Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on June 12th, 2006

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ladies, I am very happy to see you here. I listened carefully to your comments. Could you give the Clerk a copy of the document you read to us?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Roger Préfontaine]

We already have one.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

In French or in English?

[A voice]

Yes.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

So you read the document that had already been submitted. You didn't make any changes to it? Is it the same thing? I think there have been changes.

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

I can clarify that. The version I gave today was a condensed version, because I was told that I had only ten minutes. I know if I went through the document that was submitted, that would have taken more like 15 minutes. It has been cut down.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Are the conclusions the same?

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

Yes.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Okay. I want to understand something , and you'll see how practical I am. You said that women should design and deliver the curriculum, because it is mostly they who deal with education. According to you, in what proportion are aboriginal women responsible for the education of their children? For example, are they responsible for 98% of it?

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

That's a pretty difficult question to answer, but I do understand that there are a lot of women-headed households in which the father is not actively involved. I realize that's a very general statement, but I know that compared to the proportion of households headed by women in the rest of Canadian society, the proportion of households headed by women in aboriginal society is much higher. I'm sorry, I do not have that exact percentage, but it's a significant percentage.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Are we to understand that, before even designing and delivering a curriculum, we will need to help single parent women and women in general who deal with their children's education so that they will be able to help their children develop?

[Karen Schuyler]

Yes, I think you're right. At the same time as we are trying to help the children, we have to help the young mothers to come along too. I know they want to help their children learn, and if they can't help their children even with their homework, then they will feel they're not fulfilling their responsibility either. If that could happen at the same time in the same place, that would be ideal.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Suppose we're in an extraordinary world, led by an extraordinary political party, which has not been elected yet.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

We recognize ourselves.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

In this extraordinary world, we have a good curriculum and we help children pursue their education. They complete their high school and college education. Let's go that far. What would these young need to go to university to study medicine, for example? I know the communities badly need doctors and teachers. I wouldn't dare say they need lawyers, because there are too many of us.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

They need engineers.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Indeed.

Today, in 2006, what gets in the way of meeting this objective? Do you have an opinion on this?

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

I'll take a stab at answering that.

I really believe strong role models play a very important role in encouraging young people to reach careers they may not have considered. Also, the feeling has to get out there to aboriginal youth that to be a doctor is possible; that it's not airy-fairy or out in left field somewhere; that it can be done. I'm frustrated that there's so much communication, whether it's subtle or not so subtle, that “you can't do it; it's way above you.”

That triggers another comment I'd like to make, which is that the self-esteem of individual youth has to be increased so that they can believe in themselves and believe in their ability to become doctors and other kinds of professionals, and that they might want to do it. For me as a youngster, that was not in the realm of something I could attain to, and I would like to see that changed with the younger generations.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Thank you.

Madam Crowder.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank you both for coming today before the committee. It's important to have representation from a broad cross-section of organizations that speak on behalf of first nations, Inuit, and Métis, which actually leads to my first question.

There is some confusion around language. When the department presented its aboriginal education plan, they titled it “Aboriginal Education” and they cited throughout the plan statistics about aboriginal peoples. But when they actually got to money, they talked about investment for “first nation” students. My understanding of your organization is that you represent first nations and Métis women both on-reserve, off-reserve, status, and non-status. Is that correct?

The department itself, when it's dealing with education, talks about its jurisdiction in kindergarten to grade 12 as being on-reserve. So it would seem that there is a large gap in what the federal government sees itself as being responsible for. I wonder if that's your experience as well.

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

Yes, it certainly is, because INAC is only involved with registered Indians, people whose names are on the registry. Well, there are many people who have aboriginal descent and may never ever have the hope of getting onto the registry rolls. Or there are some who are in the process of getting onto the registry because of the changes, for example, to Bill C-31. INAC is only involved with the registered Indians, as opposed to the total aboriginal population.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Right now, many of the first nations, Inuit, and Métis women in Canada really have no access to federal government programs; they are reliant on provincial government programs for their access to education, if they do not live on reserve.

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

It actually depends on the particular first nation as well. For example, it depends on the education council or the education department within the first nation--how much money they have and what their political will is to support students not necessarily living on the reserve.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

At the end of your presentation, you talked about needing to raise the issue around racialized, sexualized violence against women. Of course, I come from British Columbia, where we have a significant number of aboriginal women, both on the Vancouver east side and on Highway 16, which is being called the “highway of tears”. These are mostly aboriginal women, who are either missing or dead.

I noted your talk about the link between poverty and education and, of course, what we loosely call the social determinants of health, about housing, about education, about access to health services.

I notice that when the department has, in the process of developing an education action plan in response to the Auditor General's report in 2004 that talked about the fairly grim state of affairs...when I looked at their plan, I did not see how women were consulted.

I wondered if the Native Women's Association of Canada had been included in the development of this policy and the framework agreement that's coming. Have they been consulted? Have they been included at the table? Has there been outreach done to the communities, either on- or off-reserve, for women specifically?

[Anita Olsen-Harper]

I'm actually fairly new with the Native Women's Association of Canada, but I am the team lead for research and policy for the Sisters in Spirit, which addresses the missing and murdered women, including Vancouver's downtown east side and the highway of tears.

We're just getting off the ground now--entering year two--to start addressing the issues of what communities can do to help the lives of aboriginal women be more safe and to provide some incentive so that when they do leave the reserve.... I mean, young people look around and want the best for themselves. How are they safe? What can we do to guarantee their safety as they go out there looking to see what's good and right for them, and also to have supports for when they come back?

Unfortunately, most reserves don't have that. We're beginning to put together educational tools for different communities that have to do with missing murdered aboriginal women. As far as NWAC's participation, we were at the round table discussions.

Karen, what else do you know about that?