The chief of a Kamloops-area First Nation says it is important to make sure the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women inquiry doesn’t end up sitting on a shelf.

Neskonlith First Nation chief Judy Wilson, who is also on the Union of BC Indian Chiefs executive board, says the truth is out there, and the next step is acting on the inquiry’s more-than-200 recommendations.

“We have to be able to do action with this to really make those systemic shifts, those systemic changes in the lives of our Indigenous women and girls. Also our men and boys too, because they’re also impacted through this colonial genocide,” Wilson says.

“We can’t spend more time in rhetoric, we can’t spend more time in getting these reports that just sit on the shelf. We’ve got tons of them out there; Truth and Reconciliation, Royal Commission, there’s lots of reports even before that and after that. In B.C. we have the Wally Oppal public inquiry. We have to be able to take action with this.”

Meanwhile, a well-known member of the Coast Salish Nation says recommendations in the inquiry don’t go far enough in one aspect.

Fay Blaney, who testified in the inquiry, says the recommendations don’t address a gap in the Gladue Decision, where judges can factor in colonization as a mitigating factor in sentencing.

“I believe in that practice of taking into account the impact of colonization in the case around property crimes, those sorts of things. But when it comes to violence against Indigenous women, that should not be a consideration.”

Blaney says the Gladue Decision means Indigenous men can figuratively, or even literally, “get away with murder” in some cases when it comes to violence against women.

(Photo: Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs)