Thank you.
When I said autonomy, I meant that I believe that all of us have the solutions within ourselves to many of the problems we face. I believe that far too rarely have we actually gone to aboriginal communities and asked aboriginal communities to come forward and be part of the solution. I think that is important. To properly resource that is also a significant contribution that needs to be made.
I find, in our city, that many aboriginal people remain voiceless still. It's quite possible to go to meetings all week in the city and not encounter an aboriginal person, unless it's on a particularly aboriginal issue. This is in a city that has the largest aboriginal population of a city of our size.
It's about bringing all people into the political process and into the civic process. It's about seeking views and opinions and listening to them and acting on them and moving away from that invisibility that is so prevalent, I think, in our cities. There's no voice, even. It starts with dialogue and visibility, and I think we move from there. I believe, largely, that we're not even there yet.