First Nations communities have requested more than $700 million from a federal program aimed at identifying and repatriating the remains of children who died at Indian Residential Schools — nearly three times the amount originally allocated by cabinet.Blacklock's Reporter says the Residential Schools Missing Children Community Support Fund was created in 2022 with a $238.8 million budget to support the search for undocumented burial sites, help communities document and memorialize them, and honour families’ wishes to locate and bring home children’s remains. But a March 14 memo from the Department of Crown-indigenous Relations reported total funding applications have reached $704.3 million. To date, $246.7 million has been spent. Not a single grave has been found..“The actual number of individuals buried, or cemetery sites associated with residential schools, is unknown,” the department wrote, citing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 2015 conclusion that thousands of indigenous children died while attending the institutions. The Commission documented 4,100 deaths among the estimated 150,000 children who attended residential schools over more than a century, though that figure remains unverified.The federal fund was originally set to expire March 31 but has been extended by one year due to high demand.A 2024 report by the Senate indigenous peoples committee urged the release of all provincial and territorial coroners’ records to help determine how many children died. .The report, Missing Children, Missing Records, noted many children who attended residential schools ran away, went missing, or died under unknown circumstances, and that families were often never told what happened.The creation of the federal fund followed the 2021 announcement by the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation that ground-penetrating radar had detected what were believed to be the graves of 215 children at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School. No remains have been recovered at the site, but the First Nation received $12.1 million for exhumation and DNA testing efforts.Kimberley Murray, the Independent Special Interlocutor for Missing Children and Unmarked Graves, told a Senate committee last November that public skepticism is permitted, but warned against hate speech targeting indigenous communities.“It is one thing to say you don’t believe there are burials. That’s your opinion,” said Murray. “But when you say there are no burials, that First Nations people are lying because they want you to burn down churches or take away your cottages, that is inciting hate against indigenous people. That’s the type of speech we need to stop.”
