Kimelman Report

The Kimelman Report had a substantial and lasting impact on aboriginal child protection in Canada that was part of a fundamental shift in international child protection paradigms for aboriginal peoples.

In the early 1980s, following the notorious Sixties Scoop, [See: Margaret Philp, "The Land of Lost Children", The Globe and Mail, Saturday, December 21, 2002, http://www.fact.on.ca/news/news0212/gm021221a.htm, accessed 21 August 2008.] in which many children were removed from aboriginal families for adoption by non-aboriginal parents, the Manitoba government established a Review Committee on Indian and Métis Adoptions and Placements. Judge Edwin C. Kimelman chaired the Committee. In 1984, "After reviewing the file of every Native child who had been adopted by an out-of-province family in 1981, Judge Kimelman stated: 'having now completed the review of the files... the Chairman now states unequivocally that cultural genocide has been taking place in a systematic, routine manner'." [ File Review Report, Report of the Review Committee on Indian and Métis Adoptions and Placements. Winnipeg (1984): Manitoba Community Services; and see Lawrence J. Barkwell, Lyle N. Longclaws & David N. Chartrand, Status of Métis Children within the Child Welfare System, http://www.brandonu.ca/Library/CJNS/9.1/metis.pdf, accessed 21 August 2008]

In 1985, the Review Committee issued a final report, entitled "No Quiet Place" and known in child welfare circles as the Kimelman Report, ["No Quiet Place", Final Report of the Review Committee on Indian and Métis Adoptions and Placements to the Minister ofCommunity Services, Manitoba Community Services, Winnipeg (1995)] that had profound impact on aboriginal child protection in Canada and perhaps elsewhere. [Tom Lyons, "Stolen Nation", http://www.wrcfs.org/repat/stolennation.htm, accessed 21 August 2008]

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