The Mushuau Innu: Surviving Canada. (2004)

They are an Indian people who have suffered for many years. They were forced to live in unimaginable squalor. Houses not much better than cardboard boxes. No running water, no sewage disposal. Human waste tossed into the streets where children played in it and dogs ate it. As their sense of worth disintegrated, they engaged in a process of self-destruction. 90% of the community became alcoholic. Many of their children sniffed gas. Many more suffered from chronic disease. Stripped of culture, meaning, and hope, they killed themselves at a rate among the world's highest. But their tragedies did not occur in a third world country. They happened in a country with a reputation as one of the world's best places to live-Canada. They are the Innu. For thousands of years they roamed strong and free. They survived on one of the harshest lands on earth, the tundra of the great Labrador. After 50 years under white control in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, they struggle daily to survive Canada. In 1993, the Canadian Human Rights Commission released a report condemning the Federal government's treatment of the Innu. The report came to a shocking conclusion. It found the federal government had been in violation of the constitutional rights of the Innu for more than 50 years. The Mushuau Innu: Surviving Canada explores the devastating impact these constitutional violations have had on the Innu and their future as a people.