Human Resources Committee on Jan. 26th, 2021

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you so much. It is a pleasure to listen to you today.

My next question is for Henry Wall.

One thing I have been pushing for is a guaranteed livable basic income, and one of the things I've been discussing is the high cost of poverty, including the direct correlation between rates of poverty and incarceration rates. Can you imagine if we invested the $115,000 a year in federal government funding into human rights? This is something that I've been saying, unfortunately, to deaf ears by Trudeau, who says that is off his radar. In any case, that's another frustration.

We have heard from previous witnesses that in comparison to the patchwork of funding currently being offered by the federal government, massive and sustainable investments are required to ensure indigenous peoples' right to housing.

Do you agree with this? What types of funding would be required in order for your organization to meet the needs of the communities you serve? I'm talking specifically about wraparound supports for people in need of supportive housing.

[Henry Wall]

Thank you for the question.

First, my apologies to the chair. I had the interpretation button on and I was not able to hear you, so please accept my apologies for earlier.

Having stable funding—and that's more than just one or two years—is incredibly important, especially when we are talking from a rural, remote and northern perspective, because government has not, in a meaningful way, invested in housing. Because of that we've lost our capacity to develop, build and create housing. When there are programs that come along, we have to spend a lot of resources on bringing in consultants from across the country to tell us how to do this and how to build it.

From that standpoint, having a more permanent structure as to how resources flow through a strategy like a national housing strategy, especially an indigenous housing strategy, allows our community to start planning for it. We can start aligning our labour force with it, and if we had it for a couple of years, suddenly the creation of housing is also an employment program. It becomes an income program.

We're not just building housing and shipping the resources out to other companies coming in to build in our community. It really is by us, for us. That is where longer-term funding would be a game-changer when it comes to creating housing.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Going back to Margaret Pfoh, one of the things we fought really hard for in Winnipeg Centre was a 24-7 safe space for women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA. I worked very closely with Adam Vaughan on it and the city, and I'm glad, after nine years, that they finally funded it.

How critical are low-barrier safe spaces, particularly for women, in response to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls?

[Margaret Pfoh]

It's absolutely essential. It's another missing piece in the national housing strategy. There is enough information to stand on its own, but the national housing strategy sure has a role to play in that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you very much, Ms. Pfoh and Ms. Gazan.

Mr. Melillo, please, you have five minutes.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you very much.

I'd like to thank both of our witnesses for joining us today and for being part of the discussion.

Mr. Wall, I want to thank you for your work for the people in our district. It does not go unnoticed, and I want to thank you for that. I will direct my questions to you.

One of the things you mentioned already—you were sort of getting into it and ran out of time—was the bureaucracy and making sure that housing programs are about housing. I'm curious as to whether you could speak more from your experience about some of the bureaucracy and red tape that has made it difficult for some of these important projects to move forward.

[Henry Wall]

I think this is where it's really important. Generally, strategies are very aspirational. It's motherhood and apple pie, but then we get to the actual nuts and bolts of it and the financing. Something that is a challenge, especially for smaller rural and northern communities, is the measurement of affordability from CMHC's standpoint. I think it's really important when we determine medium market rents—on which the affordability component is measured—that they are actually truly reflective of the community.

We've actually had to undertake our own studies just so that our housing is affordable under the programs. That actually took about a year to do, which really set us back. I'd say that's another piece: really ensuring, when we determine what affordability is, that the government has good data and that the hard work is done in collecting that data.

The other piece, too, is that, if it's about housing, then let's be a little less strenuous on the financing and the financial performance. I realize they are really important, but we also have banks that do that. If it really is a housing funding program, really consider what the unique costs of construction are in remote, rural and northern communities. They are very different from large urban centres.

The other piece that's missing is that when we talk about affordable housing, we just focus on the unit that can be rented out, ignoring cultural space, ignoring the fact that for indigenous families there's not just one child per family. In our area, our fastest-growing household demographic is single, lone parents with three or more children. Our housing has to fit that need. It's really difficult, from an affordability standpoint, if the resources don't quite match the building reality in our communities.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you. Those are some good points. I think the construction is one that often, I would say, the government does not do a good enough job of accounting for. There are higher construction costs, obviously, in rural and northern regions, as you mentioned.

I also want to ask about Reaching Home. Obviously, that's a program that your organization was able to utilize. Unfortunately, many other northern and rural regions were not, as I understand.

Could you talk a bit more, with the couple of minutes remaining, about some of the barriers to entry for rural and remote northern regions in trying to access a lot of these federal government programs?

[Henry Wall]

I want to say, too, that, working with the staff at CMHC and also at the ministry with respect to the Reaching Home program, we're certainly working through a lot of the details. I would say that we're making good progress. The staff are very open to listening and making changes.

What we find is that programs, whether they're provincial or federal, are very much either on or off reserve. In our region, you can walk 100 metres and you're in a first nation community, between a municipality and a first nation community. If I could make any recommendation, it would be that it would be really good to have programs, say with Reaching Home, where if individuals, as part of a homelessness prevention plan, are better supported in their communities, in their first nation communities, we can support said first nation communities in helping create those supports and those homes in those communities rather than.... Because we can't use our Reaching Home dollars in a first nation, we have to find a way of supporting individuals in communities that are not their homes, and they feel disconnected.

The idea is that the program should really foster and encourage inclusion and a sense of belonging. My advice to any federal program is to give as much flexibility at the local level as needed to address the need, from our perspective.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Wall and Mr. Melillo.

We're going to go now to Mr. Dong, please, for five minutes.

[Han Dong, Liberal, Don Valley North, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Wall and Ms. Pfoh, thank you very much for coming today. I'm certainly learning a lot from your presentations and from your answers to my colleagues' questions.

Mr. Wall, earlier on in response to my colleague MP Long's question, you were in the process of giving examples of some of the practical solutions. I would like to offer an opportunity for you to finish those examples. They were good. Again, I think they're going to be helpful to the committee.

[Henry Wall]

We find it really important, as we're looking at programs and creating new programs.... We're a unique organization in that we're one of 10 DSBs in northern Ontario. We're neither municipal government nor non-profit, so CMHC actually had a really hard time classifying what these ten organizations in northern Ontario really were. For the purposes of housing, we're deemed to be a municipality.

What we're finding is that, when we're really serious about what we need from a housing program, we actually need to listen to and understand the families we're trying to serve. If I could use the example in Sioux Lookout with the 20-unit supportive housing project that we did in partnership with the friendship centre and Ontario Aboriginal Housing Services, we had an idea going into it what the intent was. The intent was to end chronic homelessness. As we were meeting individuals who would fit, as part of the tenant selection process, and the project construction was still happening, we quickly realized that this wasn't just about ending homelessness. This was about family reunification as well.

Suddenly, we had to switch gears. I'm glad we did. In that particular example, of the first 20 residents who moved in—at least that we know of—they had at least 30 or more children who were wards of the Crown or in the foster care system. As much as it was about ending homelessness, this was about bringing families together.

I could share a number of examples, but that really was an eye-opener for us when it came to program design.

[Han Dong, Liberal, Don Valley North, ON]

Thank you.

We know that indigenous people are overrepresented among those who experience homelessness. You mentioned that you saw correctional services as part of the housing continuum. Could you expand a little bit on that? What do you see as a major factor contributing to this reality? How could an urban, rural and northern indigenous housing strategy help to address that?

[Henry Wall]

Basically it is just by adding more homes. That's what we need across Canada. We just need to have more housing, period.

What we see quite often, in particular with respect to young indigenous men, is that if the economic opportunity isn't there or they've lost hope, there's a high likelihood that they'll end up in the justice system. They'll be a victim of organized crime in terms of being recruited. It's fairly easy if individuals have lost hope. Once in the system, a young man might be brought to Kenora with one or two charges. He's processed through the justice system through the courts and then he's released on promise to appear, but he's not going back home. He's actually staying in Kenora, off reserve.

We looked at 3,060 breach cases in Kenora over a period of five years to see what the commonalities were. I can tell you that when individuals are brought to an urban centre, released and told to stay there, and then they're told that their condition is to just not drink or to not do drugs—if it was an addiction that brought them there—but they're sent on their way without supports, within hours or within a couple of days they're back in the justice system.

We might have a young man coming to Kenora with one or two charges. By the time he leaves, it's probably 20 to 30 charges. The likelihood of that young person not getting employment because of their criminal record.... It's incredibly difficult. That's what we're seeing.

As one of the police detachment commanders put it, in our region we have a charge factory when it comes to indigenous young men.

[Han Dong, Liberal, Don Valley North, ON]

Thank you. I have only a minute left.

I know my colleague, MP Vaughan, is always a big advocate for indigenous homelessness issues, and he consults many with regard to the Reaching Home program.

Do you have any thoughts on what improvements are needed? This question will go to Ms. Pfoh first.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Please give a short answer if you could, please, Ms. Pfoh.

[Margaret Pfoh]

To pick up a little bit from Henry's comments, I think the biggest thing is around the need for these subsidy dollars for support services. Bricks and mortar are fantastic. We do need more units for sure, but we have to recognize that the needs in our community are so substantial that we need subsidy dollars for support services, wraparound services, as well, if we're going to effect real change.

[Han Dong, Liberal, Don Valley North, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you very much, Mr. Dong.

We're going to do the two and a half minute rounds with the Bloc and the NDP, so we're going to go a little longer on this panel, which will shorten up the next one a little bit.

Ms. Chabot, you have two and a half minutes, please.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question is for you, Mr. Wall. I'd like you to give us more details. The situation is worrying—

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Ms. Chabot, I think your microphone is too far away from you.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

All these problems will one day be part of the committee's annals.

Mr. Wall, my question is about the lack of housing for seniors that you talked about. It's a pretty serious situation.

What approach do you recommend to address the housing needs of seniors who want to remain in their homes and communities for as long as possible? What would be the solution? Seniors are vulnerable. They need housing that is affordable but also safe. What would be the best approach to address this issue?

[Henry Wall]

I'll say from our experience that we've done a couple of senior home developments. These are new, and it gets really tricky when it comes to infrastructure funding. We need to have space to allow elders and seniors to age in place, and that requires programming space. If those costs aren't associated with a new development, that is very difficult from an affordability standpoint, especially around seniors housing.

In any housing programs specific for seniors and elders, the funding piece should also account for programming space that can be developed so that elders and seniors can age in place where the supports come to them. In a northern context, our elders and seniors are being shipped all over the province and Canada to access services. We're really looking at that and asking how can we reduce that and bring the services and the supports on site so they can age in place.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Wall.

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Are you talking about social services, food assistance, care, accompaniment? Are these the types of services that are normally offered by health services? Should there be a better linkage of these services?