Government Operations Committee on Jan. 30th, 2018

[Patrick Cheechoo]

That's exactly what one of my messages is. There needs to be a sincere and, I guess, formal outreach to indigenous women as far as the whole procurement process goes, to overcome the fact that this procurement.... People know that the government has a procurement process, but how do you extend an invitation specifically to indigenous women as part of the process and have formal steps specifically for that in your strategy?

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Right, and maybe it could take the form of some sort of advisory board, as you mentioned. Obviously your organization would be happy to play a role on that, I would imagine.

[Patrick Cheechoo]

For sure.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

How's my time, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

You have about a minute.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Cheechoo, further to that, NWAC is a huge organization, of course, with many facets to it. Business is just one part of it. You guys do so much on behalf of aboriginal women. If you had the ability to track successful businesses, I wonder what percentage of aboriginal women's businesses would even be aware of this. What sorts of metrics do you have? Or is it just that you guys are so busy that the capacity isn't there to accurately track and measure what's going on currently?

[Patrick Cheechoo]

We're actually just beginning the process, and again it's twofold. We're trying to sustain and build on the Aboriginal Women's Business Entrepreneurship Network, which would have a key role in exactly what you're describing, but even within the organization we're trying to get resourcing to specifically do that, again, through our own research and policy development and whatnot, but also even through our endeavours for the store that we rent.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you.

Thank you, everyone.

Mr. McCauley or Mr. Kelly, do you want to add to that?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I just have one quick question for Mr. McIntyre and Ms. Flood. You talked about the need to increase capacity with aboriginal business, as we've heard with regard to other businesses as well. Can you maybe give us some of your best practices, especially on the smaller scale, of how you've increased capacity?

[Howard McIntyre]

I'll give a couple of examples. First of all, entrepreneurs and aboriginal businesses need to know how the procurement process works—how to put in a bid, what's expected—just so they can kind of get to the qualification table. So training, telling them how it works face to face, is important.

Second is telling them what they need to do in order to be a qualified vendor, the expectations of capacity, skills, and things like that. So if we have an incumbent in a position that has our business, tell them what and why it's got that business, so that they have a benchmark to go against.

Finally, I'd say the perspective, which I pleasantly see in many of these communities, is to have a longer term plan. Every piece of opportunity that comes to you isn't necessarily the one you should pick. Know what you're good at, know what your own long-term strategy is and your labour pool and capacity, and then pick that path that has decades' worth of opportunity. Many of the ones we've dealt with have really done a good job of knowing what they are good at, or going to be good at, and then we can daisy-chain into their longer term plan.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Great.

[Virginia Flood]

I think one of the areas where we're seeing more growth opportunities is the area of equity partnerships. We have some of those equity partnerships already. I think that's an area where, instead of just providing the services through procurement, they actually want to be business operators as well, working in partnerships with big companies like Suncor and others. So there is another opportunity.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

That's great. Thank you.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Thank you.

I agree with my colleagues that Suncor is to be commended for the work it's done in this area. Responsible resource development in remote communities is known and understood by indigenous residents to be a pathway out of poverty, and I think it's great seeing and hearing about success stories in these communities.

Having said that, the majority of indigenous Canadians now live in cities, where many indigenous Canadians remain outside of participation in the broader economic life of Canadian society. Is there an opportunity here through federal government procurement to perhaps do for urban indigenous Canadians what primary resource development companies have done in rural communities?

[Howard McIntyre]

Here's an opinion. I think when we take a look at our portfolio investment, it is largely industrial. I think if I look at what I know about the portfolio of the government, I'll see there are many other things that urban vendors supply solutions for—anything from analytics, consultation, architecture, policy, to whatever those things are. I think, like our approach to developing capability in serving ourselves in remote communities, there's no reason why a similar model couldn't be done for urban-based entrepreneurs.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

I guess I'm assuming that, just because of the examples you gave, the majority of your successes are in remote indigenous communities as opposed to larger urban centres. Is that correct?

[Howard McIntyre]

That would be correct.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

We'll conclude with an intervention by Mr. Weir.

[Erin Weir, NDP, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Thanks.

I'd like to explore the link between aboriginal procurement and the delivery of services in aboriginal communities. The current federal government policy has mandatory set-asides for aboriginal procurement when it's delivering services to aboriginal communities, but only voluntary set-asides for departments and agencies beyond that.

Mr. Cheechoo, do you think this focus on encouraging aboriginal business where services are being delivered in aboriginal communities makes sense, or would you like to see the federal government trying to encourage aboriginal business, and female-owned aboriginal business specifically, right across Government of Canada procurement?

[Patrick Cheechoo]

Business is business and entrepreneurs are entrepreneurs, so I think it's just a matter of getting the word out that these opportunities exist and how you can be considered for such opportunities.

[Erin Weir, NDP, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Okay.

I'll pose a similar question to Suncor. I don't doubt that your company got interested in aboriginal business in part because you were operating in an area with a large aboriginal population, but at this point, due to mergers and other things, your company has assets all over the place. I'm wondering therefore whether aboriginal procurement in your operation is tied to projects in areas with a large aboriginal population, or whether it applies evenly throughout the corporation.

[Howard McIntyre]

It's something that we seek everywhere in the organization. It's not limited just to where it's available. I should mention that we have the same perspective on hiring aboriginal employees and whatnot. This isn't just unique to one area; it's representative of our culture, and we look for an opportunity to do business everywhere. In my opening remarks I mentioned that in our downstream business where we have refineries and whatnot we want a more concentrated effort to liaise with aboriginal opportunities in urban centres. We have Edmonton, Sarnia, Montreal, and that could be an example of how we hook up with some more urban-based aboriginal groups.

[Erin Weir, NDP, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

That's good.

Unless any of our witnesses have additional points they're burning to add, I think that's good for me, and I want to thank everyone for their testimony.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you, Mr. Weir.

We do have some additional time. Madam Ratansi, you said you have a question or two.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I have a few quick questions.

Thank you all for being here; you're doing such good work.

I'd like to ask Suncor three questions. In the best practices you shared, I was amazed at your saying that you had first taken a colonial approach, which nobody admits to, and then went to a collaborative approach. Number one, where did that cultural shift come from?

Number two, when you were engaging the aboriginal communities was there ever an incentive to hire aboriginal employees? I ask because when we met with the Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business, they said the federal government should provide incentives for major businesses or corporate Canada to employ aboriginals.

Finally, how many of the aboriginal entrepreneurs you employ or work with are women? Thank you.