Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Nov. 9th, 2006

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

I can very brief.

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

Could you repeat that please?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Your question demands a brief response, and that response is yes. It does threaten the direction that we, you, the provincial and territorial governments and the Aboriginal chiefs identified, which is to say the need to remedy the absolutely unacceptable situation that you have just described.

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

Mr. Martin, the Kelowna Accord provided for a number of things, including an investment of approximately $300 million over five years for housing on the reserves. It is happenstance, but you may have noticed this morning that there was a housing crisis on several reserves. It is urgent to intervene.

Based on your estimates, out of the 80,000 housing units required across Canada, how many could have been built with this $300 million?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

The amount is certainly not sufficiently high to fill the gap, but it would certainly allow for significant progress.

I would also like to add that for housing, the total we discussed was over $1.6 billion, which is much more than $300 million. In any event, you are right: $300 million would certainly be a good start. You are also right to say that the Kelowna Accord is not the end of the road, but rather the very beginning.

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

Mr. Goodale, you explained earlier to my colleague Ms. Neville that around the time of the Kelowna meeting, the estimated budget was approximately $5.1 billion. My question is very precise: where did this money go? We have not heard anything about it. We would like to know what happened to it. I would imagine that the first nations and Inuit who are listening to us would also like to know.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Monsieur Lemay, the last sources and uses table to which I had access was the one I referred to in my response to Ms. Neville, the one dated November 24, 2005. In that table the provision was made explicitly for the $5.096 billion.

As I answered in my very brief answer at the end of the questioning by Ms. Neville, the sources and uses table cannot be changed. Once an item is in the sources and uses table and committed to by policy decisions of the Government of Canada, with the policy consent of cabinet, the financial consent of the Minister of Finance, and the executive authority of the Prime Minister, it can't be changed unless the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance decide to reverse their position.

I can assure you that in the time between November 24 and the change of government in the early part of February 2006, Mr. Martin and I did not change our minds, and the money was there on February 6, 2006.

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

Was this $5 billion in addition to the funds that the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada already had for current operations?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Wascana, SK]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Madame Crowder.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

And thank you, Mr. Martin, for coming before the committee today on Bill C-292.

Clearly the NDP supports Bill C-292, as it did the Kelowna accord.

I have a bit of a statement to make. I am deeply troubled by the fact that the issues around poverty, water, housing, economic development, and all of those issues are not issues that just arose in the last couple of years. There is long-standing, well-documented evidence that for decades the neglect in first nations, Inuit, and Métis communities has been substantial. I would argue that both your Liberal government and past Conservative governments have a great debt owing to first nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples across the country.

I could name the communities now that are in crisis: Pikangikum, Kashechewan, Penelakut, Garden Hill, where we are talking about TB outbreaks, rheumatic fever.... It is shocking. The Teslin Tlingit people right now have a land claim that has been signed off, yet implementation is going exceedingly slowly. We can come back to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples of 1996. I have a few of the recommendations here, of which I would suspect very few have been implemented. And you mentioned the tripartite agreement that was signed in Kelowna, British Columbia.

Certainly the first nations leadership in British Columbia took the Kelowna accord on good faith. They subsequently signed an agreement between you, Premier Campbell, and the first nations leadership in British Columbia and in fact documented targets, goals, substantial time lines, and those kinds of things.

I am completely baffled at how a country like Canada that purports to be a champion of human rights and equality could wait until 2005 to take some steps that could be considered meaningful.

I wonder if you could comment on that.

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Chair, there have been over the course of the last number of years some very extensive studies on the relationship, and on the policies of the Government of Canada and of a number of other provincial governments going back to Confederation and then to union governments before Confederation, regarding how aboriginal issues were dealt with. I don't think any Canadian reading those would feel very proud of what transpired.

The point you're making in asking how this could have happened over these years may be explained by the circumstances of the time, but I don't think I would buy that as an answer. I think this has been a very deeply human issue in which paternalistic policies misapplied have led to the situation in which we now find ourselves.

Let me just answer for one second.

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

May I ask you to include, though, in your answer what it is it we need to do to break this logjam?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

I've got to say that if you look at the debates in the House of Commons, in which all the political parties who have been here historically were involved, you find very little debate that really focused on the human tragedy and the need to turn it around. I think the answer is that we all bear our share of the blame. I think the aboriginal leadership also must step forward and accept its responsibilities.

The question you now ask is what we should do. I believe that the course in which we should engage includes the original meetings between the aboriginal leadership and cabinet, the round tables that Mr. Scott engaged in right across the country--because they have to be involved--and then the setting of very clear targets and the commitment of money to achieve them. That is by far the best answer.

I think you are absolutely right. I wish it had been done much earlier.

A lot was done earlier with the healing fund and the aboriginal head start program, but I think this is the first time a policy with such a comprehensive nature has been followed. Mr. Scott may want to complement this, but I do believe that this is the right course.

[Andy Scott, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Ms. Crowder, I think that the same honest desperation that I can hear in your voice led us to bring together 475 aboriginal leaders and 22 cabinet ministers in April 2004 to say, let's fix this. This is a blight on our country. It's a blight on our governments. And everybody has to accept responsibility for what the situation was in April 2004.

I think nobody is proud of that history. Everybody is embarrassed by this history. Let's fix it.

A lot of this is about that, and a lot of this is about trust. A lot of this is about collaboration. So in April we met. As a group, we together decided on the six areas that we were going to study. I was the minister of housing at the time. That September we started with health, coincidentally, because there was a first ministers meeting on health. The aboriginal leaders were rightfully saying, “You said we'd have a seat at the table; we want to be there”. They were, and we did the health piece.

That winter we took all six areas for deliberation and had round tables all over Canada. I attended all of them. At that time it became apparent to me that there was going to be a significant resource issue. Also everywhere we went, it became obvious that we were going to have to engage the provinces.

I held a meeting on March 17 with the provinces.

I'm sorry...?

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

You have twenty seconds.

[Andy Scott, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

May 31 was the policy retreat. In June it was the provinces again with the aboriginal leaders, and then in November it was Kelowna.

The point I'm making is that this was a 14-month deliberative process to deal exactly with what you suggested. You asked the former Prime Minister what he would do. The reality is that if it were me, I'd do this over again if that's what it took, but that seems to me to be an unnecessary step backwards.

I think this is the solution, and the provinces believe it. They believed it. Now they're worried about money, so the provinces are not going to step up, because they don't want to step up if there are no resources.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Thank you.

Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Martin, did you bring a copy of the Kelowna accord with you today?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

No, I didn't, but we can certainly get one for you very quickly. There are a lot of them available.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

You'd think you would have brought a copy today.

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Probably not, because I assumed that you had read it. It was tabled in the House of Commons.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Martin, there is a press release. I think that's what you're referring to. That's what was tabled in the House--a news release of November 25. Clearly, it is not an accord. Perhaps I'm not as learned a parliamentarian as you are, but I do know that an accord has a signature page.

I was wondering if perhaps you could indicate the time at which this accord was signed by the 13 leaders that you met with?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

All 13 leaders at a publicly televised meeting stood up and endorsed the accord, as did the leadership--

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Mr. Martin, we watched that on television. We didn't see a signature.