Guiding recommendations

Recommendation 3: Increase the number of Indigenous Peoples at all levels of the BCHRT, including staff, tribunal members and contractors.

Immediate procedural steps

Recommendation 8: Create a staff/tribunal committee tasked with developing the Expanding Our Vision Implementation Plan. Indigenous lawyers and cultural leaders or academics with knowledge of human rights should be recruited to join these efforts. The Expanding Our Vision Implementation Plan should include immediate steps to be taken in the first 6 months, and then be renewed on a yearly basis.

Incorporate Indigenous laws

Recommendation 10: The BCHRT should actively engage with Indigenous Peoples, working with the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner, Indigenous lawyers, and law schools, to incorporate Indigenous laws into a renewed human rights process which reflects Indigenous approaches for protecting human rights.

Increase Indigenous involvement within the BCHRT

Recommendation 12: Priority should be given to hiring or appointing Indigenous staff and tribunal members.

Increase Indigenous involvement within the BCHRT

Recommendation 13: Audit the current HR process to identify why Indigenous Peoples are not being recruited or hired. Provide specific training to HR staff on how to actively recruit and fairly assess Indigenous applicants. Seek specific mentoring advice from other organizations with higher Indigenous staff ratios about how to address this underrepresentation. The BCHRT should set yearly hiring targets for the first five years, and report on success in meeting those targets in annual reports.

Increase Indigenous involvement within the BCHRT

Recommendation 14: Audit the tribunal appointment process to identify why Indigenous Peoples are not applying or being appointed as tribunal members. Set specific recruitment and appointment goals for BCHRT Indigenous tribunal members.

Increase Indigenous involvement within the BCHRT

Recommendation 15: Implement options for part-time appointments to qualified Indigenous tribunal members, who may not be available full-time. This could provide a way to reflect Indigenous adjudicative and dispute resolution traditions within the tribunal’s expertise.

Settlement

Recommendation 31: Include Indigenous dispute resolution models, mediators and peacemakers in BCHRT mediation or settlement discussions. Consider use of co-mediation or joint processes involving Indigenous Peoples.

Need for legal representation

Recommendation 48: Encourage the creation of regional, or circuit, human rights clinics to both educate and assist Indigenous Peoples in filing and carrying through human rights claims. Explore options for clinics or workshops that operate regionally over time so lawyers can stick with a case, including potentially working with the three BC law schools. Clinics should be led by leading Indigenous counsel and provide representation to Indigenous Peoples, individually and collectively.