Tina Fontaine report is a 'post-mortem on the misery' of First Nations: advocate

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A new report into the death of Tina Fontainefurther highlights the need for First Nationsto be empowered and funded to help vulnerable youth in their communities, according to one advocate.

"We have the means to be able to do these things ourselves, however continually government funds itself to be able to give the post-mortem on the misery of our First Nations people," said Cora Morgan, the First Nations family advocate at the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs.

Morgan was speaking to The Current's guest host Piya Chattopadhyay about a report released by Manitoba's Advocate for Children and Youth Daphne Penrose on Tuesdayinto the death of Fontaine, a 15-year-old Indigenous girl, five years ago.

"The province keeps on churning out these reforms, and to me a lot of times they're more detrimental than good," said Morgan.

"Some of them, they sound good, but when you get down to the roots of things, they're not really that beneficial, and that's because that engagement with First Nations has never meaningfully taken place."

Daphne Penrose highlights urgency of improving services for youth

6 years ago

Duration 2:07

Advocate Daphne Penrose said the changes she recommends need to be acted upon quickly to prevent other children from facing the same barriers as Tina Fontaine.

Fontaine lived with her great aunt and great uncle on Sagkeeng First Nation, but was visiting her mother in Winnipeg when she ran away. Over the following six weeks in the city, she was in contact with police, hospital staff, and child and family services.

Her body was found dumped in Winnipeg's Red River on Aug. 17, 2014. No one has been convicted of her murder, and her story sparked a national outcry over missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

• TheCurrent:Highway of Tears: Canada's Missing and Murdered

Penrose reviewed the services provided to Fontaine before her death, and made five recommendations to prevent a similar situation from happening again.

The report suggested it was "a system-wide failure," said Scott Fielding, the province's former minister of families, and current finance minister.

"Everyone bears some responsibility," he told Chattopadhyay.

We ... want to ensure a situation like this, with Tina, really never happens again, where someone is able to fall through the cracks of the system.- Scott Fielding

Fielding said that Manitoba's Conservative government had taken strong action to improve child welfare, including the Protecting Children Act, which allows police and other services to share information about at-risk youth.

"We as a government really want to ensure a situation like this, with Tina, really never happens again, where someone is able to fall through the cracks of the system," he said.

Following the report's release, the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs renewed a call for an independent inquiry into Fontaine's death. Premier Brian Pallisterresponded that he wantsthe province to focus on the recommendations and move on.

Click 'listen' near the top of the page to hear the full conversation.

Written by PadraigMoran. Produced by Idella Sturino and Imogen Birchard.