Senator plans to revive bill to outlaw forced sterilization

A senator who has sponsored a bill to make forced or coerced sterilization a criminal offence in Canada says 12,000 cases of the procedure have been counted by her office, but she believes the actual number is much higher.

Sen. Yvonne Boyer, from Ontario, made the remarks in her keynote address March 7 on the first day of a national gathering of survivors of coerced and forced sterilization, hosted by the non-profit group The Survivors Circle for Reproductive Justice.

“I’ve done speaking events all across Canada, and people are absolutely shocked to learn that this is still happening in Canada,” Boyer said in her speech.

The Survivors Circle held workshops from March 7 to 9 in Gatineau, Que., to provide support and healing for participants. Survivors were also given the opportunity to tell their stories.

Approximately 400 people came to the gathering from as far away as Rankin Inlet and Fort Smith, N.W.T. Some also attended virtually.

Boyer has been working since 2015 to bring awareness of the issue of forced and coerced sterilization to the Canadian public. In March 2018, she was appointed to the Senate by prime minister Justin Trudeau.

The Survivors Circle was formed in the wake of a 2021-22 investigation by the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights into forced and coerced sterilization of Indigenous people in Canada. The investigation was spearheaded by Boyer.

Going back to the 1930s and up until the 1970s, Alberta and British Columbia had laws requiring sterilization of those who were considered to be “mentally defective,” the first of two reports produced by the Senate Human Rights Committee states.

While not law in other jurisdictions, the practice of forced or coerced sterilization of Indigenous women continued in federally operated “Indian hospitals,” according to research cited in the report. For a 10-year period until the early 1970s, 1,150 Indigenous women were sterilized in these hospitals.

“It was assumed that the eugenics-inspired practice had stopped with the changes to legislation in the 1970s,” the report said.

“However, the committee learned that it still persists despite legislative changes and significant media attention.”

There were 117 recorded sterilizations on Baffin Island from 1970 to 1975, according to research by Dr. Karen Stote in her book An Act of Genocide: Colonialism and the Sterilization of Aborginal Women, which is included in the Senate report.

The Senate committee also learned cases of forced or coerced sterilization continued to be reported as recently as 2018.

“[The topic] received national media attention and shock and disbelief from my colleagues in the Senate who thought that it was just a thing of the past,” Boyer said.

“I introduced the topic of modern day … sterilization to Canada and indeed, the world.”

Over the years, she said, many women and men have contacted her about the issue.

Boyer introduced Bill S-250, An Act to Amend the Criminal Code Sterilization Procedures, in June 2022. It would make forced sterilization an offence under the Criminal Code.

The bill made its way to the House of Commons in October 2024 for review. The bill’s progress stopped there with the prorogation of Parliament in January and a possibly imminent federal election.

“[The bill] isn’t dead, it’s only been delayed,” Boyer said, adding she intends to re-introduce the legislation at the earliest opportunity.

A survivor registry and healing fund support registry were also available at the gathering. Thirty-two people had added their names and contact details to the handwritten registry as of March 7.

“Forced sterilization is a form of genocide that goes to the most basic, primal, basic human right,” said Harmony Redfern, executive director for the Survivor’s Circle, during the gathering.

“There’s no greater way to cause harm in the form of genocide against a nation or many nations, than to sever that ability within the nation to reproduce.”