In this episode, I sit down with former BC Green Party MP Dallas Jones to discuss his journey to becoming a voice for Indigenous Peoples. He talks about how he stood up for the truth and accountability in public life, and the challenges he faced in order to speak the truth.
00:00:00.000I was expelled from the caucus by a press release that said that I was mocking child sex abuse victims and that I was giving support to pedophiles.
00:00:09.740Wow, Dallas. Well, I just got to I have to thank you so much for providing your testimony as to what got you through that and to that point.
00:00:20.260And I know it can. Two years ago, I was doing speaking to her on the island and I as well hadn't hardly used social media a whole lot.
00:00:31.060And the report from the RCMP came out regarding the missing and murdered women on the government's website, proving that 86 percent of the murders had actually happened within their community themselves.
00:00:44.680You know, they were killing each other. And so I had said, you know what? Thank goodness.
00:00:51.220The murdered and missing women's case, you know, the report is out and as well, the graves are empty.
00:00:57.720Well, I didn't think anything else. It was like 11 o'clock at night. I was still working.
00:01:01.820Two weeks later, I'm on this trip on the island heading into Port Alberni and the chief starts claiming that, you know, I'm banned from Port Alberni and I went anyways.
00:01:12.280And we did have a meeting, even though it got shut down. But the vitriol online and what comes after that.
00:01:19.680But it is because of us sticking it out and people like Professor Frances Whittowson and you've got Nina Green doing investigations.
00:01:28.880And there is a former Judge Giesbrecht who's writing on this issue all the time where I was years ago on this issue and speaking this, the truth and the facts about this and saying that this was a fraud.
00:01:42.280They're extorting money and there's an agenda.
00:01:45.280It's coming from the United Nations, the UNDRIP, United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, UNDRIP in BC.
00:01:55.740And so it's progressed as the light of truth gets exposed on them.
00:02:00.740I feel like they feel like their time is pressing in.
00:02:04.000So they've got to move more quickly forward.
00:02:06.080And if David, if the likes of David Evie, and I'm going to include John Rustad in this, if they hadn't been undergirding this and facilitating it, it would never have gotten to this point.
00:02:17.400And then, you know, as another matter to support the fact that we were speaking the truth all the time, that they're exploiting the Indians for their own personal gain to steal our property and to steal our natural resources.
00:02:35.760And the other report has now come out from the RCMP that was done between 1995 and 2003.
00:02:43.580There was an eight-year investigation and it was supposed to be on these so-called sexual abuse, like you say, that you're, you know, supporting pedophiles and sexual abusers.
00:02:53.620Well, the report came out and said no.
00:02:55.020So, you know, what was it, 150,000 children across the country had attended the schools.
00:03:02.080And I think there was 14 convictions consisting of Natives themselves, Indians themselves.
00:03:08.700And so their whole scenario is falling apart.
00:03:30.960And our viewers thank you for that because it has to come from all of these different directions because I believe in the end truth is going to prevail.
00:03:39.140We are going to need to overturn this.
00:03:42.260And so as we move forward, you know, having been in law, journalism and politics, all of those things I'd imagine have shaped your perspective on the truth and accountability in public life.
00:03:57.720But as party leadership had demanded you delete those tweets and you just were adamant that you were not going to accommodate them in those ways, we can see that that must have been a really difficult decision to make.
00:04:16.880Do you have any regret over it or are you glad that you stood your ground and where's the direction that you're now going from here?