Inuk MP’s bold action was a critical move for Nunavut

The second in a three-part series on Peter Ittinuar leaving the NDP to join Pierre Trudeau’s Liberal government and the fallout he faced

Rookie MP Peter Ittinuar was laughed at when he asked the leader of his NDP party to support the creation of Nunavut.

Curiously, party leader Ed Broadbent described the Nunavut proposal as “cryptic.”

After that, the NDP MP’s relations with his leader got worse.

The problem arose when then-prime minister Pierre Trudeau decided to “bring Canada’s Constitution home” from the British Parliament, where it was embedded in a British statute called the Westminster Act.

This bold move was already blessed by Queen Elizabeth, who later came to Ottawa to assent to the new Constitution. It would take our Constitution out of the control of Britain through a new “made in Canada” document which would be introduced in the House of Commons as the Constitution Act in 1983.

Broadbent, who held the balance of power in the minority Parliament, publicly pledged his support to bring the Constitution home, throwing off the colonial chains in Britain.

Privately, he directed his MPs to vote unanimously for the repatriated Constitution. Every one of their 27 votes would count in a minority Parliament.

But for Peter Ittinuar, who represented the Nunatsiaq riding, there was a problem with the new draft Constitution Act. It had one fatal flaw — it made no mention of “Aboriginal rights” in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms embedded in the new Constitution.

For Ittinuar — although it was the right thing to do to throw off the remnants of colonialism and bring the Constitution home — this was a serious flaw.

He issued a news release saying he could not support repatriation as long as the Constitution did not recognize Aboriginal People’s rights, drawing the ire of his leader.

No doubt sensing the Nunatsiaq MP’s disquiet, Ittinuar had drawn the attention of the Liberal government at the highest levels.

He remembers one day when Trudeau confidant Marc Lalonde showed up at Ittinuar’s side as he walked past the eternal flame on Parliament Hill to return to his office. This was subtle encouragement to join the Liberal party.

And pressure was building in Ottawa, since working on Parliament Hill — “the Hill,” as it’s called — is like swimming in a goldfish bowl. Rumours swirled that the young MP was considering crossing the floor.

Important votes were coming up. The Liberals needed every vote they could muster to hold onto power.

Things came to a head in October 1982. Ittinuar was in his constituency office one morning — Building 917 in Frobisher Bay — when he answered the phone. It was a call from the prime minister’s office!

“‘Would you take a call from the Prime Minister?’ Well, I guess so,” Ittinuar recalled saying, trying to sound nonchalant — which he later described as a bad joke.

Pierre Trudeau: “I hear you’re coming to join us. We should do it tomorrow. We’ll send a plane for you.”

Peter Ittinuar: “Yes, it’s true.”

By that time, he had made up his mind and knew he would soon have to answer to the press.

“But no. You don’t need to send a plane. I will fly down commercial today,” Ittinuar recalled saying.

One thing to note.

These offers came with none of the usual blandishments — no offers to be a parliamentary secretary or committee chair, and certainly no promise of a cabinet post.

And Peter had not asked, because he did not want those distracting duties even though extra pay would have come with those duties.

The Hon. Dennis Patterson represented Nunavut in the Senate from 2008 to 2023. He was premier of the Northwest Territories from 1987 to 1991, and played a key role in the Nunavut land claim agreement.