Romeo Saganash

[The Budget, April 14th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his speech, which was very apropos.

We know that living conditions in indigenous communities are deplorable and are comparable to third-world living conditions and even worse in some cases. For example, we have been discussing Attawapiskat for a few days.

When I look at the budget, housing is one of the issues that concerns me the most when it comes to the living conditions in indigenous communities.

The budget leaves an impression on everyone because of the big numbers. I think that many people were surprised at the money to be allocated to indigenous peoples over the next five years, starting in the third year in some cases.

I would just like to give this example: $554 million is set aside for on-reserve housing, including $416 million over two years that will flow through Indigenous and Northern Affairs.

If we divide up this money among the 630 indigenous communities across the country, they will each receive about $330,000. It costs about $200,000 to build just one house in my riding in Nunavik because of the cost of materials and transportation in the far north.

What can the communities in Nunavik do with one and a half houses a year for, say, the next 10 years?

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, seeing the openness and collaborative spirit that the current government showed when it got elected, I proposed to the minister that somebody from the other side co-sponsor my private member's bill. She has not come back to me on it, but nevertheless the private member's bill is ready and it is going to be introduced next week.

Given that the current government supported the bill that I had in the 41st Parliament, I am hoping that the Liberals will do the same with this private member's bill because it is the framework for reconciliation. As the Truth and Reconciliation Commission indicated, it is the framework of reconciliation.

However, we cannot say that we will implement the entire calls to action except that we have a slight problem with number 43. That is not how it works.

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think there was a question in that comment.

However, I will take this opportunity to thank my colleague from Timmins—James Bay for his initiative in bringing the debate to this august chamber. I think discussing this issue thoroughly for the first time was important. It was unprecedented.

I would especially like to thank the members who stayed here for much of the evening to listen to the other speeches. Once again, I thank the House for allowing me to speak to this subject.

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, there is a lot of talk about reconciliation nation-to-nation since the government arrived on October 19, so it is important to elaborate on that.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission adopted a very important report. In that report are 94 calls to action. Most governments in the country, provincial, territories, and the federal government, have committed to implementing those 94 calls to action. However, the most important call to action is 43, which deals with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The commission makes the distinction clearly between adopting and implementing. The commission calls for the full adoption, the full implementation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

I argue that the UN declaration already applies in the country. Not too many years ago, Supreme Court Chief Justice Dickson mentioned that international instruments like declarations were persuasive in relevant sources to interpret domestic law in the country. Therefore, the declaration already applies. My private member's bill proposes to translate that legislatively through the House.

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I want to indicate that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Churchill—Keewatinook Aski.

First of all in this debate, we need to try to understand where we come from as a country. We need to reflect on where this country comes from and on the basis it was founded almost 150 years ago.

When I came out of a residential school, I set out on a mission to bring us back together. I set out on a mission to reconcile with the people who put me away for 10 years. They had incarcerated me culturally, linguistically, and politically. When I came out of there, I wanted to make sure that this would not happen to any indigenous children in this country anymore.

The historical and contemporary situation in Canada includes many long-standing injustices. In a broad context, members may remember that the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples recounts that “No segment of our research aroused more outrage and shame than the story of residential schools”.

The royal commission went on to describe the incredible damage done to indigenous peoples in this country. There was a loss of life, denigration of culture, destruction of self-respect, destruction of self-esteem, rupture of families, and the impact of these traumas on succeeding generations.

The assimilation policies of the Canadian government involved the forced transfer of large populations of young aboriginal Canadians. Such government acts also had the aim and effect of depriving aboriginal peoples of their integrity as distinct peoples and of their cultural values and identities.

I recall in 2005, the former federal justice minister Irwin Cotler said that the decision to house young Canadians in residential schools was the single most harmful, disgraceful, and racist act in our history.

Therefore, it is useful to consider the broader context of how we came to what we are discussing today and the policies relating to aboriginal peoples. For instance, from 1927 to 1951, it was an offence under the Indian Act for Indians to raise funds or retain a lawyer for purposes of their land claims. That is shameful. This discriminatory policy contributed to the further dispossession of aboriginal peoples' lands and resources, and today, as we see, their dependency.

Indigenous peoples had their integrity, security, and well-being undermined. Indigenous peoples in Canada were persecuted on the basis of their culture.

As members probably know, and as my colleague from Winnipeg Centre pointed out, I have the good fortune of being from the James Bay area in Quebec, where we signed Canada's first modern treaty in 1975. When people talk about indigenous issues here in the House, they often say that these issues are so complicated that they are almost afraid to go anywhere near them. I have been hearing these kinds of comments for nearly five years now.

I know, however, that when the will to address these issues is there, we are capable of great political and legal imagination. I have no doubt about that. I have seen it and experienced it first hand in my part of northern Quebec.

I have participated in this debate from the very beginning, and I have listened to all the speeches. It is important to remember, in looking for a solution, there is no lack of precedents in our history. We need only think of the James Bay Cree, in northern Quebec, as members opposite pointed out. There are solutions. However, there must be respect for indigenous peoples, and we must recognize their most fundamental rights. That is what is missing most of the time.

I was also involved in the process that led to the adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples by the United Nations General Assembly. This process lasted 23 years and I was involved from start to finish. This document contains provisions that inform the issues we have been discussing for several hours.

Article 21.1 pertains to health services. Article 21.2 is another example. Article 24.2 concerns the possibility of indigenous peoples controlling the programs that we are discussing here today. Article 43 is key. It states that the rights recognized in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples constitute the minimum standards for the survival, dignity, and well-being of the indigenous peoples of the country. That must be the basis for our work.

The Prime Minister made a commitment to work with indigenous people to implement the principles and goals of the declaration as well as to adopt it. I asked the question twice this evening. People talk about implementing the principles and goals of the declaration, but the members on the other side of the House never once said anything about passing legislation to adopt it. I find that unfortunate, but the private member's bill I plan to introduce will fix that. I hope to have the support of the members opposite when I introduce it.

I want to assure the House once again of my full co-operation in this process. I have had many years of experience, 35 years, in dealing with these issues, and I am prepared to contribute to this process.

I want to quote the highest court in 2012 in the case of Ipeelee. The court said:

...courts must take judicial notice of such matters as the history of colonialism, displacement, and residential schools and how that history continues to translate into lower educational attainment, lower incomes, higher unemployment, higher rates of substance abuse and suicide...

Genuine reconciliation cannot be successful as long as colonialism is perpetuated. I said over the weekend that true reconciliation is not possible in the absence of justice. We need to remember that.

Finally, I spoke briefly about my mission when I came out of residential school. We know that South Africa also had its own process of truth and reconciliation. I will quote Nelson Mandela on how he described his own transformation during 27 years in prison:

It was during those long and lonely years that my hunger for the freedom of my own people became a hunger for the freedom of all people, white and black. I knew as well as I knew anything that the oppressor must be liberated just as surely as the oppressed...[for all have been] robbed of their humanity.

When I walked out of prison, that was my mission, to liberate the oppressed and the oppressor both.

That is our mission today. That is our mission for the next couple of years. Let us hope that we walk on that same path.

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the speech of the parliamentary secretary was very inspiring indeed.

She mentioned in her speech something very fundamental that I want to raise with her. She said that the basic foundations of this country need to change. I happen to agree with that.

In a speech before the Assembly of First Nations, Special Chiefs Assembly, the Prime Minister made a commitment. He said, “Finally, we will conduct a full review of the legislation unilaterally imposed on indigenous peoples by earlier governments”.

If there is one piece of legislation in this country that is pernicious, insidious, and archaic, it is the Indian Act.

Will the parliamentary secretary tell the Prime Minister to uphold that commitment to change the Indian Act?

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister for his speech. The minister and I share similar ridings, in terms of not only size but also population, so I can relate easily to the stories he brought to this House today.

I would like his comment on a quote that I will read to members. It is a quote from a former prime minister of this country, a former minister of Indian affairs, and also the architect of the 1969 white paper. After explaining that these kinds of things are complicated, are complex, and take some time—a long time, as a matter of fact—he said, “There is no economic base for having jobs and so on and sometimes they have to move like anybody else”.

I would like his comments on that comment, particularly from a former prime minister. Also, I want to ask him if this national tragedy will continue under his own government or if he will make sure that this time is the right time, that this time is the time for real change.

[Situation in Indigenous Communities, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I have been following indigenous politics for the last 35 years, but I have not had the opportunity to hear that kind of speech on indigenous relations.

The minister referred to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. She rightly pointed out that the standards that were provided for under UNDRIP were effectively the minimum standards for the survival, dignity, and well-being of indigenous peoples.

I recall when we negotiated and drafted this U.N. declaration for a period of 23 years. We tried to think about every possible situation in the indigenous world when we drafted those articles. There are a couple of articles in the declaration that refer to health, articles 21.1, 21.2, and 24.

I want to ask the minister a simple question. I have been listening carefully to the Prime Minister. I have read carefully the mandate letters to the ministers and they all refer to the implementation of UNDRIP. Call to action 43 of the TRC refers to adopting and implementing the declaration. Does the minister make that distinction? Is that a simple oversight? If we adopt legislation and we—

[Indigenous Affairs, April 12th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, this evening, we are going to debate how we can put an end to the crisis in Attawapiskat.

The community had been trying for months to alert the federal government before it finally received emergency mental health services.

However, other communities, such as Cross Lake, Manitoba, are also facing similar crises, and my thoughts are with the young people in Kuujjuaq, Nunavik, who are also having a very difficult time. I think everyone will agree that this is a national concern.

Can the minister tell us what the government plans to do to finally put an end to this tragedy once and for all?

[Indigenous Affairs, April 11th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, let us go from Bay Street to Attawapiskat. The chief of Attawapiskat was once again forced to declare a state of emergency on Saturday, following a rash of suicide attempts by young people in his community.

While the Prime Minister talks about how saddened he is by the situation, the fact is that it is getting worse and nothing is being done about it.

The government refused to conduct an inquiry, and requests for mental heath services are often denied. The government is turning its back on young people.

When will the government take action and put an end to this tragedy?