Canada’s top judge in a speech decried the legacy of “assimilation” policies on aboriginal people, and called for “inclusive” leaders in “all our institutions, religious and secular” to promote tolerance
By Tonda MacCharles Toronto Star – Published on Wed May 27 2015
OTTAWA—Canada’s top judge decried the legacy of “assimilation” policies on aboriginal people in a speech on the public value of diversity, and called for “inclusive” leaders in “all our institutions, religious and secular” to promote tolerance. Beverley McLachlin, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, delivered the wide-ranging keynote speech Thursday at the Global Centre for Pluralism, a non-profit centre founded by the Aga Khan and the Canadian government.
It comes on the eve of a historic report into Canada’s relationship with aboriginal people. It also comes as the limits of public tolerance are tested by national security threats made by Islamist fundamentalists, and political vows of “zero-tolerance” toward perceived threats.
McLachlin argued tolerance, within limits, “is the only way forward,” saying the Canadian government’s 19th century assimilation policies toward aboriginal people would today be called “cultural genocide.”
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