OTTAWA — The federal government is providing $45 million in compensation to Inuit in Nunavik as part of Canada's apology for its role in the killing of sled dogs between the mid-1950s and the late 1960s.
Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree is travelling to Kangiqsujuaq is scheduled to apologize for Canada's role in the killings Saturday afternoon in Northern Quebec.
A 2010 report from Jean-Jacques Croteau, a retired Superior Court of Quebec judge, found Quebec provincial police officers killed more than 1,000 dogs in Nunavik "without any consideration for their importance to Inuit families."
Croteau found the federal government failed to intervene or condemn the actions and said the implementation of mandatory schooling and residential school was fundamental in the lead-up to the dog killings.
"I'm hoping for some of them that it will bring closure," said Pita Aatami, the president of Makivvik which represents Inuit in Nunavik.
"When I hear some of the interviews of the elders that had their dog slaughtered, the pain that they went through it was so much. Their livelihood was taken away from them.
"They had no more means of going out on the land, to go hunt, to fish, or go get ice, or go to the tree line. All the things they did with their dogs, that was taken away."
Aatami told The Canadian Press the federal government will be providing $45 million in compensation a part of the apology.
He said the money will go toward revitalizing the culture of dog team ownership in the region, and "all the things people need to raise dog teams." That includes training, food and fencing.
"Historically, Inuit didn’t tie their dogs. That was one way of keeping them healthy. And it's only when the non-natives came, that they started having to tie their dogs. And that's when the dogs became more vicious, lazier. Not as good as before, kind of a thing."
Aatami said some of the money will also go toward direct compensation, but how it will be disbursed has not yet been determined.
"For me it's just a start because we also want funds for mental healing and so-forth," Aatami said, adding Makivvik had requested $75 million.
"Whenever there was alcohol in the community, they turned to alcohol to numb the pain that they were going through because they had their livelihood taken away. Their independence was taken away."
The 2010 report from Croteau found Canada's liability for the deaths of the dogs arose, in part, because of the establishment of mandatory schooling and residential schools in Nunavik villages, and the failure to intervene sooner when the killing of sled dogs began in four initial villages.
"The authorities chose confrontation over negotiation by using the services of the provincial police. As a result, any untied dog was killed without prior warning, while the statute relied upon allowed anyone to kill a stray dog without incurring liability," Croteau wrote.
Croteau found Canada knew of the issue involving the killing of sled dogs as early as 1958, but still established more schools in other villages. Croteau said Canada should instead have suspended the unilateral launching of day schools in favour of first consulting with Inuit elders and establishing more schools as needed.
"The problem arose after the imposition of mandatory schooling and the sedentarization of a population that was not ready for it," Croteau wrote.
"The Inuit had a lifestyle involving the use of sled dogs in order to ensure their livelihood."
Because attendance was mandatory, and because Inuit then never allowed themselves to be separated from their children, "Inuit families were in a hurry to settle in villages, bringing their dogs with them in order to ensure their livelihood and transportation," Croteau wrote.
Inuit passed on traditional knowledge orally, but residential schools "supplanted the oral tradition" according to Croteau's findings.
In Kangiqsujuaq specifically, where Canada's apology is being delivered, Croteau's report recalls how the federal government opened a school in 1960, then a nursing station a year later. By 1962, small prefabricated houses were built and Inuit settled in the village.
"As was the case in the other villages, the dog issue arose once the school opened because mandatory attendance led families who had been nomadic to settle in the village," Croteau wrote.
"Never before, that is to say, not since time immemorial, had outsiders attempted to exert control over the dogs, which seemed so strict to members of the community.
"To the Inuit, the whites’ attitude was a threat to their culture, their way of life. They could not understand how a provincial statute, of which most were unaware, could give an officer discretion to determine the fate of their sled dogs."
Croteau also wrote many dog owners did not have adequate collars or chains to even tie up their dogs. He determined that over a three-day period sometime between 1965 and 1967, more than 200 dogs were killed in Kangiqsujuaq alone, amounting to more than half of the canine population.
Inuit there also reported some of their dogs died after being inoculated. The vaccines were requested by a federal administrator of the community, Croteau's report found, but nobody had warned Inuit of the risks.
"It therefore came as a shock to them when some of their dogs did die," Croteau quoted from a 1964 memo by a federal administrator.
Croteau determined the federal government ought to have known that the influx of a large number of non-Inuit to the North would significantly disturb Inuit culture and their way of life.
"Moreover, Canada, in its capacity as a fiduciary, should have asked its civil servants to solve the problem in the above-mentioned villages through negotiation instead of confrontation," Croteau wrote.
In 2011, then-Quebec Premier Jean Charest formally apologized to Inuit in Nunavik for the province's role in the killings across the region, and settled with Makivvik for $3 million toward promoting and protecting Inuit language and culture.
In 2019, the federal government apologized to Inuit in Nunavut for the RCMP's role in killing of sled dogs there.
A final report from the Qikiqtani Truth Commission on the issue found hundreds of dogs were shot by the RCMP there out of a fear of loose dogs or the spread of disease.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 23, 2024.
Nick Murray, The Canadian Press