Government Operations Committee on Oct. 21st, 2016

[Ashleigh Shultz-Bear]

I know our mailbox number is 238, and ours is at the end. I think there are only about 200-and-something mailboxes.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Okay.

The second part of my question is that there are people who don't live here who would come here. They don't live on the reserve, but would they get their mail here as well, from outside the area?

[Debbie Chief]

On lot 3.

[Chief Jim Bear]

Yes. Even though you can see the reservation, further back in there are some lots that aren't reserve land. You're driving, and all of a sudden you come to non-reserve. You drive a little further, it's reserve, then it's non-reserve, then it's reserve. Yes, there's—

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

It looks like the east side of my constituency, like a Lego set.

Thank you.

I want to just talk, then, as my colleague just did, about the move to the store. I know they've checked on some of the trial situations. I believe there have been two areas, one in Vancouver and an area here, that are looking at options and changes. The store is the change that's taking place here.

[A voice]

Yes, it is.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

That's working much better with the longer hours that have been—

[Chief Jim Bear]

Well, at least the store is, but the postal service is still down the road.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Okay, yes, so they're looking at moving it to the store. It hasn't moved yet. That's what I want to get clear.

Do you see other services that could be offered through a postal outlet, or anything like that? Part of this study is to look at viability, and to make sure that Canada Post is still there as a service. There's some talk in other regions on how to make it more viable. I wonder if you have ideas you could share with us on that.

[Chief Jim Bear]

Personally, I don't, offhand. Certainly those kinds of things we can eventually entertain with the people as well.

Ashleigh has given you some of the services that she would like, or is going through at the current time. She might have some ideas of any improvements of what she would further like to see.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Chief Bear, we've heard in several other communities that people have suggested that the post office could be used to approve and hand out hunting and fishing licences, passport applications, those types of things. In other words, other government services could perhaps be offered in a post office. Would that type of approach be beneficial to your community?

[Chief Jim Bear]

Definitely, but we also have to watch what kinds of services, because we are government as well. We're trying to structure those kinds of things in our own government. If we set aside a postal service, then we can say that they can possibly look after those types of things.

We have, right now, a term band membership section, so maybe those kinds of things can be done in our own current office. We'd have to take a hard look as to what we'll really designate in terms of the postal aspect of it.

I can't rule out any of those things you've mentioned as well.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

I'm sorry, Mr. Maguire.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

That's what I was looking at. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for pointing those out, because those are some of the things I've heard of. I've only been on the committee today, but I have heard others, and in reading presentations, on the fact that they have asked for some other services.

In your case, it's a situation where you want to develop those as well through your own nation. Certainly, I believe there are opportunities for you, which I don't think need to be taken over by Canada Post, necessarily, in your case, and other first nations the same way.

I come from the western side of the province. The Dakota Sioux in Sioux Valley get their mail mainly in the little town of Griswold. There are only 25 people who live in Griswold, but there are about 200 mailboxes. They are not on the reserve. They have to come about six miles south to get their mail, but fortunately, that's the direction most of the traffic flow goes anyway. You don't have that situation here.

I would ask Ashleigh, then, about the post office in regard to the Entertainment Center. It's convenient to use it here now, but it's only for three hours, is what you were saying, for all of the postal needs you need at the centre and everything else. It would be much better to have it expanded to the store here.

[Ashleigh Shultz-Bear]

Yes.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

You would use it, probably, every day, then, would you?

[Ashleigh Shultz-Bear]

Maybe three or four days out of the week.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Well, I don't have any other questions, Mr. Chair. Am I out of time?

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

That's seven minutes, anyway, Mr. Maguire. You're out of time.

Mr. Blaikie for seven minutes.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

Thanks for hosting us here today.

I just want to go back to what Ms. Shanahan was saying. One of the basic questions of this review is whether Canada Post should primarily be seen as a public service that needs to be maintained, or whether its services could be offered by a private entity. How much Internet shopping goes on here? How much are packages and parcels part of the life of the community here?

[Chief Jim Bear]

Gee, I wish I could have had a good handle on that. I just got back to the community recently, five years ago.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

You're not sure. Maybe it will help if I explain what I'm driving at.

What I'm interested to know is if that's an important service for people here because they are buying things online. The Brokenhead Ojibway Nation has the benefit of being closer to Winnipeg than many rural and northern communities, but would private parcel delivery—FedEx, UPS—likely come here if Canada Post weren't there to provide that service? Are you confident that you would get good postal delivery service from whatever the private service provider ends up being?

[Chief Jim Bear]

Again, that's one thing we'd have to have a good dialogue on, and get further information on that. You're right. We are in a convenient location, but we still have a lot of challenges, even in terms of the number of mailboxes, because our population is going to be growing. Last year we put in 20 new homes, and those are occupied by our people who are working, so they own those homes. Of course, a lot of them have families. We're going to be doing more, so yes, we need the service badly.

The Internet service, believe it or not, even in Brokenhead goes out for a few days at a time sometimes. That causes a lot of problems. Improvements in terms of the postal services would just be an asset to the community overall. Yes, people still would, knowing that it's well set up... However, they may have things sent, so that is always an option.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

What do you imagine as being a helpful way forward? You mentioned earlier that it's not always the most constructive relationship with Canada Post, or it's not that consultative. What do you imagine as being the ideal way for Canada Post to engage your community better and to serve your needs?

[Chief Jim Bear]

I guess it's a two-way street. We in the community should also be reaching out to the postal services. I'm not saying it's entirely the postal services' fault in terms of communication. I'm really glad to see this panel going around the country. Even just the little recommendations that we are giving will go a long way to improving the services for our people.