New Brunswick systemic racism commissioner finds two common complaints so far

Not yet half-way through her year-long look at racism in the province, New Brunswick's commissioner on systemic racism says two main complaints have emerged. 

Manju Varma said she's already conducted 30 private consultations, and so far, the two most common issues are an inability to find work and "overt racism" that children are experiencing in schools. 

She said many people complain about not finding work in their field, or having to take jobs below their experience or skill level. 

Varma was appointed by the province to the position in September. Her year-long task is to look at systemic racism in New Brunswick and report back to the government with recommendations on how to fix identified problems.  

She said her report is due to be given to government in October, and she is expected to include recommendations to address systemic racism in areas such as health care, education, social development, housing, employment and criminal justice.

Varma told Saint John councillors that she hopes to wrap up submissions by the end of May, which will give her and her staff time to prepare the final report. 

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At Tuesday night's virtual council meeting, Varma invited the City of Saint John to send her team an official submission. She told councillors that she had just entered into a partnership with Moncton a couple of hours earlier. 

While she didn't go into detail about the agreement, she said she was "going into partnership with them to do consultations at their city level." 

Coun. David Hickey asked what that would look like and whether Saint John could do the same. 

Varma said she doesn't have enough time for similar partnerships with other communities.

"I'm working with one university, one community college, one municipality, because it's really a matter of time," she said.  "We've been given one year to to fulfil this mandate of seven different departments and several different racialized groups, including our Indigenous communities."

If the commission were to be made permanent, however, Varma said there could be "opportunities for cities to have those partnerships and I would certainly encourage it as well." She drew similarities to the permanent commissions such as those for official languages and privacy.

When asked by a councillor for advice for the city on how to deal with racism, Varma repeated a message she gave last week, in response to the so-called freedom protests. She said doing nothing to condemn acts of racism is in itself racist.

She told councillors there are racists at one end of the spectrum and anti-racism activists on the other. She said there should be no neutral ground in the middle. 

"That comfortable space — that space of neutrality — doesn't exist," she said. 

"There is no space for silence anymore."