Good afternoon.
My name is Kai Liu and I'm the executive director of the Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario and former chief of the Treaty Three Police Service.
I want to highlight two key developments. These are the major court rulings confirming discrimination in Canada's first nations and Inuit policing program and IPCO's own successful legal action.
In Quebec, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal and the Federal Court of Appeal found that Canada discriminates through FNIPP by refusing to negotiate honourably and by imposing arbitrary terms and conditions.
In 2024, the Supreme Court went further, ruling that Canada breached the honour of the Crown and describing negotiations with Public Safety Canada as like having “a knife to the throat”. IPCO intervened in that case to share Ontario's experience.
In 2023, IPCO launched its own human rights complaint and won emergency Federal Court relief after three of our police services had their funding cut off. The Federal Court ordered Canada to maintain funding, suspend discriminatory terms and negotiate in good faith, yet Canada continues to delay our broader complaint.
We believe these issues can and should be resolved through honourable, good faith engagements without further litigation.