Roberta Jamieson

Roberta L. Jamieson, C.M. is a Canadian lawyer and First Nations activist. She was the first Aboriginal woman ever to earn a law degree in Canada, the first non-Parliamentarian to be appointed an ex officio member of a House of Commons committee, and the first woman appointed as Ontario Ombudsman.

History

Jamieson is a member of the Six Nations of the Grand River. She was educated at McGill University and the University of Western Ontario, graduating with a law degree in 1976. She worked primarily as a policy advisor in government bodies, including as a commissioner on the Indian Commission of Ontario from 1985 to 1989 and as Ontario's provincial ombudsman from 1989 to 1999.^[1]

Jamieson was the first non-Parliamentarian to be appointed an ex officio member of a special House of Commons committee on Indian self-government.^[1]

Jamieson has also been recognized for her work in developing and promoting alternative dispute resolution methods. She received the Goodman Fellowship from the University of Toronto in 1991, and the international Association for Conflict Resolution's Mary Parker Follet Award in 1992. She was awarded 13 April 1994 the Order of Canada and invested on 1 March 1995 as a Member of the Order of Canada.^[2][3]

She was a candidate for the leadership of the Assembly of First Nations at their 2003 leadership convention, losing to Phil Fontaine but finishing ahead of incumbent chief Matthew Coon Come.

Jamieson was awarded a National Aboriginal Achievement Award in 1998 for her achievement in law and justice.^[1] She was subsequently named president and chief executive officer of the award's parent organization, the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation, in 2004.^[4]

References