SASKATOON – The Commission on First Nations and Métis Peoples and Justice Reform will hold a news conference in Saskatoon on Thursday, November 20 to release its third interim report. The conference will take place in the Commission’s boardroom at 802-119 Fourth Avenue South at 11:00 a.m.

The document will focus on several areas including a strategy for implementation of recommendations that this Commission will present. Commission chair Willie Littlechild says the need to have a plan to deal with recommendations is vital.

"From the outset we recognized that if this Commission is to be successful we have to develop a mechanism to ensure that our recommendations will be taken seriously," Littlechild said. "To simply have recommendations presented without a plan for their implementation would not be acceptable."

The Justice Reform Commission has looked at previous commissions, including the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples and the Linn Reports and determined that the limited success of these bodies was likely due to the fact that an implementation strategy was missing.

"Over the years many Commissions have come and gone and hundreds of recommendations have been delivered but we haven’t seen much of an improvement in the lives of First Nations and Métis people," Littlechild added. "We are determined to see that our recommendations are not ignored."

As well as an implementation plan, this report will review the eight critical areas the Commission has been focussing on, report on previous recommendations, and present an analysis of Restorative Justice.

The Justice Reform Commission was established in November 2001 and will conclude its work in March 2004. The final report will be released in mid-March 2004.