UNDRIP ready for the next step as Bill C-15 passes
May 25, 2021
OTTAWA -- Almost 14 years after the United Nations adopted a framework establishing the rights of Indigenous people, Canada is finally on the brink of implementing the historic document.
Despite concerns being raised by some opposition MPs over exactly what adopting the United Nations’ Declaration on Indigenous Rights (UNDRIP) will mean legally, the minority Liberal government, with the aid of the NDP and Bloc Quebecois, passed Bill C-15 by a 210-118 margin on May 25. It now goes to the Senate for final approval.
Bill C-15, “An Act respecting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples,” forces the federal government to bring all of Canada’s laws into line with the UNDRIP. This is the second time since the United Nations passed the non-binding declaration in September 2007 that Ottawa moved to fold the UNDRIP principles into Canadian law. A 2018 private member’s bill died in the Senate when Parliament dissolved for the 2019 election.