The Corporation of Catholic Entities Party to the Indian Residential School Settlement (CCEPIRSS) was created in April 2006 under the Non-Profit Corporations Act, 1995 (Saskatchewan), as a temporary body. It was constituted at the request of the Government of Canada and its purpose was to represent the Catholic entities that had been involved in the administration of residential schools. (Unlike the other denominations that had operated residential schools, the Catholic Church lacks a single national body that oversees its churches, religious orders, and affiliated organizations.) Canada believed that a single legal and administrative body would facilitate its negotiations with the Catholic entities leading up to the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (2006), and the latter’s implementation of the Agreement. CCEPIRSS consisted of forty-eight Catholic entities, primarily religious orders, but also a few dioceses. After the Settlement Agreement had been approved, CCEPIRSS was responsible for managing the Catholic entities’ obligations under the Agreement, namely its financial and in-kind obligations, including its fundraising campaign.

In 2013, the Government of Canada made a Request for Direction seeking the Court’s guidance on the terms set out in the Settlement Agreement relating to the administration costs claimed by the CCEPIRSS. In 2015 CCEPIRSS took the Government of Canada to court (Fontaine v Saskatchewan (Attorney General), 205 SKQB 220) claiming to have come to a new Settlement Agreement with Canada, where, in return for $1.2 million, CCEPIRSS was released from all remaining obligations under the original Settlement Agreement, including the $21 million shortfall in its fundraising campaign. CCEPIRSS won the case and was absolved from any further financial or legal obligations under the 2006 Agreement. CCEPIRSS returned monies that exceeded those required in the new settlement to the Catholic entities, and dissolved in April 2016.