Ottawa to stop approving travel for Indigenous mental health program

Ottawa to stop approving travel for Indigenous mental health program Ollie Williams Sunday July 26, 2026 at 6:01am MT Indigenous services minister Mandy Gull-Masty, centre, in a photo published by her office. Share The federal government says a key mental health program will no longer cover travel for counsellors to visit residents in isolated communities – or vice versa. Earlier this week, Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) said funding delays were to blame for disruption to a counselling program on which some northerners rely. The program is called the Indian Residential Schools Resolution Health Support Program. According to ISC, it is part of a broader package of supports named the Trauma-Informed Health and Cultural Support Program. Survivors of residential schools and their families can use the program to access mental health counselling. In recent weeks, some said their counselling had stopped because the federal government had placed the program on hold. In its initial statement to reporters, ISC said the program would continue, gave little detail about the funding delays, and made no mention of any changes to the supports northerners can receive. Advertisement. Advertisement. But an email sent to mental health workers on Friday by ISC’s director general for the North, Heather MacPhail, makes clear that the delays have lasted for months and caused significant disruption, while a major change has been introduced with immediate effect. $630 million announced in March to extend a suite of mental health supports didn’t actually arrive until the end of June, MacPhail wrote, saying this had caused “disruption in the department’s ability to pay invoices in a timely fashion.” Multiple mental health workers contacted Cabin Radio over the past week to assert that despite ISC’s Monday insistence it was now “approving invoices within service standards,” they had not been paid for months and had been told expenses related to new clients would not be reimbursed. Two people said they were continuing to see clients but considered themselves “volunteers” as they felt unable to turn people away who had recently started counselling but whose costs were now not covered by ISC. Advertisement. Advertisement. In her Friday email, MacPhail said ISC recognized “the challenge that this presented for providers of important mental health services” but insisted invoices are now being processed and payments sent. No more travel While mental health workers who…