Evidence of meeting #67 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was manitoba.
10:20 a.m.
Co-chair, Manitoba Federation of Non-Profit Organizations Inc.
I think so. It was signed in December 2001.
10:20 a.m.
Co-chair, Manitoba Federation of Non-Profit Organizations Inc.
I have a copy, if you ever want it. I have many copies, actually.
10:20 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
Thank you very much, Ms. Neville.
For those of you who need French translation, our next MP is going to ask his questions in French, so I'll just give you a chance to put on the headsets.
I'll then turn it over to Mr. Lessard for seven minutes.
10:20 a.m.
Bloc
Yves Lessard Bloc Chambly—Borduas, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I would like to begin by thanking our guests for being here this morning to present us with this evidence, which is greatly appreciated and will be very useful in preparing our report.
I apologize for not being able to speak your language, but I will speak slowly so that translation can keep up. It is not that I simply don't want to. Even if I were to try speaking to you in English, it would still have to be translated.
Many observations have been made since we started these hearings. In some cases, we were already aware of a number of elements, but there are many which we were unaware of and which you brought to our attention, particularly regarding the magnitude of the problem of poverty and how poverty is manifested. In addition, you described best — perhaps Aboriginal persons — this incredible resiliency, this ability to accept the unacceptable that is poverty, poverty that in some respects does not allow us to teach anyone any lessons.
What we discovered, especially in Yellowknife, is quite horrifying. Poverty affects a large portion of the population. No segment of the population is spared, but there are some segments that are especially hard hit, and they are women, children and, harder still, Aboriginal persons.
I come back to what you said, Mr. McBain. Canada was recently singled out again regarding social housing, the lack of social housing initiatives. What bothers me personally is that this is the seventh, eighth, tenth time that the United Nations has pointed a finger at us and the criticisms just roll off our backs, whereas we should be terribly shocked. It is as if it were self-evident, that it was inevitable; but it is not inevitable! Since 2004, we have been taken to task on social housing, on the future of children, on the way we apply Employment Insurance rules — very specifically, it was two years ago — and in no uncertain terms regarding our treatment of Aboriginal peoples
The fact that one of the first things the current government did after it was elected was cancel the Kelowna agree is completely unacceptable. It refuses to sign the United Nations Protocol on the Rights of Aboriginal Peoples, which points very clearly to a position of abandoning the most vulnerable members of our society.
I am getting to my question. I see in you a sort of resiliency which stems from a sense of inevitability that I find surprising. I believe that we have to rise up and that our report — I am telling my colleagues because this is the end of our hearings — has to be a wake-up report on the situation. Remember that the Canadian government is the first and only steward of the conditions in which Aboriginal peoples live. It bears sole responsibility, even though the provinces have some territorial and other jurisdiction. So I say to you that our report will have to be crystal clear in that regard.
The question I am going to ask you I asked others before you and I know it is not an easy one to answer.
What do we have to do to change this attitude of abandoning the political will to take real action on poverty?
My question is about an undertaking made 20 years ago this year, on November 24, 1989, to eliminate poverty by the year 2000. Look at the situation we are in today. That is my question, and I would like to know what you have to say on the subject. What do we need to do differently in order to change course?
10:30 a.m.
As an Individual
I'd love to address that.
I think there needs to be accountability. I think the legislation--and I don't know how that's going to be possible--could be changed to allow people who lived in poverty, or were having these kinds of problems, to take individuals to court, and they wouldn't bear the onus of responsibility or the onus to prove their case. Since individuals who are living in poverty can't afford lawyers--they don't have the resources--they shouldn't have to carry that burden. That burden should be carried by whatever service or government they're suing.
If there's accountability--if you can prove accountability that way--if there's a price to pay, more than likely you'll get some movement somewhere. If people or organizations or governments knew they were going to have to pay for not doing something, or there was a likelihood, you'd get some movement. That's my opinion anyway.
10:30 a.m.
Representative, Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs
I mentioned briefly the systemic cycle of housing, health, and education. As you know, there's a cap on those three areas, the three core areas of our governments. A 2% cap was imposed in 1996, and that cap has to be lifted. No doubt. Just in my community alone this year we had to turn away 30 students who were ready for university, because we just don't have the money.
10:30 a.m.
Conservative
10:30 a.m.
Director, Manitoba, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
Sure.
I just want to stress again the complexity of poverty. It has come up a few times. We can't be setting these sorts of grandiose plans--we're going to eliminate poverty by a certain year--and then not follow through in a significant way by looking at what the role is of all departments and different levels of government in making that happen. As Chief Fontaine noted, it's all intertwined. It reflects on health, it reflects on child care, it reflects on people having access to employment. Housing is critical. Again, we must be sure that we're going to follow through with a commitment--a financial commitment--working across departments, across governments, because we won't be able to do this without a significant financial commitment.
Going back to previous comments in the previous panel, that means we all have to pay for that and we all have to be willing to pay through our tax system. Political leaders need to take some responsibility in starting to turn that discourse around, that this what we need to do if we're going to solve these problems.
It's complex and the solutions are complex. We have to recognize that.
10:30 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Lessard.
We're going to move now to Mr. Martin, for seven minutes, please.
10:30 a.m.
NDP
Tony Martin NDP Sault Ste. Marie, ON
Thank you very much for being here today and for being helpful in this exercise that we're in at this committee.
We're looking at the federal role in a national anti-poverty strategy. We're almost at the end of that process and are preparing to table a report with government with some action items in it. There's no lack of good ideas. We've tried to focus on a few that the federal government could and should have responsibility for, and to work in partnership with the other levels of government to actually implement those.
The big question, though--and it's been referenced here at this panel, and the panel previously, and yesterday--is that we can bring forward the best ideas possible and lay out a number of things that could happen now and in subsequent years, but if the government decides that it doesn't have the money, or if we as a people in Canada decide that we are not going to provide the money for the programs that we know we need for our neighbours and family members and our communities, then it just isn't going to happen. We've seen a pattern of that, actually, over the last 10 to 15 years in the country, where we've decided that the priority was tax breaks, not tax increases, and we've done that in a major way.
I remember listening to the Prime Minister in the last election saying at a leaders debate that there was a $250 billion tax relief package rolling out, and indeed, he's correct. That's $250 billion that's not going to be available to government for all of the programs that we've suggested we need here--although government does and continues to promise. For example, housing is a huge issue. We hear about that over and over again. And the government did, in the election and in its budget, promise $1.9 billion for housing, and so far we've seen $68.4 million rolled out. The housing ministers from the provinces met yesterday and are meeting today, and they've identified as one of their priorities a more efficient and timely flow of that money so that we can get those houses built in communities and first nations and across the country.
CCPA has come out very clearly to say that we have the money, that the money's out there. It's a question of ideology, whether we believe, as we have for the last 10 or 15 years, that the private sector will take care of all of this. We were led to believe that if the economy got better, everybody would benefit. If we leave the building of affordable housing to the private sector, it will get built. None of that has happened.
So I guess the big question for me today, and I think it's a discussion we're going to have to have over the next number of months if we're going to deal with all of the different challenges that we've heard about as we've crossed the country, is where do we get the money, and how do we deal with taxation? Do any of you have any ideas on how that might happen or how we might do that more effectively or efficiently?
10:35 a.m.
Representative, Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs
I have a recommendation with respect to housing, but it could go into other areas. Just in Manitoba alone, our backlog for first nations housing is 16,000 homes, roughly $2 billion. Here's a recommendation.
There's a paper mill right next door to our community, Sagkeeng. They've been in existence 83 years now, and I've said all along that with all the forest there, all the nice territory, all the nice trees, it's a shame that it goes to paper. I have yet to see one house come out of our forest, our traditional area. Ninety per cent of the news in the paper is negative anyway, right? Where's the housing?
My recommendation is that when you issue licences, whether it's a province or the feds, put stipulations in there, put conditions in there. Say that so much has to go to housing.
Thank you.
10:35 a.m.
As an Individual
Could I make a comment on taxation?
If I'm correct in this, at one time didn't business carry, slightly, the tax burden for the country? That has changed over the past years, and now it's the middle class that's actually carrying the largest tax burden for the amount of money brought in. They're paying a higher percentage of income tax than businesses are.
Wouldn't it be a little more equitable if businesses started to carry their fair share of taxes? After all, they're getting services from the government. You wouldn't have to go back that far, but go back far enough to where business is actually carrying their fair share.
10:35 a.m.
Director, Manitoba, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives
I'll go back to housing, because I think it is critical. In all the work we've done--CCPA and other groups--we've heard that housing is the biggest priority for people who are living in poverty.
I don't have the numbers with me, but in terms of how we fund social housing, there's a significant surplus in CMHC that could be directed to it. If we had slowed down on the tax cuts, we could have redirected some of that to build more social housing. But in the early 1990s the federal government pulled out of social housing entirely, and then the response in early 2000 was the affordable housing initiative, which very much focused on the private market as the solution to affordable housing.
I want to be clear that we've finally changed the discourse here in Manitoba around housing. We don't talk about affordable housing anymore, because affordable housing doesn't really mean anything; it depends on how much income you have. We're focused on social housing, and I'm pleased to hear some of the committee members using that term.
As Lindsey noted, we need housing with rent geared to income. The reality is that the private sector is not going to build that kind of housing. It's not profitable for them. I'm not criticizing the private sector for that, but the reality is that it's a public responsibility to ensure that low-income people are adequately housed. So we need to shift that discourse and get the federal government back in the game of focusing on building social housing for people who are in most need of housing.
10:40 a.m.
Communications co-ordinator, Right to Housing Coalition
I'll add one comment to reinforce what Shauna was saying. The amount that Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has in legacy savings they've accumulated is $4.6 billion. That's a huge amount of money that could be used to finance the creation and rehabilitation of Canada's housing stock.
Mr. Martin was asking about making changes and figuring out how we're going to either get the money or change the ideology to allow these changes to be made. Canadians don't fail on compassion; we're very compassionate people who understand the need to address poverty and would like to take action. Perhaps this committee needs to look at really explaining the rationale for social housing, because it looks as if Canadians don't understand why it makes sense to address these issues.
When I talk to friends and relatives who are not involved in this work, they don't get it. I do my best to explain, and the organization I work for does its best to explain, but it would be really good if you folks on this committee, who have taken the time to go out and learn about these issues, also included in your initiatives the chance to go out there and educate Canadians.
10:40 a.m.
NDP
Tony Martin NDP Sault Ste. Marie, ON
I couldn't agree with you more.
To Martin, when you read the papers and hear the Prime Minister talk about how they're going to deal with this big deficit we've run up, you know it's going to fall primarily on the backs of the not-for-profits. Those groups are targeted because many of them receive direct federal transfers. We already know how difficult it is. We've heard about the capacity and the infrastructure and how we continue to maintain that.
I've travelled the country and met with these not-for-profit groups. They're older and they're tired. They're committed and working as hard as they can. They're running out of steam and looking for some leadership in support resources.
One woman in Vancouver works in the downtown east side. She's a worker in the not-for-profit sector and said that she's competing with the poor for the housing stock that's available. That's how bad it is.
So what do we do? There's a tsunami coming for the not-for-profit sector, I believe. So how do we put the skids on that? If we don't, all of this will be for nothing.
10:40 a.m.
Co-chair, Manitoba Federation of Non-Profit Organizations Inc.
That is a very difficult question. It's fundamental in terms of service delivery, and I think there are two issues. One is that we expect people to leave the sector who have been in the sector for a long time. Most of them are women who are not prepared to retire, and they are going into poverty. We know that. That's important to know.
You also need to know in that context that two areas of growth for this sector are actually aboriginal first nations organizations and newcomer organizations. We haven't prepared ourselves for that in terms of what their capacities are and what they need to do. So there are really probably three or four areas of further investigation and discussion.
Going back to your other point, leadership on this issue is coming from the sector; it's not going to come from government. That's really a problem, because governments will actually either support this or not.
I go back to this question: is there a relationship of trust between the sector and government? In the provincial sphere, we are now having conversations with the province. By and large, provincial governments support the sector probably 60% of the time, but a lot of the money is transferred from the feds. We know that.
I think there are probably three things that need to be looked at very carefully, and that goes back to my question: is there an understanding that this sector actually delivers services on behalf of government? That is not necessarily understood. It's not understood by Canadians and it's not instantly understood that it is truly what's happening in Canada. I speak to various government departments, and we are not perceived necessary as the suppliers of that service in a way that I think is respectful and a way that identifies our needs.
So there's a provincial conversation and a national conversation. The national conversation is, where is this accord? Are we able to go back and possibly have a different range of activities to actually start that conversation with the current government to build on what we learned and the $190 million that was spent on that initiative three, four, or five years ago? I think going back will perhaps help us to go forward on that conversation.
I go back, Anita, to your point. It's unfortunate, but where there is traction is in the labour market conversation and labour market opportunities. We can probably try to address the retention, recruitment, and attraction, but it still goes back to the fundamental question, are there going to be resources available for the sector?
Governments provide the majority of it, but sectors are also generating revenue and other sources are in place. We need to bring all those parties together. This is multi-sectoral. It's not just a conversation between two levels of government and us; it's much broader than that.
We can learn what Quebec is doing, because Quebec is at this table and has been doing this with the économie sociale organizations in a way that actually does two things. It's fundamental in terms of a relationship of trust, where government has actually come to the table and recognizes the sector; and secondly, resources have been provided strategically to strengthen the sector.
10:45 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
Thanks, Tony.
We're going to move to Ms. Cadman for seven minutes.
10:45 a.m.
Conservative
Dona Cadman Conservative Surrey North, BC
My question is to Chief Fontaine.
I figured out that about 38% to 40% of first nation people live off-reserve. Do you think there should be a separate housing strategy for first nation people who are living off-reserve?
