Aglukkaq says Aboriginal people “hunt everyday” rejects United Nations Rapporteur as “ill-informed and patronizing academic”

Indigenous people in Canada don’t face food security issues because “they hunt every day,” said Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq in the House of Commons Wednesday as she fended off opposition attacks fueled by the findings of the UN special rapporteur on food issues.

Olivier De Schutter, UN special rapporteur on the right to food, said in a press conference earlier in the day that he was “struck” by the “desperate situation” Indigenous people faced in the country.

De Schutter was in Canada for nearly two weeks to investigate food issues in the country. While he visited some First Nations communities, he did not make it up to Canada’s more remote communities where the cost of healthy foods remains a constant concern.