Government Operations Committee on Oct. 21st, 2016

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

I will call the meeting to order, it being 1:30. I understand that Ashleigh Shultz-Bear is going to be joining us, hopefully. If she does show up, we'll just incorporate her into the proceedings.

First, Chief Bear, thank you very much for the opportunity to visit you and your community. Thank you for all the participation and help, and for giving us, hopefully, some very useful information that will assist us in our deliberations.

Chief Bear, the procedure we follow here is fairly simple. We will ask all of our witnesses to give a brief opening statement—hopefully, five minutes or less. That will be followed by questions and answers by all committee members. The intent of this meeting is to try to get suggestions and recommendations as to the future of Canada Post, and how it can better serve your community, and some ideas that you may have for ongoing success for the corporation.

With that very brief opening, Chief Bear, the floor is yours for five minutes.

[Chief Jim Bear, Chief and Council, Brokenhead Ojibway Nation]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and fellow sister and brother panel members. I would like to welcome you to the Brokenhead Ojibway Nation, Treaty No. 1. I'd like to thank you for taking your time to come to the Brokenhead Ojibway Nation.

Our nation has been using Canada Post services for many years. Unfortunately, the hours have been restricted from nine o'clock in the morning until noon, which provides minimal access to the individual mailboxes. If our members are not able to access the services, we're forced to drive a half-hour away to access postal services, just south in Selkirk.

Canada Post services are currently being provided in a building the size of a small storage shed, just down the street. This infrastructure has created a very limited and confined way of providing postal services to BON. However, the outlet is moving to our new BON grocery store, which is next door here. We understand hours of operation for the postal outlet will, unfortunately, stay the same. We feel that should be reviewed.

Mailbox holders will have access to their mailboxes during store business hours from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. In negotiating the lease in the grocery store for the local postal outlet, very little information has been provided in terms of the types of postal services that will be provided. Information sharing is key in order to maximize services. It seems like Canada Post operates in isolation of the community it is servicing. This current relationship can obviously be improved upon.

BON does not maintain an ongoing dialogue with Canada Post in terms of areas such as employment equity opportunities. BON would benefit from this information, as we have many members who also reside off our main nation land here and we share information with them through our website, social media, and face to face where possible.

The stats on indigenous peoples are alarmingly high when it comes to health concerns and social factors such as diabetes, intergenerational impacts from residential schools and so forth, and retention rates due to our lack of sense of belonging in mainstream sectors. Does Canada Post consider our actual health and social demographics in terms of accommodating and maintaining indigenous participation within the postal services system?

BON is also not aware of the environmental approach to postal service delivery, and would appreciate having this kind of information in the wake of the growing daily concerns regarding our home and external environments.

Meegwetch. Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you, Chief Bear.

Now we have Ms. Chief for five minutes.

[Debbie Chief, Director of Health, Medical Clinic/Pharmacy, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My name if Deborah Chief. I'm the health director for Brokenhead Ojibway Nation. I'm presenting on behalf of the people of the Brokenhead Ojibway Nation in regard to Canada Post and having it moved to our grocery store building.

I'm just going to tell you a little bit about the community. Brokenhead is an Ojibway First Nation community of about 700 people who reside in Treaty 1 territory. Brokenhead nation 4 extends north to the shores of Lake Winnipeg. It includes part of Netley Creek. The Brokenhead River runs through the core area of the community. Highway 59 crosses through the northeast section of the reserve. To the south is Winnipeg, which is 82 kilometres away, and to the north is Grand Beach, Patricia Beach, and Victoria Beach. Our economic base is agriculture and our local businesses. The total population is 1,838, with 776 people living in the community and about 1,062 living off-reserve.

I've spoken to several people, and the major reason for the move is accessibility, being able to receive their mail. Currently the hours, as Chief Bear had mentioned, are only from 9:00 to 12:00. That's not enough time for everyone to get to the post office. Another reason is that people who work outside of the community cannot get their mail in that short time frame.

If the post office is located in the grocery store, then they have access any time the store is open, which is 9:00 to 8:00 Monday to Saturday, and 10:00 to 6:00 on Sunday. It will act as a one-stop-shop where they can pick up their groceries, pharmacy, and mail all at the same time. We'll soon have medical doctors working out of our medical clinic.

The majority of the people I've spoken are in agreement on moving the post office to the grocery store. They said they were happy because they can get their mail every day if they want to. They feel it's more convenient for them and more accessible. The current post office building is very small. It's not very secure. In terms of temperature, it's not warm in the winter and it's very hot in the summer. The postmaster will also enjoy the space, the warmth, and the safety of the new building.

With that, that's my report. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Shultz-Bear, we're asking you to make a brief opening statement, perhaps five minutes or less. Then we will follow with questions and answers from all of our committee members.

Over to you for your statement, please.

[Ashleigh Shultz-Bear, Manager, Entertainment Center, As an Individual]

I work at the Entertainment Center in Brokenhead. It's in the same parking lot as the post office. We use the post office a lot. We need to get money orders done, and I can't drive all the way to town to the bank to get them, so we use the post office daily. We also have to pick up cheques at the band office and then rush them to the post office before 12 o'clock. I think it would be better if it were moved over here so we had more time. A lot of people have to go there before lunch because they're closed at 12:00.

That's pretty much it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Okay. Thank you very much.

We'll start our line of questioning from Ms. Shanahan, for seven minutes, please.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you all for joining us here this morning, and for receiving us here.

It sounds like the thing that's happening right now is this move from the current location to the store location. We've been hearing testimony from different communities about how some like to keep that postal location. For some, where they have a lot of services there, it becomes like a community hub. You're sharing with us that, actually, the preference is that it goes to the grocery store location, which is open 8:00 to 8:00. What strikes me about that is everyone has a different preference, every community has different needs.

Do you feel that you were consulted about the move before it happened? If so, how did that proceed? Chief, I think you mentioned there's still not a lot of communication about which services are going to be delivered out of that postal outlet.

[Chief Jim Bear]

Yes, that's true. We have a number of senior managers in the community. Our director of operations unfortunately isn't here, but she brought it up with the senior managers. They reached out into the community. Deborah has done the same thing. The majority of feedback we're receiving is on improved services, a better location, just more convenience.

I was just over at the South Beach Casino, and one of the individuals told me that by the time he gets off work, if he has to go to Selkirk to pick up whatever, by the time he wants to do his postal-related services he's unable to. He's looking for improved hours as well.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

What I'm curious about, too, is that it seems to be a positive move. Ms. Shultz-Bear, you talked about the fact that you're doing daily business at the current location, and that it is a great inconvenience having to get there before noon and so on. Had this been voiced before? Was Canada Post receptive to the limitations in service? What took this change now to the grocery store location?

[Ashleigh Shultz-Bear]

I'm not sure. I just heard about it recently. The post office lady, Olive, was telling me that they were thinking of switching. She asked about putting it in the Entertainment Center, too, but individuals have to be 18 years old to be in there, so I said it wasn't a good idea.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Oh, so that's it. You couldn't send your kids to go get stamps. Okay, understood.

Ms. Chief.

[Debbie Chief]

I'm not aware of any conversations with Canada Post prior to...going to them and saying this is not acceptable. I know there were some discussions when they constructed the building, and that's a few years back.

[Chief Jim Bear]

Originally it was in a worse location as well: it was about two miles off the main highway here. That was inconvenient. We're always trying to make improvements. Whenever we do things here, we always try to present them to the community. We'll be having another community session coming up on the 26th. We always put things out for our people. We also do surveys. We don't come up with these things in isolation of our community members.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Very good.

The purpose of our committee here, of course, is we're trying to get ideas about Canada Post going forward. We're asking Canadians how they feel about Canada Post. Is it important to their community? Is it an essential public service? Could it be run as simply a private business?

Could you give me your thoughts on that?

[Chief Jim Bear]

Certainly. We would like to have those kinds of more detailed negotiations. If it is privatized, what does that mean? You're going to have to look at the cost factors, how long will you have these services provided. Yes, if we had access to a lot of information, then we could look at more options. Until then, I can't really say. All we are trying to do right now is to improve services in any manner that we can.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Okay.

Ms. Chief.

[Debbie Chief]

It's definitely an essential service. Older people, especially, still depend on that way of communication and for getting their bills and cheques, whether old age security or whatever kind of income they have. It's something they grew up with and it's important to them. That is where they come from, essentially, especially the elders.

Then there's also the question of who is responsible for the construction and the rental fee of the building. Is that the communities? Is that the post office?

I think there were some discussions about that when they built that little building there. I don't remember the details. I think Councillor Winston DesJarlais could probably recall a little bit better than I can right now. There was quite a big discussion around it, because when that building was constructed, I believe the band helped with some of those costs.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Okay. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you.

Sorry to interject, but I have a quick question. Do you have Internet service here?

[A voice]

We do.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Mr. Maguire, it's over to you for seven minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you to all three of you for your presentations today. Thank you for welcoming us to the Ojibway Nation here and Treaty 1, Chief Bear.

Ms. Chief mentioned the number of people as 776 living here still. How many post office boxes, then, roughly, would there be in the post office? There wouldn't be one for everyone because there are families involved.

[Debbie Chief]

I would imagine there would be one per household, yes. I'm not exactly sure how many houses we have right now.

[Chief Jim Bear]

On top of that, there are individuals on the outside who utilize the services as well, even though they don't live here.