'Alarming' Jordan's Principle funding denials, delays leave kids without care: Manitoba chiefs

First Nations leaders in Manitoba say the federal government is failing to provide communities with vital funding and resources through Jordan's Principle, leading to an escalating crisis affecting children. 

Jordan's Principle is named after Jordan River Anderson, a five-year-old Norway House Cree Nation boy who died in 2005 in the midst of a two-year battle between Manitoba and Ottawa over who would pay for his care.

In 2007, the House of Commons adopted the principle in the five-year-old's name. Ottawa launched the Jordan's Principle program in 2016 to compensate qualifying families for their children's health and therapeutic services.

But the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs said in a statement that Indigenous Services Canada has "centralized decision-making in Ottawa, bypassing First Nations leadership" on Jordan's Principle funding.

That's led to "alarming service denials and delays" in funding for essential services, the statement said.

"Families are denied the medical, social and educational support they need.… This is not fairness, [it] is cruelty," AMC Acting Grand Chief Betsy Kennedy said at a news conference on Wednesday. 

"Canada's continued broken promises are leaving our children without care."

In November, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruled the federal government needed to immediately deal with a backlog of claims under Jordan's Principle.

It gave the federal government until Dec. 10 to report back with a detailed plan, targets and timelines.

The federal government confirmed last week there are now 140,000 backlogged requests across Canada, but said it doesn't know when they will be cleared, calling the legal order requiring swift action on it "challenging" to implement.

On Wednesday, members of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, the Southern Chiefs' Organization and Anishininew Okimawin held a special meeting to talk about the welfare of First Nation children amid Jordan's Principle funding delays.

They say the number of applications through Jordan's Principle that have not been processed has risen to 6,000 for Manitoba — between 2,000 and 3,000 of which are marked as urgent.

Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation Chief Angela Levasseur said First Nation leaders raised their concerns with an Indigenous Services Canada representative at Wednesday's meeting.

Some of the questions were on why a large number of Jordan's Principle claims are being referred to Indigenous Services in Ottawa, when there's a regional office in Manitoba set up to process applications. 

First Nations leaders also asked for a timeline on clearing the backlog of unprocessed claims, but Indigenous Services didn't directly answer their questions, Levasseur said.

"We were very clear in terms of the answers that we wanted to have today … and I just felt it was a grave display of disrespect towards our First Nations chiefs," she said.

"I was left with the feeling that they could not have cared less if they tried." 

CBC News reached out to Indigenous Service Canada for comment but didn't immediately hear back.

The department has pushed back against the human rights tribunal's deadlines, with a federal spokesperson saying last week ISC is "concerned that the timelines to address the backlog of Jordan's Principle requests could have unintended impacts on delivering critical services to First Nations children and families and is not operationally feasible."

'We're set up for failure'

Acting Grand Chief Kennedy said after years of being denied the needed funding, there is no longer trust in the current administration to deliver on the promises of Jordan's Principle. 

"We're set up for failure," Kennedy said. "It was just like residential school over again." 

Pimicikamak Cree Nation Chief David Monias said jurisdictional gaps and delays in federal funding have left communities solely responsible for providing services children need.

"This is not only a breach of trust, but the direct violations of the government commitments made under Jordan's Principle," he said. 

The situation is pushing First Nations to consider taking radical steps, Monias said, including declaring a state of emergency or filing an injunction against the federal government "to force them to comply with the orders" set by the tribunal. 

First Nations should also consider taking the situation to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, he said.

"This is not just a funding issue, it's a human rights issue," Monias said. "Our children are not statistics. They are our future."