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Despite claims of 215 ‘unmarked graves,’ no bodies have been found at Canadian residential school

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Over 100 churches have been burned or vandalized since the Trudeau government and mainstream media promulgated, without any physical evidence, the narrative that mass ‘unmarked graves’ had been discovered at Kamloops Indian Residential School.

Canada’s Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations has confirmed it has spent millions searching for “unmarked graves” at a now-closed residential school once run by the Catholic Church, despite the fact that no human remains have been found.

In total, some $7.9 million was earmarked for a search of unmarked Indian Residential School graves in Kamloops, British Columbia. According to the spokeswoman for the Crown-Indigenous Relations, Carolane Gratton, the community got the money “for field work, records searches and to secure the Residential School grounds.”

“Details of initiatives taken by Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation are best directed to the community,” noted Gratton. 

To date, the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations has not given a financial accounting under the Access To Information Act as to where the money went. According to the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation, it “continues to grieve children that are in our care and are focused on the scientific work that needs to be done,” but made no mention of the $7.9 million. 

In 2021 and 2022, the mainstream media ran with inflammatory and dubious claims that hundreds of children were buried and disregarded by Catholic priests and nuns who ran some of the schools. 

The Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nation was more or less the reason there was a large international outcry in 2021, when it claimed it had found 215 “unmarked graves” of kids at the Kamloops Residential School. The claims of remains, however, were not backed by physical evidence, but were rather disturbances in the soil picked up by ground-penetrating radar. 

The money given to the First Nation was done so to find the “heartbreaking truth” of the residential school system, according to a 2022 Indian Residential School Sites: Unmarked Burials department briefing note.  

“Our thoughts are with survivors, their families and communities as the heartbreaking truth about Residential Schools’ unmarked burials continues to be unveiled,” read the note.  

“Funding is available to support communities, survivors and their families on their healing journey through researching, locating and memorializing those children who died while attending Indian Residential Schools.” 

While there were indeed some Catholics who committed serious abuses against native children, the past wrongs led to widespread anti-Catholic sentiment, which boiled over in the summer of 2021 after the discovery of the 215 so-called “unmarked” graves in Kamloops.

While some children did die at the once-mandatory boarding schools, evidence has revealed that many of the children tragically passed away as a result of unsanitary conditions due to the federal government, not the Catholic Church, failing to properly fund the system.   

No human remains have been found 

Soon after the Kamloops announcement in 2021, other regions claimed the presence of “unmarked graves,” which prompted Canada’s House of Commons under Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, with the help of all other parties including the Conservatives, to declare the residential school program a “genocide” despite the lack of evidence.

The reality is that to date, no human remains have been found at the Kamloops site or other sites.

In fact, in August 2023, the Pine Creek Residential School, located in Pine Creek, Manitoba, underwent a four-week excavation and yielded no remains. 

The excavation was led by a First Nation’s tribe called Minegoziibe Ashinabe, and came after a total of 14 abnormalities were found at the former school by ground-penetrating radar.  

There have been other excavations conducted at residential schools that have likewise turned up no human remains.  

Since the spring of 2021, over 100 churches, mostly Catholic, have been burned or vandalized across Canada. The attacks on the churches came shortly after the “unmarked graves” narrative began.

Despite the church burnings, the federal government under Trudeau has done nothing substantial to bring those responsible to justice or to stem the root cause of the burnings. 

“I think Canadians have seen with horror those unmarked graves across the country and realize that what happened decades ago isn’t part of our history, it is an irrefutable part of our present,” Trudeau had earlier remarked to reporters.  

The unmarked graves controversy also spurred a Senate committee in 2023 to claim that anyone who questions the graves is engaged in “Residential School denialism.” 

“Denialism serves to distract people from the horrific consequences of Residential Schools and the realities of missing children, burials and unmarked graves,” said a Senate Indigenous peoples committee report titled Honouring The Children Who Never Came Home.  

The Senate committee report said that the Canadian government should “take every action necessary to combat the rise of Residential School denialism.” 

Jordan Peterson tells Pope Francis to ‘take note’ 

Responding to reports about the Trudeau government spending nearly $8 million without finding a single body, renowned anti-woke Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson took a shot at Pope Francis.

“Pope Francis take note @Pontifex,” wrote Peterson on X (formerly Twitter) last Thursday. 

Peterson’s remarks likely came in light of the fact that Francis visited Canada in the summer of 2022 for the purpose of apologizing for churchmen’s role in the operation of the residential school program.  

During his July 2022 trip, Francis visited First Nations in Alberta and Quebec. While in Quebec, he seemed to join in on a pagan “smudging” ritual before giving a lengthy speech where he conveyed “deep shame and sorrow” for the role played by Catholic Church members in government-funded residential school abuses.  

While Francis seemed to go along with the mainstream narrative regarding residential schools, others have spoken out.

Last year, retired Bishop of Calgary, Frederick Henry, blasted the blatant “lie” that thousands of missing indigenous children who attended residential schools run by the Catholic Church were somehow “clandestinely” murdered by “Catholic priests and nuns.”

The founder of the National Post, Conrad Black, also made similar statements as Henry in an opinion piece for his former paper, calling the entire narrative a “fraud.” 

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Saskatchewan files injunction against Trudeau gov’t over carbon tax dispute

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Saskatchewan’s Justice Minister Bronwyn Eyre confirmed Thursday that the province has filed a court injunction to try and stop Canada’s tax agency from seizing its bank account because it has refused to collect an ever-increasing carbon tax instituted by the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.  

In a video update on Thursday posted to X, Eyre, who services as both justice minister and attorney general for Saskatchewan, confirmed that the Trudeau government is “sending the Canada Revenue Agency after the Province’s bank account” over Premier Scott Moe’s refusal to collect the carbon tax on home heating.

Eyre noted that because the “Saskatchewan government was providing the same carbon tax relief here that the federal government was giving to other Canadians,” the Trudeau government is “threatening us again with their favorite move when someone disagrees with them.” 

“They’re sending the Canada Revenue Agency after the Province’s bank account. That’s what they’re doing,” she said. “And the reason they’re doing this is because we are providing Saskatchewan residents with the exact same carbon tax exemption as Trudeau is giving other Canadians.” 

As reported before by LifeSiteNews, in October of last year, amid dismal polling numbers that showed his government would be defeated in a landslide by the Conservative Party come the next election, Trudeau announced he was pausing the collection of the carbon tax on home heating oil for three years.

While it was a welcomed move by many, home heating oil is almost exclusively used in Atlantic Canada, meaning the tax break really only applied to certain citizens, namely the 24 seats in Atlantic Canada currently held by the Liberals.

Going a step further, Trudeau refused to offer a similar carbon tax relief to those who heat their homes with natural gas, the main product used in provinces such as Alberta and Saskatchewan. This led to Moe announcing his government would take matters into its own hands by pausing the collection of the federal carbon tax on natural gas for home heating, a policy which took effect on January 1, 2024.

Moe has continued to state that his policy is one of fairness, arguing that now citizens of Saskatchewan, like in Atlantic Canada, do not have to pay carbon tax on home heating bills.

In the Thursday video, Eyre said that it is “unconstitutional” to go after a province’s bank account as “section 126 of Canada’s constitution does not allow the federal government to grab money from a province’s bank account.” 

Eyre added that when it comes to the issue of not collecting the carbon tax, it’s “about fairness and the fair application of the law.” 

“The Trudeau-NDP carbon tax should be taken off everything for everyone,” she said. “But until that happens, your Saskatchewan government will protect our province and ensure tax fairness for Saskatchewan families.” 

The Trudeau government has not only denied tax exemptions, it has remained adamant that it will continue increasing the carbon tax rate.

On April 1, the Trudeau government increased the carbon tax from $65 to $85 per tonne despite seven of 10 provincial premiers objecting to the increase, and 70 percent of Canadians saying they are against it. 

To reach Trudeau’s goal of net zero by 2050, the carbon tax would have to balloon to $350 per tonne. 

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Business

No reliable evidence that ESG investing produces above-average returns

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From the Fraser Institute

By Steven Globerman

Despite growing skepticism among investors, as evidenced by their withdrawal of billions of dollars from ESG equity funds so far in 2024, many finance industry leaders continue to claim that ESG-focused investing produces above-average returns.

But is that true?

Environmental, social and governance (ESG) is a movement designed to pressure businesses and investors to pursue larger social goals. According to ESG theory, firms that receive poor ratings from ESG rating agencies should lose investment dollars. Yet the claim that ESG-focused investing can help investors do well by doing good has received surprisingly little empirical support from academic studies.

However, according to a new study published by the Fraser Institute, which tracked 310 companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange from 2013 to 2020, neither ESG rating upgrades nor downgrades were related in a statistically significant way to the stock market performance of companies.

Moreover, because the study finds that ESG ratings changes—which, when released, are effectively new information for investors—are not consistently related to financial returns, ESG ratings are likely not relevant to the expected future profitability of publicly listed companies in Canada.

This of course raises the question—if new information (i.e. ratings changes) about a company’s ESG-related practises is not statistically related to equity returns from investing in that company, why do money managers pay for the services of ESG rating companies?

One possible reason is that managers pass a substantial share of the costs along to customers who are willing to sacrifice financial returns (due to higher management fees) to express their commitment to environmental sustainability and other social causes. Another possible reason is that promoting ESG-focused investment alternatives appears to have been, at least until recently, an effective marketing tool.

But again, the empirical evidence suggests there’s no reliable statistical relationship between ESG-focused investing and the risk-adjusted returns earned by investors. And since asset managers typically charge higher fees for ESG-focused mutual funds, ESG investment strategies are more likely to underperform than overperform conventional investment strategies.

Certainly, if some percentage of investors choose to pursue ESG-related investment strategies, even at the cost of lower risk-adjusted investment returns, there should be no legal or regulatory restrictions on doing so. However, securities regulators should closely monitor the investment industry to ensure it provides reliable and up-to-date information about the financial performance of ESG-focused investment products that portfolio managers market to the public.

At the same time, when ESG advocates push for more government-mandated ESG disclosures from companies in Canada, policymakers should be wary of any claims that greater disclosure mandates will improve the financial performance of companies.

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