Question Period Note: Prairie Green Landfill

•The deaths of Indigenous women in Winnipeg, and elsewhere in Canada, are heartbreaking and a painful reminder of the national crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQI+ people.

•The Prairie Green Landfill Feasibility Study Report, completed in May, concludes that a search of the landfill is feasible.

•$740,000 is being made available to the Long Plain First Nation to examine, in detail, the proposed activities – such as personnel training, construction of facilities, equipment procurement, and hazardous, toxic, and biohazardous waste management – that are necessary to launch and conduct any potential search.

•Our priority remains to make sure work is done in a respectful, culturally-sensitive and trauma-informed manner, with principal consideration given to the needs of families.

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If pressed on what the federal government will do next

• The best possible way forward in respect of potentially launching and conducting a search of the Prairie Green Landfill would be for families, First Nation leadership, and the federal and provincial governments to work together.

• We will not take any action without first understanding the needs and objectives of the other parties concerned, principally, the families of victims and other jurisdictions.

• Discussions with the newly elected Government of Manitoba will begin as soon as possible to work toward an approach and achieve an outcome that will bring some closure for the families and community members of Long Plain First Nation.