Canadian Heritage Committee on Oct. 25th, 2017

[Larry Rousseau, Executive Vice-President, Canadian Labour Congress]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the standing committee for your invitation.

The Canadian Labour Congress is the largest labour organization in Canada, with 56 affiliated Canadian and international unions, provincial federations of labour, and regional labour councils. The CLC represents 3.3 million workers across all private and public sectors. Indigenous workers, racialized workers, and workers of all faiths are a growing and important part of our labour movement, and any attack on them is an attack on us all. As trade unionists, the CLC and its affiliates continue to stand strong in solidarity to eradicate the forces of hate, racism, and discrimination that divide us.

Systemic racism and discrimination in Canada is well and alive. In 2015, 48% of police reports showed that hate crimes were motivated by hatred of a race or ethnicity, and 35% were motivated by hatred of a religion. Between 2014 and 2015, police reported hate crimes rose by 5%, mainly attributable to the increase of racial and religious hate-related crimes.

The unprecedented rise of Islamophobia and religious discrimination in Canada is very disturbing. There have been attacks on Muslim women wearing hijabs, vandalism of mosques, threats and verbal abuse, numerous anti-Islam and anti-Muslim protests, and anti-racist, anti-fascist counter-protests across Canada.

Most horrifying of all was the terrorist gun attack on the Centre culturel islamique de Québec during evening prayers on January 29, 2017, that left six Muslim worshippers dead and 19 injured. The labour movement condemns in the strongest possible terms any acts of violence against Muslims.

Religious hate crimes against women rose between 2014 and 2015 due to the increase in victimization of Muslim as well as Jewish women.

The very recent Bill 62 in Quebec will likely worsen matters. Bill 62 ostensibly ensures religious neutrality, but de facto it's an attack on the rights of Muslim women who cover their face from receiving or delivering public services. The particularly gendered exclusionary impact of this bill is discriminatory. It is also wrong to ask workers providing public services to participate in the violation of rights that are promised to every Canadian under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as well as provincial human rights codes. We must stand up against Islamophobia and categorically reject policies that discriminate against people of the Muslim faith.

Racism and discrimination have no place in our unions, in our communities, or in our country. Today indigenous people, as well as black and racialized Canadians, are still more likely to be carded, under surveillance, and incarcerated. There have been anti-immigrant flyers and protests targeting Chinese and Sikh communities, police violence and shootings of black Canadians and indigenous people, and racist epithets hurled at racialized Canadians in public.

Muslim and racialized Canadians, as well as indigenous people, continue to experience employment discrimination, wage disparities, and lack of opportunities, in particular if they are women, live with a disability, and/or are LGBTQ. They continue to be the most impoverished in Canada.

Lastly, even Canada's low-wage streams of the temporary foreign worker program systemically discriminate against racialized workers from poorer countries in the south by weakening their rights through tied employer work permits and offering little hope of Canadian citizenship. These developments project urgency and compel us to act with even more fortitude.

At the CLC convention in May, 3,500 union delegates affirmed our commitment to pursue public policies that respect the dignity and rights of all working people regardless of race, religion, immigration status, or country of origin. With our affiliates, we are committed to educating the rank and file to inoculate them against right-wing populism, and we are ready to assist the government to better make diversity our country's strength.

We also have seven recommendations for the standing committee.

First, the government has to immediately implement the 94 recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This also includes government actions to support the ongoing work of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and develop a strategy and prioritize the implementation of the inquiry's findings and recommendations.

Second, reinstate Canada's action plan against racism to activate a whole-of-government approach to reducing or eliminating systemic racism and religious discrimination. This would help Canada comply with the requirements of the UN World Conference Against Racism.

Third, the government must repeal the effects of legislation that characterizes or insinuates racist stereotypes and propagates fear in Canada, specifically the Conservatives' Bill C-51, the Anti-terrorism Act, and Bill S-7, the Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices Act. These should be repealed.

Fourth, the government must strengthen the federal Employment Equity Act and program, reinstate the $200,000 government contract threshold for the federal contractors program, and restore mandatory compliance requirements equivalent to the Employment Equity Act itself.

Fifth, immediately introduce proactive pay equity legislation that will close the wage disparity, in particular for racialized Muslim, black, and indigenous women.

Sixth, the government should increase funding to support anti-racism and anti-oppression programs.

Seventh, the government should collect disaggregated data by ethno-racial and religious background across all departments, crown corporations, and other relevant institutions for better analysis and evidence-based policy-making, to eradicate systemic racism and discrimination.

I thank you for the opportunity to present, and I look forward to your questions.

Whichever language you would like to ask them in is fine with me.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Mr. Rousseau.

I will move to Ms. Blackstock, for 10 minutes, please.

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock, Executive Director, First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada]

First of all, I would like to begin by recognizing that we're on unceded Algonquin territory and thanking you for the opportunity.

Children may not always listen to their elders, the saying goes, but they never fail to imitate them, so the question is, what kind of example are we setting, domestically and internationally, for the children of this generation in terms of the way that we treat one another and the way that we address and acknowledge discrimination, both at an individual level and at a structural level?

Here it requires a courageous conversation, because sometimes it's we, the good guys, who are doing the harm. In this case, it is the Canadian government that continues to racially discriminate against first nations children. That has to be acknowledged, not only because it relates to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's top call to action about equity and child welfare to make sure that we raise this generation of children safely in their families, but also because it's simply the right thing to do.

What have we learned from history? That is the other piece. We apologized for residential schools, and then we apologized for the sixties scoop, and now Canada is out of compliance with four legal orders of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal to end racial discrimination with children. What have we actually learned from residential schools? What have we learned from the past? How do we prepare this generation of children to learn from those past actions of racial discrimination, affecting indigenous peoples and others, in ways that prepare them to address injustices, both in a contemporary format and going forward into the future?

Today we saw in census figures that we're not holding up our promise to the residential school survivors in terms of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's call to action number one. Over 40% of all children under four in child welfare care today are first nations children. Keep in mind that when children were removed for residential schools, they were removed at the tender age of five, and we saw the cataclysm that created. These are preschoolers.

Chairperson, as a physician, you know that the first 2,000 days of life lay down the fundamental building blocks of life. It's also a time, important to this committee's mandate, when children learn languages, particularly the indigenous languages, which are so at risk in this country in many cases. That's why Canada's compliance with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal orders is so essential. It's essential because it's about giving a generation of first nations children a chance to grow up equitably and fairly in this country, but it's also about preparing a generation of non-indigenous children so that they never have to say they're sorry again.

A contemporary tragedy is unfolding in front of us all. It's not behind us. It's not in the residential schools or the sixties scoop. There are more first nations kids in care today than at any time in history. We have an opportunity to do something about it by providing equitable and culturally based child welfare services to first nations communities as the tribunal required and by ensuring the full and proper implementation of Jordan's principle so that first nations children can access all the public services they need, when they need them, and without additional red tape related to their first nations status. The third thing that can be done is something I call the Spirit Bear plan, which is for members of Parliament to ask the parliamentary budget officer to cost out the aggregate value of all the inequitable services that first nations children face.

Keep in mind that first nations children are not just receiving inequitable child welfare; they're also receiving inequitable education and inequitable early childhood. Some of them can't get clean water, and there are inadequate sanitation systems. As a country, we need to see what that big figure looks like, and then launch something akin to the Marshall Plan after the Second World War to eradicate those inequalities in ways that take full consideration of children's development and children's best interest. If we can rebuild Europe in 10 years, we can certainly correct a fundamental racial injustice that's occurring in this country in far less time than that.

For those who say it's too expensive or too complicated, I ask you this: if we are so broke as a nation that the only way we can fund things like arenas or subway systems is through racial discrimination against children, then what are the children losing to? What does this country really stand for?

I am one taxpayer who would be very happy to put off some of these projects that the government spends on, as much as I would like them, if it means a child will have a proper opportunity to grow up healthy and proud in this country for the first time in their culture's history. Start off your 151 with a positive legacy.

I am going to move on to something else about learning from history, which is less well known in our work. We are honoured to collaborate with Beechwood Cemetery, which is Canada's national cemetery; KAIROS; Project of Heart; Truth and Reconciliation commissioners Marie Wilson and Murray Sinclair; historian John Milloy; and Ellen Gabriel.

We recognize that in Canada's national cemetery are some of the leading characters in the residential school story.

Peter Henderson Bryce was the doctor who blew the whistle in 1907 on the preventable causes of death of children. He found that kids were dying at a rate of 25% a year from preventable causes, and he knew that with an additional $10,000 to $15,000 from the Canadian government, many of those children's lives could be saved. He was a chief medical officer in Canada. His findings were published in papers. He is buried there.

Duncan Campbell Scott, the leading bureaucrat on the residential schools file for 52 years, the man who refused to implement Dr. Bryce's reforms, is also buried there.

Nicholas Flood Davin was the person who wrote the Davin report, which was requisitioned by John A. Macdonald and led to the founding of industrial schools here in Canada.

We've created historical plaques that accurately tell the stories of these people. Duncan Campbell Scott, for example, is recognized as being a confederate poet, but he is also recognized as being a key actor in what the Truth and Reconciliation Commission found to be cultural genocide. His historical plaque includes both passages: confederate poet and cultural genocide. For Dr. Bryce, the full story of his career is told as well, and it's the same with Nicholas Flood Davin.

I think this is something very essential: teaching, at a time when people are talking about taking down monuments. I actually don't agree with taking down monuments. I agree with telling the full and proper truth, and this is something that I'd like to see the National Capital Commission embrace with a lot more vigour. For example, just a couple of years ago there was an exhibit on Laurier and Macdonald, and it talked about the building of the railway and the first francophone prime minister. It said nothing about their respective roles in residential schools. John A. Macdonald was an enthusiastic endorser of them, and hired Duncan Campbell Scott; Laurier was prime minister at the time when Dr. Bryce's reforms hit the newspaper, and he did not press for those reforms to be implemented and those kids' lives to be saved.

If we are to learn from the past, we have to accurately tell the history of the country. We have to train a generation of children to learn from our collective history, and not just the good and shiny parts. We have collaborated with Project of Heart. We've taken all the historical research that we've done for those plaques and converted it into school curriculum so that children are learning about these historical figures all over Canada as part of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission work.

In addition to that, to promote the Truth and Reconciliation calls to action, we have developed free activities that all children and families can do, which are peaceful, respectful, and evidence-based, and which make a meaningful difference.

We not only want to address the contemporary injustices, but we urge you to recommend, in this committee, that Canada immediately comply fully with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal's orders.

We recommend that you work with the National Capital Commission, and we hope that they would be inspired by our reconciling history project to create historical plaques here in Ottawa that recognize the true telling of history.

We ask you to endorse the Spirit Bear plan to end the inequalities across all areas, and of course to fund and support indigenous languages with the same vigour and enthusiasm with which you do French and English in this country. To me, it is a travesty that indigenous languages are not recognized as the official languages of this country, when the name of the country itself comes from a first nations word. If we truly want to live up to being a village, which is what “kanata” actually means, we need to respect and honour the peoples who were the original founders of this nation.

With that, I thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

Now we go to the second part, and that means the question-and-answer part. We have a seven-minute session, and that means the question and the answer must take seven minutes. Because we are going to have bells soon, I'm going to make everybody keep to their time.

We begin with Dan Vandal for the Liberals, for seven minutes.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

First of all, thank you, Cindy, for your very compassionate and compelling presentation. On behalf of the elected officials here, and as an individual who graduated from the school of social work at the University of Manitoba, I congratulate you for your tremendous work and advocacy over many years for indigenous children.

I want to begin by trying to understand the ruling from the tribunal. I'm trying to clarify it. The original complaint by you and an agency you work for, the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, pursuant to the Canadian Human Rights Act, refers to Canada's underfunding of child welfare on reserves.

I'm trying to get a better understanding. Is the ruling pursuant only to indigenous children on reserves? The reason I ask is that in Manitoba, where I come from, we have all sorts indigenous agencies now—for example, the Métis agency—that are in rural areas but principally in Winnipeg. Does that ruling affect the Métis children at the Manitoba Métis Child, Family and Community Services?

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

It's an excellent question. The reason the original complaint dealt with first nations children on reserve in the Yukon with regard to the child welfare component—the Jordan's principle component was on and off reserve, so that's the second part of the complaint—is that Canada, through the Department of Indian Affairs first nations child and family service program, only funds status Indian children on reserve and in the Yukon for the provision of child and family services. It was that program that we were alleging was, and was later found to be, racially discriminatory.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

What you're saying is that the finding is only relevant to first nation children on reserve.

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

The specific finding on the child welfare portion is on reserve and in the Yukon, the whole Yukon territory, and for Jordan's principle, it's on and off reserve.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

Okay. That's good.

Five million dollars spent on child welfare in downtown Winnipeg is not going to go as far as $5 million spent in Shamattawa, Hollow Water, and different reserves. How much of that is due to things costing more on reserves that are isolated? We all know things cost more in communities that are isolated.

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

Part of the inequity is driven by remoteness, but the inequity exists regardless of where the first nations agency is. For example, I worked at the Squamish first nations child welfare agency, called Ayas Men Men, which is located in North Vancouver. I also worked off reserve for the Province of B.C. Literally, when I crossed the road, the inequities were immediately apparent in the funding, and particularly the services that I took for granted to support families off reserve were simply not funded by the federal government.

That's what we found in testimony and in federal government documents that were brought before the tribunal: regardless of location, the discrimination was there, and in more remote areas, the discrimination was deeper because of the issues you talk about.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

One of the first jobs I had was in 1986 at the Ma Mawi Centre in the city of Winnipeg. I'm not sure if you're familiar with it. The child welfare system back then, in 1986, was in disarray.

It hasn't gotten any better in Manitoba, regardless of who's elected. In fact, currently there are 12,000 children in care in Manitoba, which I believe is a historical record high. Many people are saying that the system is broken, that it needs to be reworked, and that there are actually incentives to apprehend children.

Will more money for a broken system solve that problem, or do we have to structurally rethink how child welfare is delivered?

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

I think there is something to be said for rethinking how child welfare is delivered. Personally, I'd like to see the definition of neglect thought out a bit more so that it doesn't codify structural discrimination as a parental deficit and it holds families accountable for what they can change, but not for what they can't change.

That said, what the tribunal found is that Canada's inequitable funding actually is the incentive for the removal of kids, because there is inadequate provision of child and family services. They find that in the ruling.

Another important thing is that we have seen examples—for example, at Mi'kmaw Family and Child Services—where funding levels have gone up about 300% due to their strong advocacy and the tribunal ruling. They have reduced the number of children in care in that province by about 40% over a period of two years. The agencies know that they can do better, but they need the resources there to be able to do that job. Inequitable funding in any recipe of children's services does not enable success.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have one and a half minutes.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

The reason would be, though, that the extra funding would have to go through prevention services to keep families together and to keep young people occupied, and not to apprehension. Can you comment about that?

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

Right. Those are two separate funding streams, and what the tribunal was looking at is exactly what you're talking about.

The other piece is we need to have equitable salaries for social workers. We need to have safe buildings for children and families to come into, and that whole package is what the tribunal ruling really centres on.

For children coming into care, they're reimbursed at actual cost by the federal government, so that's less of an issue. The real issue is bolstering up these supports so families can become healthy and keep their kids at home. Prevention is the key.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

Do you have a number for how much it would cost to close the gap or to erase the gap?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have 30 seconds.

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

We don't know exactly what it would be to erase the gap fully. We know regions are preparing those summaries right now. We have suggested as of the ruling date, as of January 26, that our best estimate, based on government documents, is it would require an immediate injection of $216 million just to take the immediate sting off the discrimination. That wouldn't address the whole problem.

Canada's budget in 2016 provided $71 million, of which the department took $10 million, so roughly just less than 25% of what was required was provided in that budget.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

Now we're going to move to David Anderson for the Conservatives for seven minutes.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

I would like to follow up on that a little, if you don't mind. Thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

What kinds of preventative things can we do to support families? The key in so many ways is keeping families together if we can possibly do that. Do you have any suggestions or recommendations? That deals with so many of the issues that we have in this motion if we can do that.

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

I think that's where the Spirit Bear plan is really critical in costing out that number for all of those inequalities. We know from good-quality research that the drivers of the over-representation of first nations children in care are predominantly poor housing, poverty, and substance misuse related to unresolved mental health due to multi-generational impacts of residential schools. What we have seen is that when those issues are effectively targeted as child welfare interventions and you're addressing the wholesale inequalities across the board, then you see substantial improvements in child safety.

I'll give you one quick example. In a U.S. study of 14,000 families, half of these families got to keep an additional $100 per year, and that was it. The other families didn't. The families that got to keep the additional $100 a year saw a 10% reduction in substantiated child maltreatment rates. It shows how dealing with those poverty and basic needs measures really help keep kids safe.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

I asked something similar to this of Judge Sinclair when he was here: do we need different strategies for urban and rural areas?

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

I think we do, because you find different constellations of indigenous peoples in urban areas. However, I think it's fundamentally the same: having a responsiveness to culture, a responsiveness to language, and equity as the base. It's targeting those areas that put families under the most stress: the poverty, the poor housing in urban areas, and the lack of culturally based services.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

What about economic development? Where should that come from?

[Dr. Cindy Blackstock]

I think that is a key piece. I'm not an expert on the economic development piece. That's more to the national chief of the AFN and others who are in that portfolio, but I think that relates back, for me, on the children's issues of education.

If we have an underfunded first nations education system, we cannot produce children who are going to be able to pursue the careers of their dreams. We're seeing time and time again kids with such great potential, but they are simply not being given the opportunity to enter the job market and to create innovative economic opportunities for others.