Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on March 22nd, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

That's about all the time we have, Ms. Crowder. Thank you very much.

We'll go to Mr. Rickford for our last question, for seven minutes.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

And thank you to the witnesses for coming today.

My name is Greg Rickford. I am the member of Parliament for the Kenora riding and parliamentary secretary for Indian and northern affairs.

First of all, I want to congratulate the commission on its important work. In fact the communities, by way of this important work on some impressive statistics, which you've indicated has resulted in high retention factors, young people returning from substantive training, and family formation in those communities.... It's a bit of a nuanced dimension to some of the ongoing housing issues that remain in first nations communities and that are in fact long-standing.

Mr. Saunders, I want to respectfully say that I'm not completely persuaded by your opinion with respect to the role of CMHC and the work that the Cree Regional Authority is doing. As you can imagine, I have some information and experience in these regards. In fact I was in Thunder Bay not too long ago, making some announcements for a number of first nations communities in the northern Ontario region. This is obviously a region where first nations communities have not had some of the processes and good fortune that by your own admission have benefited your communities greatly.

The overall response was favourable, to the extent that funding formulas through CMHC provided communities with more flexible models to meet the changing demands, as Mr. Kanatewat has pointed out, around things like home ownership and the ability of bands to have leasing and renting agreements. I recognize of course that this isn't a panacea, but it does represent a substantial change, if you will, in some of the intractable problems historically that the department and the bands have had.

I see that you're nodding; you may have some agreement with this.

My question might be more appropriate for the Cree Regional Authority. I was wondering if you could comment on any knowledge you have with respect to housing programs, and funding formulas specifically, as they relate to CMHC, which take us a little further down the road in terms of overall flexibility for housing programs in those communities.

[Richard Saunders]

Thank you. I think you're making some points that are quite important for us to focus on a little.

You really should talk to the Cree Regional Authority about the details--

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

I understand that.

[Richard Saunders]

--of the negotiations, and that's fair enough. You may wish to do that, and I would encourage you to do so.

At a more general level, though, I think part of our problem with CMHC, and indeed with many government agencies many times, is the tendency to not come to grips with the issues and to spend a lot of time, as I said earlier, getting ready to plan, to prepare, to think about, to develop a committee to look at it, rather than getting on with things. There's a little too much of that.

I'd like to be very clear that this is not a partisan matter in any way.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

It's not intended to be, Mr. Saunders.

[Richard Saunders]

We met with one of your minister's predecessors, Jane Stewart, and we told her, “Minister, you're impotent”. “Well,” she said, “maybe some of my colleagues are, but I'm certainly not”.

What we meant by that was that very frequently the political leadership—ministers, parliamentary secretaries—the government, regardless of who they are, Liberal, Conservative, whatever, make decisions, or appear to have made decisions, in good faith--

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

What I'm suggesting, Mr. Saunders, if I may--

[Richard Saunders]

--with the chiefs and so on, and it doesn't happen.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

What I'm suggesting.... And certainly partisan never even crept into my mind here; the question was actually fairly objective. The federal government's responsibility in these regards, and by way of extension, CMHC, is to look at hundreds and hundreds of first nations communities. It is a very dynamic situation, particularly with respect to the economic conditions, or lack thereof, that prevail in one region versus another. And they are diverse.

It appears as though this question might be better for the Cree Regional Authority. I know that the commission recommended that the Cree and Naskapi authorities implement some kind of a strategic plan that takes into account short- and long-term needs of the Cree and Naskapi communities with respect to housing. Without perhaps commentary on any specific political party or the leadership in the first nations communities, can you more pointedly highlight whether we have identified short- and long-term needs in these regards, with any specificities that might be relevant for our discussion today?

[Richard Saunders]

A couple of years ago the late Chief Billy Diamond, who was working on that, did produce a fairly substantial piece of research. I believe it was provided to the committee. I think at the time we were waiting for a French translation, and it was ultimately provided. Nonetheless, I think that's the basis of where the Cree are coming from at the moment.

Clearly more needs to be done, and I really would encourage you, and any other member who is able to facilitate more progress in this area, to talk to the Cree Regional Authority and look at specific things that can be done to move the process along, because the problem is stubborn. There's good will on all sides to solve it, and over a period of time no doubt resources can be found.

Your points about planning are well taken. I think the Crees have laid the groundwork through the late Chief Diamond's work. But I would encourage you to talk, either as a committee or as an individual member or as the department, to the CRA about the specifics.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Members, thank you very much for your questions.

To our guests, we appreciate your time and attention to this report, and of course to your ongoing work at the commission on behalf of the people you represent and work with.

I must say, members, if I can be so bold....

You've given us some insight, shared your insights and experience with the committee today. They are the kinds of communities that I would hope in the future the committee will have an opportunity to visit from time to time, so we can see for ourselves the kinds of experiences you have taken the time to share with us here this morning, even if it is so briefly.

Members, we're going to suspend the meeting momentarily while we switch our witnesses. It will give us a chance to say goodbye to our guests.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We'll resume, members.

I'll just do a quick check. Does anyone have to run right out at 15 minutes to the hour, or are we okay to give our guests the full hour? We're running about seven minutes over right now, but if you don't have to run right out at—

[A voice]

There's house duty.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Do some of you have house duty? Well, we'll see how we do. If we lose a couple of members, I don't think it's anything we have to sweat about.

We have with us today the representatives of the National Association of Friendship Centres, on their request. I'm glad we could work out the timing.

Mr. Jeffrey Cyr is going to lead off. Mr. Cyr is the executive director for the association. With him, of course, is Mr. Conrad Saulis, the policy director, as well as Tricia McGuire-Adams, who is the research manager on the Urban Aboriginal Knowledge Network.

Mr. Cyr, we're going to lead off with you. We have up to ten minutes for the opening presentation. If you want to split that with your colleagues, that's your choice.

Let's go ahead.

[Jeffrey Cyr, Executive Director, National Association of Friendship Centres]

Mr. Chair, thank you very much. I think I will monopolize the first ten minutes of it.

Allow me to begin with acknowledging the Algonquin Nation, who inhabited the land we are sitting on today.

My name is Jeffrey Cyr. I'm the recently appointed executive director of the National Association of Friendship Centres. This is my fourth week at the organization.

I am a proud member of the Métis Nation. I am originally from Manitoba. I am a father of six children, Métis and first nations. We are a product of the urban aboriginal experience.

I am joined today by Conrad Saulis, our policy director, from the Maliseet Nation, and Ms. Tricia McGuire-Adams, who is our Urban Aboriginal Knowledge Network research manager, of the Ojibway Nation.

I want to thank the standing committee for the invitation to present today. The NAFC is very encouraged to have this opportunity, and we hope our dialogue will support our organization's ability to improve its reach and capacities.

As I am sure you are aware, the National Association of Friendship Centres consists of 117 urban-based aboriginal service organizations across the country and in many of your ridings. We are working to meet the needs of Canada's urban aboriginal population, which according to the 2006 census comprised 54% of the total Canadian aboriginal population. That is an increase from 47% in 1996, so you can see the migration trends.

The NAFC's 117 centres and seven provincial and territorial associations are well known in aboriginal Canada as highly respected service centres that provide vital programs and services to aboriginal peoples of all ages. We have been around since approximately the 1950s.

We are also becoming better known with other populations in Canada, including members of Parliament and your committee.

I am very glad to be the NAFC's new executive director. My learning curve has been extremely steep in the last four weeks, which includes learning of the Friendship Centres' all-party caucus. I want to thank Jean Crowder, and formerly Chris Warkentin, for helping to establish and co-chair that. We have had successful lobby days on the Hill as a result.

I hope the all-party caucus will continue to be available to me and to the NAFC executive committee for continuing dialogue and support.

To my knowledge, this dialogue session with your committee today marks the first opportunity the national association has had to take an hour of your time. I thank you for that opportunity again.

Over the past two years, NAFC delegates have been meeting with members of Parliament in efforts to seek your support for increasing federal funding to our friendship centres through the aboriginal friendship centre program, which is our core funding program.

Each year the NAFC publishes a report outlining the state of the friendship centre movement. Data for the report is gathered from friendship centres' applications for core funding.

Our 2010 report demonstrates, once again most emphatically, that governments—federal, provincial, territorial, and municipal—rely on friendship centres to deliver key programs to urban aboriginal Canadians. However, local friendship centres face tremendous challenges in sustaining core operations with funding allocations that have not increased since 1996, have not had a cost of living increase since 1996.

On a personal level, I refer to that as structural impoverishment of the program.

Talking a bit about how friendship centres are relied upon across this country, in our last report we gathered the statistics from the friendship centres. There were 2.3 million points of contact at friendship centres across the country. Each time a client accesses a program or a service, it is referred to as a point of contact. It's been a marked increase since 2009. That's mostly because we're getting better at capturing the data over time.

The top three programs offered at friendship centres, as you can imagine, are health, family, and youth. Health comprises some 27% of all programs, family 14%, and youth 14%. This pattern has been consistent at least over the last three years.

In 2010-11, friendship centres will offer more than 1,264 programs across the country. In my opinion, it is the pre-eminent national urban aboriginal service provider.

Just to give you a snapshot of how the funding works for our organization, combined federal-provincial-territorial funds to friendship centres is over $100 million a year. Own-source revenue for friendship centres is about $3.8 million a year, and cities, towns, and other funders provide about $4.1 million per year.

This is the key point of our presentation today to you: these tremendous challenges and what they mean in operating costs for us. The annual aboriginal friendship centre allocation covers less than 40% of the annual cost of operating local friendship centres. Local friendship centres cost approximately $325,000 a year in core funding to run. That's averaged across the country.

We receive approximately, on average, $140,000 per year to do that, and for the last 16 years the friendship centres have continually put in applications to the federal government for core funding based on what we actually need to do the job. What we receive is less than half that. In essence, current allocations do not meet core funding costs, and this puts a lot of strain on program centres, services, and people.

The average friendship centre executive director's salary is $56,000 per year. The average salary in comparable positions in other non-profit organizations is at least $10,000 higher. And if the friendship centre executive directors are making $56,000 on average, then their staff are making considerably less.

“The State of the Friendship Centre Movement”, our report, clearly demonstrates that governments rely on friendship centres to deliver key programs to urban aboriginal Canadians, one of the fastest-growing populations in the country. The report also shows that local friendship centres face tremendous challenges due to the insufficient amount of funding to run those centres.

There is a need to ensure that friendship centres can address challenges and continue delivering for governments. Increased funding to local friendship centres needs to come through an increased budget for the aboriginal friendship centres program, which is now run through the Department of Canadian Heritage.

As a parliamentary standing committee, your efforts are crucial to helping us achieve budget enhancements for friendship centres. It enhances our ability to leverage funding from municipal, provincial, and other sources.

This is the main body of the presentation. I just want to add that the National Association of Friendship Centres here in Ottawa and my staff were involved in a lot of other initiatives as well. We work with the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development on the urban aboriginal knowledge network. This is a research effort on urban aboriginal needs that takes the community's direction on where research needs to happen. We're also involved in other initiatives, such as Elections Canada's encouraging aboriginal people to vote. So we work across a spectrum of policy and other issues at the national association.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Cyr, and congratulations on your new post. I'm sure that learning curve will continue to escalate as the weeks go, as it generally does.

Let's go to our first round of questions. We're going to lead off with Mr. Bagnell.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you all for coming. It's a great pleasure for me to have you here. I was a board member for many years at Skookum Jim Friendship Centre, the treasurer and the president. So you've always had an ally here and I've always pushed for your budget increases. In fact, if it isn't in today's budget, the media will hear about it again, and I'll be encouraging the committee to make a motion to that effect.

I'm just wondering if society hasn't really caught up to the democratic trends. I'm talking about large structural issues. Does it not seem a little bizarre that we have a $10-billion Indian Affairs budget and yet 54% of aboriginal people live in urban centres, not on reserve? If you took all governments combined, the figure you gave is less than 1% of $10 billion for 54% of first nations people and a few employees at Heritage Canada, compared with the 5,000 at Indian Affairs.

Doesn't it seem that we have to catch up to change that proportion dramatically to help urban aboriginal people?

[Jeffrey Cyr]

I wholeheartedly agree. The demographic trends have been shifting pretty rapidly in the last decade and a half. This isn't a trend limited to Canada; it's around the world. Migration to urban centres is an issue for all countries, and in particular it's an issue for aboriginal people, because what's been referred to sometimes as the urban churn--coming from a rural and remote or reserve community into an urban setting, taking people out of their cultural base--causes a lot of chaos in the urban environment for different aboriginal people.

I don't think that necessarily the policy thinking has caught up with the demographic reality, as you pointed out, both in a funding sense and actually in terms of focusing the policy agenda on where the issues are. I've met with some of my colleagues at the Assembly of First Nations and talked with some of my colleagues at the Métis National Council, and we agree that the urban policy issue is a key one and we are going to try to work together on that more and more. We have a very good working relationship with them. We are a service provider, as friendship centres, and we'd like to see whatever government of the day pay more attention to that. There's a lot of good work that can be done.

We have to remember that friendship centres are run by volunteer boards, by people putting in their own time. I sat on the board of the local Odawa Friendship Centre for two years as treasurer before I took this post. It was like a second full-time job. Many volunteers are working in these friendship centres.

So yes, I agree, we do need to shift our policy focus, or at least get more creative about our policy focus and how we're going to do that.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I have to admit that I don't have experience in centres across the country, but from what I've seen, and as you've said, you're a service provider and in fact a very cost-effective and efficient service provider. I would suggest that you provide services to some extent on the mandates of municipal, federal, provincial, and territorial governments much more efficiently than other alternatives those governments might have. In the long run, in the prevention of down-the-stream social problems, you actually save those governments money, considering the tiny amount of money that you actually get. Would you agree with that?

[Jeffrey Cyr]

Absolutely. If I return to the long-term funding of the AFCP, it hasn't received any funding increase since 1996, and even the issue around 1996 was that it was cut back dramatically at that point. Essentially, it's received an ongoing deficit of the cost of living per year: 1.4%, 2.2%...it depends on which year it is. So what's happened at the friendship centre level is they've cut back resources continually. They've taken it out of salaries of our people working there and they've put it into the programs and services. They are very good at running these programs and services in a cost-effective manner--extremely good--and these programs are very successful by any measure.

My argument would be that it would be good business practice for government to work with friendship centres in the delivery of programs and services to reach urban aboriginal Canadians across the spectrum. I see friendship centres as a spectrum of services.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Is Canadian Heritage the best department for you to be in?

[Jeffrey Cyr]

It's a tough question. The first part of my answer would be that the best department would be the one that's funding us properly. Let's put it like that. It doesn't matter where it's housed. If it was in the Department of Transport and funded properly, that would be different.

There are probably synergies with other departments that are better suited, whether that's in something like the Department of Indian Affairs or somewhere else. If there are other policy initiatives going on, then I think we're open. But the question for us is the funding of the core program itself. That's where I'd leave that response.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

So my understanding is your number one priority is to catch up on the core funding. Are there other programs that you've successfully run that have subsequently been cut or not extended, or eliminated, or not given a cost of living improvement, that are major parts of your service delivery?