Public Safety committee  Of course, you have to consider the unique status of indigenous people. The legislation requires us to give them specific programs, and that is what we do.

Public Safety committee  No, when they are in our institutions, their conditions are the same, apart from the Pathways concept. The elders look after those pathways.

Public Safety committee  It is a unit within a penitentiary. The cells are the same, but an elder has intense involvement with the offenders there.

Public Safety committee  Indigenous people represent 3% of the Canadian adult population, but they represent 24% of the prison population. We can’t do anything about that. When they come to our institutions, their profiles are different. The pressure we feel is more on our involvement and our programs for the indigenous people in our institutions.

Public Safety committee  One of the challenges with indigenous offenders—certainly with those in the prairie region, in any case—is their affiliation with gangs. When they arrive at our institutions, we want to make sure that they are surrounded by people who behave socially, before they are influenced by gangs.

Public Safety committee  Earlier, I talked about the profiles of indigenous offenders. Often, there is more violence and substance abuse. In terms of the needs and the risk, the situation is more serious. So, in their case, we have to work harder. As a result, it may take longer. That is the reason we now have aboriginal intervention centres, the goal of which is to prepare them more quickly.

Public Safety committee  We've developed structured guidance for parole officers and members of the case management team. It's called “A guide to documenting consideration of the Aboriginal social history”. As well, at each of our aboriginal intervention centres this summer, all the members received training on aboriginal social history.

Public Safety committee  The first thing that's being done, obviously, is to continue to work with indigenous communities that expressed an interest in section 81. The other thing we've done is enhance our policy framework so that we have a stronger agreement framework. We've also enhanced our funding arrangements for existing section 81 healing lodges.

Public Safety committee  I wouldn't say it's equal, but it's been enhanced. Again, it's for them to better respond to the needs of indigenous offenders. Actually, just to let you know, in September 2017 the minister and the first nation community of Waseskun signed a new section 81 agreement for five years that uses this new framework and the new funding arrangement.

Public Safety committee  The issue is more the security level.

Public Safety committee  Yes. We use actuarial tools to determine the security level, but, for indigenous offenders, social history is also taken into consideration.

Public Safety committee  I have it right in my hand.

Public Safety committee  Our offenders have access to the same programs; they do not get different programs. Even for the young, we consider the social history, of course.

Public Safety committee  Exactly, the programs are the same.

Public Safety committee  What do you mean when you say solitary confinement?