APTN News InFocus

In this episode of InFocus: Less than five per cent of the population in Canada is Indigenous, yet Indigenous men make up 28 per cent of those behind bar, Indigenous women 43 per cent and Indigenous youth 46 per cent.

And while incarceration rates are on the decline for the general population, they’re trending upwards for Indigenous people.

In this episode of InFocus: Clint Davis, the chair of the Labrador Capital Strategy Trust (LCST) says the issues facing Indigenous communities run so deep Ottawa alone will not be able to solve them. Davis says private investment will be needed too, if the economic outlook for Indigenous people is going to change.

But not everyone agreed with Davis who joined analyst Pam Palmater, Joseph Quesnel on InFocus to talk about the federal budget that was delivered Tuesday in Ottawa.

In this episode of InFocus: The phenomenon of hoarding skeletal remains and cultural artifacts of Inuit, Metis and First Nations by private collectors and institutions, flies in the face of reconciliation, say Indigenous leaders.

Many of the items are stolen from graves and sacred sites. Others are found when land is disturbed during construction or other work being done.

It’s a scandal that has rocked the Liberal government for the past month.

Canada’s first Indigenous attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould quit cabinet over what she says was pressure from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to do favors for SNC-Lavalin, an engineering giant based in vote-rich Quebec that is facing bribery, fraud and corruption charges.

In this episode we put Jody Wilson-Raybould and the SNC-Lavalin scandal InFocus.

Land acknowledgements have been growing in popularity in the past 10 years to the point they’re now at most events or gatherings.

But while they’re common, some question if they’re useful in reconciliation or simply superficial platitudes meant to give the illusion of honour and respect for Indigenous land and nations. That’s on this episode of InFocus.

With hunting and harvesting rights being attacked, and the cost of food going up, how are First Nation, Metis and Inuit people supposed to get back to traditional eating, or make healthy food choices on a tight budget?

In this episode of InFocus with Host Melissa Ridgen, we looked at the move towards country food including plants and animals consumed in a region by the people Indigenous to it.

From mould to overcrowding, we're putting the housing crisis on First Nations InFocus.

Cat Lake First Nation in northern Ontario has declared a state of emergency related to Jordan’s Principle due to mold in most homes in the community.

According to officials in the community, three children have been medevacked out of the community over the past two weeks because of illnesses.

This episode of InFocus was the last in a three-part series putting the child welfare system under the microscope.

Natasha Reimer spent her entire life bounced from foster home to foster home when she was apprehended as a young girl from an unsafe home.

While the system kept her separated from a mother who couldn’t parent, it also robbed her of a relationship with her seven younger siblings, who were also raised in care.

On the second edition of a three-part series about child and family services (CFS) on InFocus, Host Melissa Ridgen talks with parents who found themselves targets of CFS agencies and how they beat or continue to fight they system.

Stacy Owl lost her five children two years ago on the word of a tipster whom she had never met.

A woman had called CFS accusing Owl of being a “crackhead” and running a meth lab.

High apprehension rate makes families distrust child and family services (CFS) agencies.

On this first of a three-part series on CFS, Host Melissa Ridgen talked to a child advocate and a former CFS worker who shed light on how this industry works and why Indigenous families are targeted.