Human Resources Committee on Dec. 3rd, 2020

[Susan McGee]

It's one of the projects right now that is in front of the rapid housing initiative review.

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Okay.

This question will be very similar to the one I asked Mr. Lawson. From a process standpoint, let's say you were in government and you had an opportunity to kind of sculpt or script how the funds would come through to you. How would you like to see it flow through to you?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Please be brief, if you could. We're into extra time here.

[Susan McGee]

I will be very, very quick.

We need to be held accountable and given metrics around what we're expected to deliver, but this circular kind of expecting us to be able to make 15-year commitments on support dollars that nobody in Canada commits to, other than on a yearly basis, doesn't invest in the organization and doesn't invest in the system. This expectation that the system will continue to work and that we'll figure it out creates this very conditional feedback loop, which makes it very difficult to really move things forward.

I think there needs to be confidence in the local operators and the system. You know, hold us accountable, but I think trying to predict the future is hard for all of us.

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. McGee, and thank you, Mr. Long.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question goes to Mr. Lawson-Swain.

At the beginning of your testimony, you said, in a very heartfelt way, that you wanted to see a day when your communities have the same access to housing as non-indigenous communities. That is perfectly legitimate.

If you had a solution for us this evening, given your realities, what would that solution be?

How could we best proceed? How could we best respond to your needs, given all the federal programs?

[Marcel Lawson-Swain]

I'll go to my earlier comments and maybe to those made earlier by Adam Vaughan. We are in desperate need of a fourth direction and some national funding, and to be recognized as urban indigenous peoples with the right to create our own governance and provide resources to our communities in the manner we see fit across this country. We have not had equitable access to resources and money to do that, and we need that rapidly.

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

What kind of dialogue do we have to engage in to reach the solution you are advocating, given the sometimes different realities among indigenous peoples?

[Marcel Lawson-Swain]

Thank you for that. I agree. Definitely, the realities for our communities are different right across the country.

I think there's a significant synergy across the country for urban organizations, whether it be through the Metro Vancouver Aboriginal Executive Council, which participates on councils like that across the country. There are urban native housing providers across the country. There are those groups that are funding through Reaching Home.

I think what we could be doing is using Reaching Home as an example of what we can do to deliver resources on the ground and to have the community make the decisions on what the priorities are and how the money is to be spent. I think that model is there for us to look at, and we should be examining that rather quickly so that we can mimic that for a national indigenous housing council to allocate resources across the country.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Lawson-Swain.

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

Next is Ms. Gazan, please, for two and a half minutes.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a question for you, Madam McGee. You spoke a lot about declining mental health. In the riding I represent, Winnipeg Centre, I certainly see a rapid decline in mental health and increasing rates of homelessness as the pandemic persists. With outbreaks in our shelters, our community is in dire need of housing, and certainly low-barrier housing, but also in need of more mental health supports and wraparound services within these housing units.

I wanted you to speak to the importance of having these kinds of wraparound supports, but also wraparound supports that are culturally relevant to the people who are needing housing. I say this because in Winnipeg 70% of this shelterless community is indigenous, yet the services and the housing support just continue to be lacking. Could you speak to that?

Thank you.

[Susan McGee]

Certainly. Really quickly, I said that we don't know what we don't know in some contexts, but in others, I would have to say that we could not have more evidence for the importance of certain types of support environmentally: sleep hygiene, how people are supported and housed, how they survive a day and how much that erodes their mental health and contributes to long-term challenges. There's such a wealth of evidence in support of the need to address those challenges and barriers.

Included in that, when it comes to cultural supports, I would layer.... We talk about culturally informed supports, and that may mean different things to different people, but really, from a mental health lens, it is also about safety. It's also about recognizing the trauma community members have faced.

What contributes to our own experience of safety can vary. I think that's where, when we talk about culture, we are talking about many aspects of what we may think about in terms of culture. We provide training and support for land-based cultural experiences, but also, just more deeply and richly, there is that idea of trauma, the impact of trauma and the importance of safety, and how we create safety when we're supporting people, being really tangible and directly related to mental health.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Ms. McGee.

Thank you, Ms. Gazan.

Next we're going to go to Mr. Vis, please, for five minutes.

Go ahead, Mr. Vis.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Chief Leon, if you were given more opportunities to do things like building micro homes, as you mentioned, how many more people do you think would come back to the traditional territory of the Sts'ailes First Nation?

Secondly, has the federal government been able to provide or do the regulations allow you to look for innovative housing solutions, or does that create more barriers for you?

[Chief Ralph Leon Jr.]

I think it will create more opportunity for our people to come home if we're able to do more micro homes. Like I said, the majority of our people live off reserve, and those are only the band members. We have 300 community members who live here also; we didn't utilize those numbers. I think there are some barriers in the ways that we apply for funds.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

You mentioned earlier the challenges that band members had in accessing housing off reserve. Generally, where do band members from Sts'ailes go when they're not living on your traditional territory? What are some of the first-hand challenges you've heard about?

[Chief Ralph Leon Jr.]

Right now we know of a lot of our people being in Chilliwack and Abbotsford, and a lot of our people live as far away as California or England. They're just everywhere. Wherever a job is created, a lot of them go there. There's no opportunity here; then they'll go elsewhere.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

How has the high cost of housing in Chilliwack, Mission and Abbotsford impacted the ability of your members to find adequate housing?

[Chief Ralph Leon Jr.]

It's impacted them quite a bit. We have quite a few who are homeless right now in Chilliwack and Abbotsford. Some of them sought my help—your help—with COVID funds. That helped them out a little bit, but still, Chilliwack doesn't have a place for our people to be housed. The chance for them to afford a home out there is pretty slim.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

What final advice would you have for me as your representative, and for members of this committee? What can we really do to help people in rural settings such as yours to make a difference in the lives of your band members both on and off reserve?

[Chief Ralph Leon Jr.]

I believe transportation is a high priority. We're trying to get a health centre here. We just do not find enough people to work for that. For our people to work off reserve, it's pretty challenging to get to Agassiz, Mission, Abbotsford or Chilliwack. The bus, the public transit, doesn't come here. That's one big barrier to jobs, finances and all those things. That's one thing I'd ask for.

[Brad Vis, Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Do you feel sometimes that things are stacked against your people, even though they want to succeed and they want to have those jobs, and that because they're living in substandard housing on the reserve, it impacts other aspects of their personal and professional lives?

[Chief Ralph Leon Jr.]

Yes, it does. A lot of them can't afford Wi-Fi or even a telephone. They're stuck on social assistance or whatever it may be with those barriers to transportation, and they're trying to get out. You can tell when it's SA day or when they need to go to the food bank. They're all out near the highway hitchhiking. Our people have to stop and give them a ride. That's a big barrier.

What I'd like you to do is to come here again and communicate with my chief administrative officer and some of our council and just hear them out.