Status of Women committee  I think you have already stated the answer. The existing templates that I've seen recently in Manitoba around education have been incredibly successful. Working through it with indigenous voices in the forefront, working toward creating memorandums of understanding would work. It could be legislated.

Status of Women committee  There is absolutely no question in my mind that indigenous people have the answers to the problems that are assailing them in society. We absolutely need to put the power into their hands. As Roberta Jamieson has said about speaking truth to power, they absolutely need to have the power to reconcile the suffering of their own people, and non-indigenous people need to support that process.

Status of Women committee  There are examples of community courts in pilot projects in Calgary like the drug courts, where there is co-operation between the crown and defence. There is court support around developing strategic planning and there are options to use indigenous-based restorative practices.

Status of Women committee  I think we're very entrenched in coping, and in fact struggling, with existing structures, and are all very aware that none of them are working. In my world, we work extremely successfully on court diversion and prevention. The Siksika Nation has been incredibly successful in doing this.

Status of Women committee  I'm sorry.

Status of Women committee  Yes. Can I elaborate on that? In our community, the Siksika community, they've been very successful utilizing the process that they call Aiskapimohkiiks. It is a reflection of the restorative practice initiated under the Braithwaite process, and it has been extremely successful in doing diversion from both court and eventual incarceration.

Status of Women committee  Thank you very much. Bonjour. [Witness speaks in Blackfoot] My name is Denise Peterson and I am speaking to you from the traditional lands of the Blackfoot people of Treaty 7. For the past 35 years I've worked as a teacher, principal, and education consultant, and though I am a councillor with the Town of Strathmore, my role here today is as a teacher, principal, and education consultant who is focused on working with young parenting women from the Siksika/Blackfoot nation in southern Alberta.