Canadian Heritage Committee on Feb. 20th, 2019

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

Madame Jolibois, for seven minutes, please.

[Georgina Jolibois, NDP, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Thank you very much.

Chief Bellegarde and Mr. Jones, thank you for coming. It's a very important day and discussion.

I do have two questions. Last night, we heard from the First Peoples' Cultural Council that in addition to an indigenous languages commissioner, there should be a national indigenous languages organization that would be at arm's length from the government. The idea would be that it could protect funding and languages programming from political interference. Is this an idea you would support?

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

That's a good question. I always lift up the people who are doing good work, like Tracey Herbert and her First Peoples' Cultural Centre from B.C. Out of the 58 plus languages in Canada, 34 are in British Columbia. They know what they're doing. I lift them up and hold my hands up to them and thank them for their good work.

In terms of this idea of a national institute, we always break it down to the local, regional and national levels sometimes. Is this the most effective way to bring back fluency? It's a possibility. Again, I'd look to the language experts to do that.

However, in our consultations a lot of people said that we need the money out in the communities, out in the territories. That's where people were saying the priority should be focused. Having said that, when you start looking at national institutions, you think about the following questions. What's the role of a commission? It's for oversight. What's the role of a national institute? It's to ensure there's sharing of wise practices. What about a national foundation? It's to raise and award money, the resources. There are three different things depending on, again, the role, function, and responsibility.

We're hearing something very clearly from Tracey. It's one recommendation. All things should be explored. The intentions I want people to keep focused on are, one, the need to get this done by June, and, two, to look at ways in the co-development on the implementation of the regulations and everything else coming afterwards for the most effective way to bring back fluency, locally, regionally and nationally.

[Georgina Jolibois, NDP, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Another question is related to funding. I'm still learning from the legislation, and there are still some questions around funding.

My main concern is at the provincial and municipal level. We know that first nations live on reserve and, like us, also in urban municipalities. In my thinking it's not clear to me, and this is why I'm asking you if you can help clarify it. In your discussions for funding, when it comes to funding these organizations, be they some educational institutions like FNUC and the Dene teacher education program, and then municipalities for the Métis, non status and some first nation who live in municipalities—preschools are examples—cultural centres and the indigenous organizations or even elders who live in our communities to ensure that they have access to funding as well on reserve as well as Métis settlements and the Métis governments....

Have you had those discussions and advocated strongly for them, as well?

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

That's a good question, Georgina. Mahsi cho for that question.

Earlier on I made comments. A gentleman talked about how you get services and programs, not only on reserve. But I also have to be mindful of the terminology, because in the Northwest Territories and Yukon there aren't reserves. You have to be respectful and mindful. But, for ease of discussion, a half of our people live on reserves; a half live off. I made the point earlier on about the need for and use of technology to make sure that everybody has access to these services and programs, whether on or off reserve.

I talked about the need for provincial government involvement as well. This is the federal government, but there is the role of the provinces. They control the curricula and have monies transferred to them from the federal government, through EPF financing, for three things: education, health care and social services. So there's a role for provincial governments as well. I lifted up the B.C. government for providing $50 million for indigenous language revitalization.

I also made the point about the Corbiere decision. That decision states that regardless of residency, you have the right to vote for your chief and council. Now there's going to be a reasonable expectation that the portability of services and programs should follow. We say, “I'm not just a treaty Indian because I live on Little Black Bear.” That would be also...in this case. Make sure that the resources are out there in the community, but the chiefs and councils are going to have a responsibility to look after their membership and citizenship regardless of residency.

So there is technology; the use of provincial government involvement; and respect of first nations' jurisdiction regarding looking after their citizens' needs, whether for housing, education or, in this case, language revitalization.

[Georgina Jolibois, NDP, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

How are we going to ensure that provincial involvement, especially with governments like Saskatchewan's with Scott Moe; Pallister in Manitoba; Doug Ford in Ontario; and even in Alberta, where there's the possibility of Mr. Kenney? How are we going to make sure that they say “yes” and support this?

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

There are two pieces, Georgina. A very strategic lobby and advocacy effort by leadership in each of those provinces and territories is one. In fact, in this legislation, in clause 9, there is provision for relationships and partnerships with other levels of government. There are provisions for that. That would be my response.

As well, it really becomes incumbent upon chiefs and the leadership right across Canada to exert pressure on the policy-makers and legislative decision-makers not only nationally, but provincially as well. I used the example earlier on about how in Saskatchewan it's law to teach treaties in the classroom from kindergarten to grade 12. It's in the curricula. It's legislated; it's law. That came about through a very strategic lobby and advocacy effort.

So, there has to be action on two fronts. That's the way of addressing that. There is provision in here to make that happen in terms of partnerships and relationships with other levels of government.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

Thank you. That brings you to the end of your time.

We are now going to Mr. Oliphant for seven minutes.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Thank you, National Chief. I'm not a regular member of this committee. I'm substituting today, so it's a great privilege to be here on something I actually care quite a bit about.

First, I want to ask a technical question as to whether or not the report in our kit on the national engagement sessions has been submitted to the committee to be used in evidence. If it hasn't, I would like it to be considered. I have had a chance to skim it while others have been talking. If it would be agreed, we could submit it formally to the committee so that it could be used in their report.

Is that okay, Chair—?

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

Yes.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

—and clerk? That would be considered a formal document. You don't have to get everything in, because a lot is in that engagement report.

I'd like to take a bit of time to dig down into the difference between reclamation and revitalization. I think it's a really important thing.

I'm glad that in our second hour we'll hear from CIJA, because my first trip to Israel.... I had studied Biblical Hebrew. Biblical Hebrew was really a dead language. It was a closed set of terms, ideas and religious words, and it had to be revitalized to become a living language, based on the roots. It seems to me that for many of the languages, maybe all of them, we need to not only reclaim but also really to revitalize them. That means finding the terminology to live in the 21st century. Do you have some ideas of what else that would...? We've had a few ideas come up already in the committee, but I think it would be important to talk about local, provincial, territorial, national; educational, curricular, teachers, knowledge-keepers and elders; but also academics. There are a lot of things that need to be in there. It's a bit of a shopping list. I want to give you a chance to get a bit into the committee about what it would really mean to revitalize a language.

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

That's a very good question.

The whole idea behind the act is to bring back fluency. In our case, as first nations people, as you say, there are anywhere from 58 to 90 languages across Canada, and they're all at different stages. None of them is safe. It's not that we're going to always have Cree here or Dene here or Blackfoot. None of them are safe.

So you have to assess where each one is at, and then you apply a different strategy depending on where it's at. In some cases, you might have only one or two or three speakers left. That's where, with the digitization, you're capturing that.

For example, we have 634 reserves across Canada. There's one Lakota first nation reserve. I always do this test. Where do you think that is? Out of all of our reserves in Canada, over one million first nations people, there's one. Did you ever watch Dances with Wolves? They're speaking Lakota. There's one out of all the reserves, and Little Black Bear is not it. There's a small reserve in southern Saskatchewan called Wood Mountain. They're part of the Lakota nation, part of the Lakota tribe. Out of 634, they're Lakota. So you can't exclude or forget them either and there aren't many fluent speakers. Again, you use a different strategy for the Lakota peoples.

So it depends on where each language is what strategy you use to bring about fluency. I mentioned earlier documentation or digitization capturing it. I mentioned the master-apprentice model to make sure people bring back fluency, teacher training in schools, immersion programs. It's all about having the necessary resources.

We're hyped up about this piece of legislation because it ensures there's statutory funding in place. Then you use the appropriate strategy depending on the state of that language. That's the simplest way to put it.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

The reason I dwell on that is that I lived in Yukon for a number of years, and there were two Tagish speakers left—just two at that time. I don't believe there are any now. In the schools the language they were learning was about life on the trapline. It was about a way of life that was part of indigenous life but a subset of their life. There weren't words about the things that kids were doing. They were gaming. They were involved in all kinds of things in their social lives and their technological lives.

If we sit at the level of—in Yukon it was at 1900 that the language sort of froze—how do we do that? I know it will be unique for every one. I guess I'm baiting you to try to say this needs money—

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

Yes.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

—and it needs a concerted activity by four levels of government. It needs indigenous governments, and it needs local governments with school boards, the provinces and territories, and the federal government.

I don't want you to be shy about saying that to this committee. Today we had almost unanimous consent on the second reading.

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

It will go on the third.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

My hope is that on third reading we will get that.

It's interesting. When I have been in Nunavut and in Greenland, Greenlandic is so close to Nunavut that a lot of the linguistics of the two are so related that this is also international.

You can get the Lakota speakers from the United States helping, so it's not only our four levels.

I just want you to get on record and push that when we get unanimous consent at third reading, it's not just passing a bill; it's establishing reconciliation in terms of the way we are going to move ahead on this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

In 45 seconds you can make your plug.

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

I will gladly say, for the record, that we need all levels of government and institutions working in partnership to bring back fluency. The goal is fluency. We do not want any more of our first nations languages to be gone away, to be lost. So that's the goal of this bill.

I mentioned earlier that 74% of Canadians want this as well, revitalization and focusing on indigenous languages, to bring them back.

I even say it this way, and I said earlier on that if you can't get your head around human rights or treaty rights or aboriginal rights, this makes sense, because studies have shown that when you are fluent in your language, you're more successful in school and therefore more successful in life. The fastest growing segment of Canada's population are young first nations men and women.

The old people used to say, “Nôsisim, grandson, we walk in two worlds and we need two systems of education now.” I used to wonder what they were talking about. I always thought kindergarten to grade twelve, math and science, literacy and numeracy, go to university, technical vocational skills training on one hand. Yes, we get that. But equally important are your languages and your ceremonies and your traditions, your culture, who you are and where you come from. You need both now, as a Huu-ay-aht person, an Anishinaabe person, a Mi'kmaq person, a Haudenosaunee person. It's balance, because for hundreds of years the residential schools messages to our people were, “Your languages are no good. Your ceremonies are no good. Your culture is no good.” It's coming back now, and there's a pride. If you start using that word reconciliation, it's incumbent upon not only all levels of government but all Canadians to embrace this and see this going forward.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

My closing comment would be to thank the AFN for your advocacy work on this. I don't think we would have gotten here without a generation of the advocacy work you have been doing.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

Thank you.

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dabrusin]

Mr. Blaney, go ahead for five minutes.

[Steven Blaney, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, CPC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Chief Bellegarde, welcome to the committee.

I was not here at the beginning of the meeting and missed your opening remarks. That said, I am happy, as all my colleagues have said, to confirm that the bill was passed at second reading. So we are waiting for it in committee. We are already a bit ahead; we expected the bill to be accepted. That's good news.

I really liked your last very constructive comments on the importance of identity. Yes, knowledge, science and mathematics—I'm not sure whether we are talking about the left or right brain—are important. However, as you were saying, who we are, where we are going and the language we speak are also important. For me, a Quebecker, language is important because it is associated with my culture. Of course we are proud to support this bill.

I would like to talk a bit about the numbers, Chief Bellegarde.

We heard from Minister Rodriguez yesterday, and he told us that he negotiated with the Assembly of First Nations and the Métis budget envelopes for this bill's implementation.

My first question is very simple. Have you had conversations with the minister on the budget envelope required for the implementation of the bill on indigenous languages?

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

Did we have conversations with the ministry regarding the finance piece? They're going to begin formally tomorrow. We had a co-development process, and we all had reps around the co-development table.

The gentleman to my right has a lot of experience in co-developing federal legislation, going back to the specific claims tribunal. He's fluent in Ojibway. He has that experience; he's legal counsel. Roger is going to be our rep from AFN.

It's formally going to start tomorrow on the financing pieces. This is the important piece of work now. We don't stop just because the legislation's been co-developed. You have to co-develop the implementation processes and mechanisms as well, even getting down to the details in terms of the financing that's required every fiscal year. We call that very important man Soniyaw Okimaw. Some of you will know what that means: the big money chief. That's Bill Morneau. Right now, he's the one who's very important for every federal department, including Minister Rodriguez's, in terms of what's put in to that department for this area.

That's how we want to work it with the details and putting those plans in place, but we recognize that every fiscal year there's a federal budget, and we have to influence that every cycle.