The night that private member’s Bill 618 was defeated on the floor of the Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly, Tristen Durocher had a dream.
The Saskatchewan Strategy for Suicide Prevention Act would have required the Saskatchewan Health Authority to establish a provincial strategy for suicide prevention that recognizes that suicide is not just a mental health issue, but a public health issue as well.
The bill was defeated on June 19 with 44 Saskatchewan Party MLAs voting against the bill and two abstaining.
In northwest Saskatchewan, where Durocher’s hometown of Buffalo Narrows is located, the average suicide rate per 100,000 in 2018 was 27.9, compared to the provincial average of 18.7. The national average in 2018 was 10.3 per 100,000.
Durocher said he was sickened and struck speechless by the bill’s defeat and he knew he needed to do something about it.
“I just had a dream I was walking down the road with a bunch of my friends,” said the 24-year-old man. “We had a teepee camp on the lawn of the Legislative Assembly. I immediately woke up out of bed, grabbed a pen on my nightstand and a piece of paper, and I wrote exactly this: I will walk from La Ronge to Regina.”
Suicide prevention resources nearly don’t exist in Saskatchewan and yet government officials voted unanimously to not address the issue, he said.
The April release of the government’s Pillars for Life suicide prevention plan has been widely criticized by health officials, including Rebecca Rackow, director of advocacy research and public policy development for the Canadian Mental Health Association.
“The unfortunate thing is that they didn't collaborate with any community-based organizations such as ourselves when they created this,” she said. “Some of us who get a lot of calls from people with lived experience or family members didn't have any input into that at all.”
This government’s decision against Bill 618 is lethal and it is criminal negligence, Durocher said.
Following his arrival in Regina, Durocher has also decided to go on a hunger strike on the Legislature lawn until a new suicide prevention bill is passed that will actually save lives.
Things changed as soon as he had made these decisions to act on government indifference, he said.
“All of that anger lifted. All of my rage lifted and all of my anxiety about the sick indifference of our people in the locus of power lifted, and I knew something powerful had begun.”
Durocher left La Ronge with his friend, Chris Merasty from Green Lake, and started their 639-kilometre journey on July 2.
Through the blisters and tired feet, Durocher carries with him the faces of people who have died by suicide. Following his decision to walk, Durocher put a call out on Facebook for people to send him pictures of loved ones who had died by suicide. Some families sent him pictures of five people.
For a province rich in resources with money galore, this is unacceptable, Durocher said.
“We can’t even fund services that are aiming to save the lives of our most vulnerable. That is beyond horrific.”
Doyle Vermette, who put forth Bill 618, said this is not a partisan issue and that it should be treated as a health and safety concern for the entire province.
Consultation with non-government organizations, everyone from families to school division leaders to First Nation leaders, was a big proponent of the bill, said the Cumberland MLA.
“We have a crisis going on, especially with young indigenous girls and boys. Looking at that we definitely tried to raise awareness...There's too many deaths and we go to too many funerals, me and my colleague from Athabasca, Buckley Belanger. We've been to too many and it impacts everyone.”
Durocher called him the Saturday following the bill’s defeat, Vermette said, and they talked for some time.
“He was pretty upset. Very emotional. He knew I was tired, exhausted. I was angry. And he said, ‘you know what, I'm not going to stand it. I've had enough’...He's so dedicated and so he's going to do it.”
Actions speak louder than words, Vermette said, and while Durocher is walking the talk, the government’s inaction is speaking volumes.
Robert St. Pierre, the mayor of La Loche, knew about trauma and death even before his town made national news due to the worst school shooting in Canadian history. It isn’t just suicide that plagues Saskatchewan’s north. It’s everything: generational trauma, colonization, residential schools, government dependency, drug addiction, domestic violence and more, he said.
“We have a lot of factors that contribute to the low self-esteem in individuals, so to work through those you need to have somebody qualified and capable in our language.”
The community is used to having teachers, RCMP officers, and health professionals come and go with no real trust built within the community, St. Pierre said. If you’re going to have supports in the community, you need people willing to stay, he said.
Durocher comes from a family rich in educational professionals and the importance of education was instilled in him at a young age. Low retention rates of teachers at northern schools is a detriment in itself to young people.
“Students step into the educational space and they don't see themselves reflected. What they get are the kind of colonized city teachers who are completely out of touch with their reality. And that's supposed to be a source of trusted information.”
Some wonderful and brilliant teachers have come to teach at northern schools, Durocher said, but they don’t stay.
While Durocher continues to move closer to Regina, anything that can be done to bring awareness about the lack of mental health supports in their communities is something that is needed, St. Pierre said.
The support for Durocher and his journey has been overwhelming, he said. Days following his decision to walk was filled with phone calls to people across the province offering support in any way they could. Now that he is on the road, people are stopping and giving him everything from food, to bug spray and sunscreen, to shoes. The support is coming from a genuine place of suicide prevention going beyond politics.
“Trying to stop more children from burying themselves is something that should be beyond politics, beyond who people voted for, beyond race, beyond class, beyond gender. It should just be a human need and desire to give our young ones a world where they are safe, where they belong, and where they're not at risk of giving up.”
There is no set date for when Durocher will arrive in Regina. He will be making stops in Prince Albert and Saskatoon to rest. The Saskatoon to Regina leg of his journey will be the longest, he said, so he wants to be prepared for the road ahead.
