For a government that brags about how fast it moves when it comes to nation-building projects, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberals have been slow to offer an apology for the RCMP’s spying on Indigenous leaders in the 1960s and 1970s.

It has been more than a week since many Canadians learned — thanks to reporting by a team of CBC journalists — how extensively the RCMP kept tabs on hundreds of Indigenous activists 50 years ago.

John Amagoalik, considered the “Father of Nunavut,” and Tagak Curley, another key figure in the creation of Nunavut, are among the names that show up in 6,000 pages of documents CBC obtained by using Canada’s access to information law.

In the late 1960s, the RCMP’s Native Extremism Section started keeping tabs on First Nations, Métis and Inuit activists and organizations, looking for the influence of radical groups.

It started with the National Indian Brotherhood, the forerunner to the Assembly of First Nations. But it later extended to Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, founded in 1971, the predecessor of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, now the national voice for Inuit.

In some cases, it sounds like the Mounties weren’t necessarily very good at the cloak-and-dagger stuff. Curley, then the president of Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, told Nunatsiaq News this week he was “very conscious” he was under surveillance, especially at airports.

Carney last week called the spying “reprehensible” and said a formal apology is in order.

RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme also expressed his “sincere regret” on behalf of the national police force.

So where is the apology? With Carney and Duheme in agreement, it shouldn’t take long.

Keep in mind this is not news to the government. Most Canadians found out about it through CBC’s in-depth reporting. But the government has known for years this story would break, because it fought the CBC in court over whether the documents should be released. Curley even asked the RCMP about it point blank in the 1980s, as an MLA in the legislature.

“They could not deny it,” he recalls of the exchange.

Carney’s recent work overseas, shoring up support with allies and forging new trade deals with India and China, is vitally important to Canada at the moment.

But it would also be appropriate for the prime minister to pause his jet-setting long enough to formally apologize for this mistake the government made decades ago.

Naturally, the question of compensation has surfaced. But how do you put a dollar figure on the invasion of someone’s privacy and violation of their human rights based on their race?

There should be some financial compensation for the egregious overstepping by the RCMP and its political masters. Maybe the compensation shouldn’t be made directly to the people who were spied on, but instead perhaps lump sum payments to Indigenous organizations to help them further their work.

The model the government used to give $45 million to Makivvik Corp., as part of its apology for the killing of sled dogs in Nunavik in the 1950s and 1960s, could work.

The spy story is one more sad episode in Canada’s treatment of Indigenous Peoples.

Thanks to the CBC, both Canadians and their government have been forced to acknowledge the truth and extent of the spying. Now, it’s necessary to atone for it.