B.C. Conservative MLA defies media, NDP attacks over “zero” Kamloops graves post

B.C. Conservative MLA Dallas Brodie is refusing to back down in the face of attacks from the BC NDP, legacy media outlets and even from within her own caucus for daring to point out that “zero” ...

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B.C. Conservative MLA Dallas Brodie is refusing to back down in the face of attacks from the B.C. NDP, legacy media outlets and even from within her own caucus for daring to point out that “zero” child graves have been uncovered at the Kamloops Residential School site.

The Official Opposition attorney general critic for justice reform commented on a report concerning a lawsuit against the Law Society of B.C. for requiring members to profess the misleading claim that 215 unmarked graves were found at the historic Kamloops Residential School.

Her post garnered a wave of criticism online, mainly from members of the NDP government but even from a few B.C. Conservative MLAs who amplified denunciations from B.C. NDP ministers. The post in question was a link to a National Post op-ed by Michael Higgins supporting B.C. lawyer James Heller in his lawsuit and affirming that “zero” confirmed child burials had been discovered at the site.

Heller is taking the law society to court after it refused to add qualifying words to its Indigenous training course before noting soil anomalies that were discovered at Kamloops Residential School by ground-penetrating radar.

The training materials the law society uses say, “On May 27, 2021, the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation reported the discovery of an unmarked burial site containing the bodies of 215 children on the former Kamloops Indian Residential School grounds.” Though no bodies have been unearthed and the Kamloops band, on the third anniversary of the discovery of soil anomalies at the site, cited the anomalies as “probable unmarked burial sites.”

Investigations into the site by the First Nation are ongoing, including archaeological surveys.

Despite the lack of exhumations of the site both the media and the Liberal government, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, promoted the misleading narrative that the suspected burials were evidence of “mass graves.”

Heller asked that the law society add terms such as “potential,” “possible,” and “suspected” before noting “unmarked burial sites,” which aligns with the interim report of the special interlocutor for missing children and unmarked graves and burial sites, released June 2023.

The lawsuit alleges that the law society further defamed Heller following his requests for the material to be changed, accusing him of “genocide denialism” and anti-indigenous racism.

In a series of posts on X, Brodie contended that the Law Society, the government-recognized independent legislative body for lawyers, was wrong not to change the information in its training materials to conform with the facts.

“The number of confirmed child burials at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School site is zero,” she said. “No one should be afraid of the truth. Not lawyers, their governing bodies, or anyone else.”

Brodie vowed as attorney general critic to engage Attorney General Minister Niki Sharma and the Law Society over the course materials and “the apparent mistreatment of the lawyers who requested corrections to them.” Brodie has since had the same accusations of “residential school denial” levelled against her, although she has stated on the record she recognizes the abuses that took place against Indigenous children in Canada’s residential school system.

B.C. Conservative leader John Rustad asked Brodie to remove the statements without commenting on the validity of the claim. He only expressed that there was undoubtedly mistreatment of people at residential schools and, indeed, cemeteries that have children in them on site.

B.C. NDP Indigenous Relations Minister Christine Boyle, attacked Brodie on social media, demanding an apology from the MLA, sharing a post labelling Brodie’s statements “racist residential school denialism.” Boyle was joined in the dogpiling by other politicians, including federal NDP MP Niki Ashton.

Brodie told True North in an interview that she doesn’t think her statements warrant an apology, and claims that she is denying harms caused by the residential school system are “completely untrue.”

“I don’t think there are any Canadians who denied that this was not a good chapter in our history. It’s a real black mark on Canada’s history,” Brodie told True North. “What we’re talking about here is the truth of this specific story about 215 unmarked graves beneath or around the Kamloops school.”

She said Canadians hear in the media that none of the “likely graves” reported in the preliminary findings of the anomalies were discovered at the Kamloops site – and they want the truth.

“It doesn’t mean there isn’t redress still needed. It just means that this specific story, in this case, has resulted in a man, this lawyer, his life was turned upside down, his name completely sullied,” Brodie said. “This is (allegedly) a terrible miscarriage of justice and defamation.”

Other criticisms of Brodie came from B.C. Conservative MLA and house leader A’aliya Warbus. She cited a National Observer article, which notes 158 child deaths were catalogued at four separate residential school facilities.

“Questioning the narratives of people who lived and survived these atrocities is nothing but harmful and taking us backward in reconciliation,” Warbus said in a post on X. Warbus also amplified a tweet by Boyle on her personal social media account.

“Narratives and stories should not be considered unquestionable. Everything has to be checked against other sources of information,” Tom Flanagan, a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Calgary, told True North.

Flanagan is a co-editor of Grave Error: How the Media Misled Us (and the Truth about Residential Schools), published by True North.

He noted that the report cited lists that the majority of the student deaths were from disease or listed as accidents.

“In a few, the cause is unknown—probably from imperfect record keeping,” Flanagan said. “What is not stated is what we know from other sources: most so-called IRS deaths did not actually occur at the schools. They occurred at hospitals where students had been sent for treatment, or at home on holidays, or elsewhere during the year after leaving an Indian residential school.”

Overall, Flanagan said he supports what Brodie said on X, saying it’s entirely in her role as the attorney general critic for justice reform to criticize a regulatory legal body recognized by the government.

“I support what she said. I think, factually, no informed person really believes that human remains were found in Kamloops,” he said. “This is absolutely crazy for the Law Society to be insisting that they’d be considered actual graves when even the Kamloops administration doesn’t say that.”

Although Flanagan said Brodie’s comments were historically accurate, he questioned whether the B.C. Conservatives should have stricter rules for their members to comment on intense and essential issues without consulting Rustad.