B.C.’s West Coast Express to remain shut on Friday, as railways ready for restart

EDMONTON – An Alberta First Nation has revived a lawsuit it launched 10 years ago in an effort to get the federal government to recognize its human right to clean, safe water.

The Ermineskin Cree Nation says Ottawa’s proposed legislation on First Nations drinking water fails to recognize that people on reserves have the same right to trust what comes out of their tap as every Canadian.

“People can’t even bathe in it,” Chief Joel Mykat said in an interview.

“We have tried to work with Canada over the past decade but things have only gotten worse … Bill C-61 fails to recognize that we have (the) right to safe drinking water.”

Band member Carol Wildcat said she spends about $200 a month on bottled water but still has to bathe in tap water.

“It’s brown. Sometimes it leaves sediment,” she said.

The lawsuit was filed in 2014 as part of a joint action with three other First Nations. It was placed in abeyance while Ermineskin, with other First Nations, negotiated with Ottawa about how to solve widespread water treatment issues on reserves.

On Wednesday, the Federal Court agreed to sever Ermineskin from the joint action, clearing the way for an amended statement of claim.

“That will be filed next week,” said lawyer Clayton Leonard, whorepresents Ermineskin.

A spokesperson for Indigenous Services Canada did not respond to a request for comment.

Band officials said they’ve reactivated the suit over the proposed legislation dealing with water treatment, which is currently before a Parliamentary committee.

When the bill was introduced in December, the government said the law would require Ottawa to make “best efforts” to provide safe drinking water, establish minimum funding levels and create national standards for First Nation lands.

While the bill also mentions United Nations resolutions about Indigenous rights to clean water in its preamble, the text of the legislation contains no such guarantees, saidWilton Littlechild, a legal adviser to the band and a widely respected elder.

“We want to support the legislation, but it has to be made more expansive,” he said.

A February letter to Indigenous Services Minister Patty Hajdu makes the band’s demands clear.

“Bill C-61 must effectively address the shameful record of Canada’s failure to ensure First Nations have access to safe drinking water,” it says. “Canada’s promises of ‘best efforts’ in the bill are not good enough.

“Canada’s recognition that First Nations have a human right to safe drinking water is critically fundamental to the core purpose and efficacy of the bill.”

Drinking water on reserves has long been an issue in Canada. In 2021, Ottawa settled a class-action lawsuit with First Nations that provided $1.5 billion to improve water treatment.

But the conditions of the settlement left many bands out. A class action with about 60 bands, which has been certified by the courts, has been filed by the Shamattawa First Nation in Manitoba.

Ermineskin’s water problems are long-standing. The reserve’s water treatment plant dates from the 1970s and nearly three-quarters of the band’s homes have been under serious water advisories.

Between 2010 and 2022, people in 500 homes on the reserve south of Edmonton lived with 331 boil-water advisories.

The issue runs wider than concerns over the health impacts. Wildcat said the water problems affect economic development on the reserve.

Littlechild said the brown stuff coming out of the tap disrupts the relationship his people have with their land, which includes the water that comes from it.

“Bothare recognized now in international law,” he said.

“It’s not only the common use perspective we have on water. We have a very sacred relationship with water.”

The federal government filed a statement of defence in the lawsuit in 2014. It was written under the Conservative government of former prime minister Stephen Harper.

“Canada denies breaching any such duty or obligation,” it says. “Canada has taken extensive measures … to provide access to safe drinking water on reserves.”

In 2010, a national assessment of First Nations water found Ermineskin’s water failed Canadian drinking water guidelines on a weekly basis, with both health and appearance consequences.

More recently, in a 2022 briefing document, the federal Liberal government acknowledged concerns over “non-recognition of First Nations water rights and governance.”

“We are continuing to work with Nations and regions on innovation, sustainable development and supporting new service arrangements to better meets needs of Nations,” it said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.

Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin announced Thursday he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec to sit as an Independent, becoming the second member of government to quit in a little more than one week.

Chassin’s announcement came hours after he wrote an open letter published in local media criticizing Premier François Legault’s party for abandoning its principles of smaller government.

In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the CAQ of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.

“I was afraid that Quebec would become the republic of the status quo … but the CAQ was going to change that, Chassin told reporters Thursday in Quebec City after announcing his departure.

“And, unfortunately, the energy and audacity needed to shake up the status quo seem to have dissipated.”

Chassin, who was part of the CAQ’s conservative wing, said public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.

An economist by training, Chassin was director of research at the Montreal Economic Institute, a right-leaning think tank, before entering politics. Elected in the Saint-Jérôme riding when the CAQ rose to power in 2018, Chassin was re-elected in 2022 when the party won 90 out of 125 ridings.

“Whether we’re talking about education, housing, emergencies, courts, daycares and so on, the citizens who are among the most taxed in North America are struggling to receive services when they need them,” Chassin wrote.

He said he delivered a similar message to caucus colleagues in Rimouski, Que., last week and met Legault on Wednesday, but didn’t hear the response he was hoping for from the premier.

“I need to feel that we are ready to return to the audacity we had in the first mandate,” Chassin said, referring to such things as the secularism bill, the deregulation of the taxi industry, the abolishment of school boards, and cuts in income taxes.

For his part, Legault said he wasn’t surprised with Chassin’s decision.

He summed up the disagreements between them over two main issues. The first, the premier said, is the province’s health-care reform that wasn’t going fast enough for Chassin, who was a parliamentary assistant to the health minister. Negotiations with doctors and nurses require patience, Legault said.

The other is the deficit, which grew because of big raises for public sector employees last winter and an income tax cut that was promised by Legault’s party during the 2022 election.

“I think the more responsible position is to come back and erase this deficit over five years,” Legault said. “I would like to see a lower deficit, but I think I don’t want to cut services and I don’t want to increase income taxes.”

Chassin is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.

Last April, Eric Lefebvre, the government whip, left to sit as an Independent because he intends to join Pierre Poilievre’s federal Conservatives. In July 2023, Joëlle Boutin quit the party and her Quebec City riding of Jean-Talon was captured by the Parti Québécois in a subsequent byelection.

Chassin said he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.

Even with Chassin’s departure, the Coalition Avenir Québec holds 86 of the 125 seats in the provincial legislature, with the Liberals at 19, Québec solidaire at 12 and the PQ with four.

There are now three Independents, and Fitzgibbon’s riding of Terrebonne, north of Montreal, is vacant.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.

VANCOUVER – When Canada’s spy chief wrote a secret letter to the public safety minister last December — the week after a report emerged that two young women in the service had been sexually assaulted by a senior colleague — it came with a warning.

David Vigneault, then director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, told Dominic LeBlanc that he expected “more cases to surface in the coming weeks,” and that he had to be “transparent” about this with the minister

“(We) will continue to make the difficult decisions required to make a safe workplace,” he wrote, saying that the report by The Canadian Press had left staff “reeling.”

Vigneault, who stepped down in July, had reason to be concerned.

In the days after the report was published, Vigneault’s staff compiled tables for him showing there had been 49 alleged “occurrences” of workplace harassment and violence at CSIS since 2021.

Only eight of these were deemed to have been “founded.”

The Dec. 9 letter to LeBlanc, stamped “secret,” and the tables in a Dec. 4 email were among documents provided to The Canadian Press in response to an access-to-information request.

The documents show how Vigneault and his staff responded to The Canadian Press report published on Nov. 30, in which CSIS officers made allegations of rape, bullying and harassment in the service’s B.C. physical surveillance office.

The statistics about workplace sexual harassment and violence were compiled as part of Vigneault’s preparations for an all-staff town hall meeting about the allegations on Dec. 5.

The tables and an explanation provided by CSIS show that 20 of the 49 “occurrences” since 2021/2022 were ongoing cases. Of the 29 that were “resolved,” three were withdrawn, while two ended in conciliation, six through an investigation and none through negotiation.

Eighteen, meanwhile, were resolved through the implementation of recommendations reviewed by an occupational health and safety committee.

The numbers were not announced to the 3,000-plus staff who attended the town hall meeting in person and virtually.

But in May, CSIS released an annual public report that said there were 24 ongoing harassment investigations in 2023, depicting this as a sign of success.

“(A)lthough some would use this metric to criticize CSIS, we believe it is indicative of the advancements we have made to improve our workplace culture, as more employees are now placing their faith and confidence in CSIS’ internal grievance process,” wrote Renée de Bellefeuille, the service’s chief human resources officer.

That report did not describe how frequently cases were resolved to the satisfaction of complainants.

CSIS spokesperson Eric Balsam said in an emailed statement that some complaints took longer than normal to complete.

“On occasion, a notice of occurrence may take longer to resolve given other mitigating circumstances that may have an impact on the process,” Balsam said. “For example, the temporary absence of either party, or availability of investigators.”

Several employees were suspended between 2020 and 2024 and two were terminated, but Balsam said CSIS is “not in a position to reveal the nature of the conduct for which the employees were suspended and/or terminated because providing details for such a small number of files could breach privacy obligations.”

Balsam added that the service has “seen a higher number of grievances, complaints and conduct cases since the beginning of 2024.”

The tables list four occurrences as sexual harassment and violence and 45 cases as non-sexual.

In the December town hall meeting, Vigneault told staff the senior officer accused of rape had left the service the day before.

The man’s accusers have said he abused them in CSIS vehicles while on covert missions, in one case losing sight of a surveillance target because he allegedly drove to a car park to rape his CSIS partner.

The officers said they could not go to police because they feared breaching the CSIS Act by identifying themselves and their alleged attacker as covert officers, an offence with a penalty of up to five years in prison.

Vigneault’s letter to LeBlanc says he told staff there existed an “authority and process to report a crime to the police.”

A former CSIS employee who worked in a supervisory capacity in Ontario said her harassment complaint against a high-level managerwas among those that remain outstanding.

She said she also filed a complaint on behalf of another employee as a witness but has not been contacted in the two years since it was submitted to CSIS.

The former supervisor, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the CSIS Act’s prohibition against identification, has since left the agency.

She said in an interview that the behaviour of the new senior manager prompted the group to “come to me with concerns.”

“Then people started coming with more formalized complaints,” she said. “I had to tell people that either you have to report something or I have to report something.”

She said the manager was “highly problematic,” gossiping about employees, revealing highly personal information and “maligning” peoples’ character behind their backs.

The former supervisor said she knew formalizing complaints against someone well-connected in the service would be like signing her own “career death warrant.”

“I’m in a position where I have to say something and in saying something, I’m probably not going to be believed,” she said. “No one was going to want to touch me after that.”

She said that since filing the complaint in 2022, she had left the service for an unrelated job.

“It was making me sick,” she said. “I couldn’t bear the weight of it anymore and I thought I had nowhere else to go.”

She said she believed the complaint process had “utterly stalled,” and she had not received updates as required. This could be due to the “slow machinery of government,” she said.

‘PROBLEMATIC BEHAVIOUR’ IN CSIS OFFICE

The documents obtained by The Canadian Press also show how CSIS responded to the turmoil in the B.C. surveillance office.

In addition to the two officers who said they were sexually assaulted, two other officers supported their claims and said bullying and harassment were rife in the office.

The documents show the service commissioned a “workplace climate assessment” for the office last year. A Nov. 22 letter from B.C.’s assistant director general — whose name is redacted — says the assessment followed allegations of “problematic behaviour with respect to inappropriate conduct, harassment, leadership issues etc., that has resulted in a perceived toxic work environment.”

But the assessment did not look at the complaints of sexual assault and other wrongdoing made by the two women officers against their senior colleague, who was decades older than them, the documents show.

The assessment’s terms of reference say the process focused instead on the “current work environment,” and it would “not consider information from employees that was previously provided under a separate formal process.”

A redacted copy of the assessment dated Jan. 22 said staff indicated “a workplace culture that is perceived as fairly positive (with some definite exceptions).”

The unit’s “main shortcomings” involved the handling of complaints, “especially those related to inappropriate conduct like disrespect, bullying, harassment etc.”

“There is a general sense that accountability is significantly lacking and that the enforcement of policies and procedures is often weak,” the assessors wrote.

The assessment found the unit was understaffed and there had been “a relatively high turnover recently, especially with respect to female members leaving the unit,” causing a “distinct gender imbalance.”

It said the workplace was “male dominated” and there was an “intergenerational divide” between staff.

However, the assessment said staff “strongly disagreed” the workplace was “toxic,” but there was a “perceived lack of leadership” which contributed to “highly ineffective conflict and complaint handling approaches.”

The two B.C. officers who said they were sexually assaulted lodged anonymous lawsuits in B.C. Supreme Court.

One was dismissed last September on technical grounds that the officer had not exhausted the internal CSIS complaints process, which was “ongoing.” She said this week that she had “never been told (by CSIS) that it was still an ongoing investigation at any point.”

The officer said previously that a report for CSIS with a protected security classification had concluded her rape complaint was unfounded on the balance of probabilities.

The court file for the other officer has been inactive since it was filed in June 2023, with no public response filed by CSIS. Her accusations were investigated by CSIS as part of the other woman’s complaint.

Matt Malone, an assistant law professor at Thompson Rivers University who specializes in workplace investigations, reviewed the workplace assessment, and said its language suggested “system-wide problems with leadership” in the unit.

“This is very much a situation of where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” he said. “This workplace assessment is indicative of deeper rooted problems in the service, and you can see that there is an admission that most parties disagreed with the characterization of ‘toxic work environment,’ but there’s very uniform and very consistent discussion around the shortcomings of leadership.”

Vigneault announced on July 4 that he was retiring from the service after seven years at the helm.

The former Ontario CSIS supervisor said she lodged her complaint in 2022 out of a “strong sense of duty and responsibility,” hoping to trigger not only a change in the individual, but also “bigger change within the organization around leadership.”

Almost two years later, she said she had little faith such top-down change would happen.

“You can barely remember what you had for breakfast yesterday. Who’s going to remember what was said or not said in a meeting once upon a time?” she said.

“Investigations are still ongoing, but when you have five or six complaints filed against one manager all in under a year and you continue to promote that person and give them incredible, incredible career opportunities, I don’t actually think the organization has been ready to accept responsibility.”

“The leadership were born and raised in that same organization. They don’t know anything different,” she added. “How do you change that? I don’t know.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.