefs had other experts on hand that had not been specifically invited by Aboriginal Affairs but were still permitted to attend, said Blackstock.
In early 2010, Blackstock filed under the Privacy Act for documentation dating from the December meeting to the present.

By September 2011, Blackstock had in her possession a three-inch binder and a DVD with additional information that covered the time frame from December 2009 to June 22, 2011. In that binder was correspondence and information from two federal departments, Aboriginal Affairs and Justice, focusing primarily on Blackstock’s interaction with the tribunal. It included emails between government officials, critiques of Blackstock’s presentations at conferences, notes of child welfare conferences that Blackstock didn’t attend, and the monitoring of both her corporate and personal Facebook pages.

“Another thing they did was pull my status application. It appears twice within the materials there. Status information not only has all your bare essentials, like proper name and date of birth, etc., but also that same detail about your parents and your siblings,” said Blackstock.

In early summer 2011, she received her first package of information. The remainder of the documentation arrived in fall. The documentation from Aboriginal Affairs went as high as assistant deputy minister, while the documentation from Justice Canada reached the legal counsel handling the society’s human rights complaint.
Knowing that she was – and still may be - under surveillance by the government will not intimidate Blackstock.

“It doesn’t make me want to step back at all,” she said. “None of us should ever be silenced when a child’s well-being and safety is at stake. And in this case, it’s not just one child; it’s thousands of children.”

Blackstock is concerned about what this may mean for other Aboriginal advocates. After the news broke, Blackstock was in Saskatchewan meeting with First Nations chiefs and child welfare agencies and community providers.

“Many were scared for me and scared for themselves, as well,” she said, adding she doesn’t know if the information acquired by the government has been used against her or her organization.

The caring society is the only national Aboriginal organization without federal funding.

“My whole motivation to bring this forward is to bring this to public attention so this does not happen to other people.”

Blackstock said she is considering action against the federal government, including filing a privacy complaint or amending the retaliation complaint against the federal government which was filed as part of the Human Rights Act. The act, she pointed out, says a party that is alleged to have discriminated cannot retaliate against a complainant.

Blackstock’s privacy was raised in the House of Commons on Nov. 17. Edmonton Strathcona NDP MP Linda Duncan wanted to know why the government was “spying” on Blackstock.

In response, Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan said he had directed his deputy minister to look into whether “privacy rules were respected in this case.”

“We wouldn’t call it an investigation,” said Michelle Perron, spokesperson for Aboriginal Affairs. “We don’t use that word here.” Perron said she did not have a timeline as to when the report on the privacy issue would be completed.