After the offer from Minister Philpott to develop the bringing our children home act, we thought it was important to bring the elders forward, the women's council and all those members. We have a ceremony person who is also a lawyer and a helper in our community. She drafted it. Before anyone saw it or went to ceremony, we had a water ceremony, pipe ceremony, sweat lodge and feast. When we did that, it was asking for the guidance that the bringing our children home act travel the good path, and that all the right people brought forward what it needed to best represent our people.
Over time, we've done several ceremonies for the bringing our children home act, because it brought together our elders. In the process, we've lost two of those elders, who had significant roles: Elder Elmer Courchene and Elder Doris Pratt.
We wanted to be able to honour them in the best way and to keep pushing for it, because it has been the will of experts in child welfare, first nations experts, for the past 30 years. We want to do justice and we want what was promised to us.
Meegwetch.