MONTREAL -- The Quebec government plans to open historical files for what it estimates are "a few dozen" First Nations families whose children went missing or died after contact with the provincial health and social system.
The provincial minister responsible for Indigenous affairs, Ian Lafrenière, tabled a bill on Wednesday that authorizes the disclosure of personal information to the families of Indigenous children who disappeared or died after being admitted to a Quebec institution before 1989.
"The phenomenon is little known," according to the province in a release Wednesday. However, provincial authorities said "a few dozen" children disappeared or died in this way from the 1950s through to 1989.
In some cases, the release said, the child may have been placed in foster care after his or her time passing through a provincial health or social service. In others the children died, or it has never been clear what happened to them.
The bill authorizes families to get information about their child's fate from a health and social services establishment, an organization or a religious congregation, and it allows the province to investigate if they do not comply.
The province noted the bill is a response to the 20th and 21st calls included in a complementary report, addressed specifically to Quebec, of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.
Lafreniere said hopes the new step by the province will ultimately help bring their families some resolution.
"We are opening the books," he said.
"All my sympathy goes out to the families who have been without news of their children all this time. Such situations leave deep wounds, and I hope that the efforts of these people and the support they may receive, thanks to this law, will provide them with some peace and comfort."
He also credited Mirabel MNA Sylvie D'Amours for pushing for the bill.
"I am hopeful that getting some information can ease [the families'] pain that has gone on for too long," D'Amours said, adding the bill was "close to her heart."
"I sympathize with the parents and families of these little humans," she said. "I can't fully understand, but I can imagine all the suffering you are going through."
