Lawyers file class-action lawsuit for former patients at Indian Hospitals

“I felt guilt for many, many years because I wasn’t able to help her.”

Hardy is now hoping to help all the former patients she can as the lead plaintiff in a proposed class-action lawsuit alleging abuse at the 29 Indian Hospitals the federal government ran from 1945 until the last one closed in 1981.

A statement of claim filed last week in Toronto federal court says Indigenous patients suffered consistent physical and sexual assaults, were deprived of food and drink, force-fed their own vomit and unnecessarily restrained in their beds.

The suit further describes the hospitals as unsanitary, crumbling and staffed by many foreign-trained doctors who failed to qualify to practice medicine in Canada.

“Canada ignored, remained wilfully blind and permitted harm to patient class members in order to avoid scrutiny and unwanted publicity about its inappropriate, common practices and procedures concerning Indian Hospitals,” says the suit.

Steve Cooper, a lawyer in Sherwood Park, Alta., said his firm and two others in Ontario are representing about 30 former patients in the lawsuit so far. He expects there will be more.

“These are large institutions that were operating for decades,” he said. “If the residential school system told us anything, it’s probably larger than we expect at the beginning, and we expect something in the range of 10,000 people.”

A statement of defence has yet to be filed and a judge must first approve the suit as a class action.

An email from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada said the government is working to resolve the matter out of court.

“Canada is committed to righting historical wrongs committed against Indigenous people,” said the email. “Canada believes that the best way to address outstanding issues and achieve reconciliation with Indigenous people is through negotiation and dialogue rather than litigation.”

Hardy said staff threatened her if she ever talked about the abuse. And she never told her parents.

She wouldn’t have been able to put her name on the lawsuit had they still been alive.

“I wouldn’t want them to know what happened to me,” she said.

Hardy underwent therapy and counselling for many years, and is still dealing with flashbacks, she said.

“I’m a grandmother now and I look at my children and I think of — with absolute horror — that children that age could be subjected to that. Thankfully, nowadays, things have changed.

“But there we were, so young, and we were at the mercy of these people.”

Chris Purdy, The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Lawyers file class-action lawsuit for former patients at Indian Hospitals

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