Born in N. Battleford, Saskatchewan (1945), member of the Gordon First Nation in Saskatchewan and a first generation Chinese Canadian, the Honorable Dr. Lillian Eva Quan Dyck is well-known for her extensive work in the senate on Missing & Murdered Aboriginal Women. She was the first female First Nations senator and first Canadian born Chinese senator.

She resides in Saskatoon Saskatchewan and is the proud mother of Nathan David Dyck.

She earned her Bachelor of Arts, 1966, Honors, 1968; Master of Science in Biochemistry, 1970, Ph.D. in Biological Psychiatry in 1981, all from the University of Saskatchewan. She was conferred a Doctor of Letters, Honoris Causa by Cape Breton University in 2007 and a Doctor of Laws, Honoris causa from Trent University in 2022.

She has been recognized in a number of ways, such as: A National Aboriginal Achievement Award for Science & Technology in 1999; A YWCA Woman of Distinction Award for Science, Technology & the Environment in 2003; an Atlantic Human Rights Center Award in 2019; the YWCA Saskatoon Women of Distinction Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019, and most recently was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Canada. She has been presented four eagle feathers by the Indigenous community.

She was the inspiration for the award winning play, Café Daughter (2011), written my Kenneth T Willliams and made into an award winning film (2023) directed by Shelley Niro.

Former Senator Dyck was a Full Professor without term in the Neuropsychiatry Research Unit, Department of Psychiatry and Associate Dean, College of Graduate Studies & Research at the University of Saskatchewan.

In 2005, she was recommended to the senate by the Rt. Hon. Paul Martin. She served as Deputy Chair (2011-2015) and Chair (2015-2019) of the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples. Her priority area in the senate was the tragedy of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls.

Hon Dr Lillian Dyck was able to amend the criminal code to better protect women - especially Aboriginal women and other vulnerable persons - from intimate partner violence, violence and abuse. She also played a key role in ensuring that the federal government amended the Indian Act to remove all discrimination against Indian (First Nation) women whose Indian (First Nation) status was unfairly taken away from them simply because they married non-Indian men.

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