In 2011, Penashue became the first Innu from Labrador to be elected to the House of Commons, and the first Innu cabinet minister. He was named minister of intergovernmental affairs in Stephen Harper’s Conservative government.

Throughout his personal and professional lives, Penashue has encountered plenty of examples of discrimination or systemic racism in health care, policing, corrections and other institutions.

It shows itself in the care that Indigenous people receive — or, rather, that they do not receive. In the responses they receive when they ask for help, the services they lack, the stereotypes in which they are cast.

Source: Hateful words, diminished services: How racism rears its head for N.L.’s Indigenous people | CBC News