James C. McCrae is former attorney general of Manitoba and Canadian citizenship judgeIf Canadians are serious that every child matters, we should at least know the names of the “missing” Indian Residential Schools children about whom we hear almost daily in mainstream media reports.There are frequent reports of news conferences staged by indigenous band leaders proclaiming new ground penetrating radar (GPR) “discoveries” of unmarked graves at former residential schools. But the reality is that the small number of excavations which have occurred have yielded no human remains, despite stories of clandestine burials told by indigenous knowledge keepers..MORGAN: Another day, another mass burial hoax.It’s more than passing strange that excavations have been happening at Winnipeg landfills to find the bodies of indigenous women who were the victims of murder, yet after more than four years of gut-wrenching stories about the apple orchard at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School, there has been no excavation at all for the bodies of 200 or more indigenous children alleged to have been secretly buried there.Following the May 27, 2021 announcement of the Kamloops "discovery," a number of First Nations have followed suit, claiming to have found children’s bodies using ground penetrating radar. Aside from the fact that GPR is incapable of identifying human remains, the name of no “missing” child has been revealed by any First Nation, especially including Kamloops, which has been granted $12 million — and all this time — to do precisely that. More particularly, the Kamloops band took the money for the purpose of excavation, but has not excavated. There has been no accounting for why the $12 million has not been used for the purposes intended..Are we serious? If murdered indigenous women in Winnipeg matter, why don’t innocent little kids who did nothing more than go to school? We Canadians must be the most disingenuous people in the world. The Heather Stefanson government in Manitoba was defeated in the 2023 election, famously because of its refusal to search landfills for indigenous women known to have been murdered. How can it be that the Kamloops allegation of the worst crimes committed in Canadian history, the murder and indecent burial of more than 200 children, is not investigated? More than four years have passed; many copycat “discoveries” have been announced; the media has created a moral panic across the country and around the world; orange T-shirts are seen everywhere; schoolchildren are taught that the allegations of murder, rape, mayhem and mass graves are true..THOMAS: Calgary's birthday celebrations an exercise in wokeness.In Manitoba, Morgan Harris mattered. Marcedes Myran mattered. Their families and communities mattered. If First Nations in BC and elsewhere and, indeed, all Canadians are serious that every child matters, and if many still believe there are 200 or more children buried at Kamloops, why are Canadians kept in the dark about this? Indigenous families especially are being told, and teaching their children, that genocide has been the reason for the inequality - social, economic and otherwise - they endure today.Who is to blame for all this? It’s easy to blame federal and provincial governments for continuing to promote the moral panic that has been the result of the Kamloops story. It’s certainly easy to blame the mainstream media for its unwillingness to ask even the most basic questions about this, and for its zeal for sensationalism. .But who started all this, and who today still refuses to do what its GPR specialist recommended: excavate and find out if there are indeed bodies buried in the apple orchard; find out who those alleged murdered and mistreated children were; find out from which families and communities they came? It started with the Kamloops band, and it could - and should - end with the Kamloops band’s doing the right thing and demonstrating that its chief and other decision-makers actually care about how this story affects ordinary Indigenous Canadians.Too many Canadians are guilty of promoting and pretending to believe horrible things that have not been shown to be true. After all this time — and zero investigation — it stretches credibility still to be asked to believe the Kamloops story. .EYRE: ‘Lawfare’: How a weaponized Charter of Rights is preventing governments from governing.Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew tells us $18 million was spent to dig through thousands of tons of garbage - hazardous and otherwise - to recover the remains of Morgan and Marcedes. Surely the $12 million given to the Kamloops band to dig but a few feet should by now have been used for that purpose.Something is wrong with this picture. There is either a total lack of compassion for Indigenous children, or the “missing” kids aren’t missing at all.Where is that compassion Canadians love to think they possess?Or is it simply not true that every child matters?James C. McCrae is former attorney general of Manitoba and Canadian citizenship judge
