I certainly don't want to minimize what's going on within first nations communities, because some tremendous challenges need to be met. My depositions here are open. I'm not minimizing those impacts.
People are coming to urban areas. There are second- and third-generation aboriginal people living in urban areas who are still healing from residential school issues and the cycles of abuse and dependencies many of our communities find themselves in. We have a rampant teen-parent situation where it is almost the expectation that children of young mothers will be young mothers as well. We need to have a better learning culture in our communities, where we set a higher standard for ourselves.
The barriers are multi-faceted. They are getting better, and with better support we can even go further in addressing some of those challenges.