Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on May 8th, 2007

[Brian Storseth, Conservative, Westlock—St. Paul, AB]

No, and I'm not trying to be combative either. Actually, I agree with what you said when you talked about giving people the ability to rise up and meet their goals and their abilities in life. I believe that's exactly what this legislation does. It gives people the opportunity to stick up for themselves. It gives them the basic fundamental framework that they need to be able to accomplish some of these things.

Thank you. We'll continue later.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Mr. Lévesque.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Good afternoon to the four of you. I'm delighted you could join us today.

We are on a kind of treadmill that is very difficult to get off. The department is having a very hard time coming up with the necessary funds for housing, drinking water and sanitation on reserves. Several aboriginal women came and told us that they had undertaken consultations but that they had run out of money and resources to finish those consultations. More resources must be made available. I assume the same is true for first nations.

There was a court ruling, Weyerhaeuser ("Haida") and Ringstad v. Taku River Tlingit, that lead some individuals to believe that there is a legal obligation to consult. The minister has said that this does not necessarily meet the conditions and that there is no obligation. For example, I absolutely agree with Ms. Archibald and Mr. Beaucage who say that respect between nations and individuals implies consultation and agreement. Both the Prime Minister and a minister promised that in the future consultations would be carried out when new legislation was being developed.

I have some questions with respect to what you consider to be consultation. Would consultations be carried out by band councils or by the Assembly of First Nations? Do you need 18 months, 30 months or 36 months to consult, as you and most other parties have stated? How do you think consultations should proceed?

[Grand Counsel Chief John Beaucage]

Thank you for the question.

I think the duty to consult does go beyond just going out to band councils. The whole idea or concept of collective rights is very important to us. Deputy Grand Chief Archibald talked about the aspect of survival, that it's based upon collective well-being. Even today we have a process of collective rights, consulting our community members whenever anything is important to the community.

When we consult, we go beyond just the band councils. Band councils are elected as spokespersons for the community at large, but when there's an important issue, all of the community has to be consulted. That doesn't necessarily mean going out community by community, 633 times across this country. Maybe it just means going to, say, the first nations along the north shore of Lake Huron, or maybe it means going to the first nations in the southeast of Ontario—as a grouping, to get feedback, to provide information, to get a consensus on what is required. Consensus-building is very important to us, and that's where the importance of the collectivity is involved.

At the Union of Ontario Indians, we've already determined that a good consultation process for our 42 communities takes about six months. We can get consensus in six months for very important issues. That's a milestone. It may be different for different types of legislation, but at least we have an idea of what it takes for us.

Each Nishnawbe Aski—I'll turn this over to Deputy Grand Chief Archibald in a moment--will have a different idea of what consultation is for their communities. The same goes for Alberta and Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Because we're diverse, because we're a little bit different, it means something a little different to each one of us.

[Deputy Grand Chief RoseAnne Archibald]

Thank you.

I want to add to Grand Chief Beaucage's comments in that when we look at the specifics of consultation, the actual on-the-ground kind of work that needs to be undertaken, we have many issues because of the fact that our first nations are remote. They're accessible only by air for most of the year and sometimes by winter road, depending on nature.

So with us, the actual process of consultation is more than just saying, “Here's the document, have a look at it, and we'll get back to you, or you get back to us”. It is an inclusive process that includes issues like education.

Getting back to the linkages between, for example, our values and those seven sacred teachings, what are the linkages we can make with basic human rights that are considered across the world? How are they connected to our own sense of belief?

So the consultation process does take time. It's just the nature of the number of communities we have, and six months is really inadequate in terms of a timeframe.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Thank you.

We'll go to the government side now.

Go ahead, Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Perhaps I'll just go back to some of the comments made earlier. I believe that somebody—I'm not sure if it was you, Deputy Grand Chief Archibald—referenced the resources in the community, for instance, how post-secondary education funding is allocated to members in your community. I don't know if within your community there is a set policy in terms of how funding for students is allocated.

[Deputy Grand Chief RoseAnne Archibald]

Actually, that was Grand Chief Beaucage who talked about post-secondary.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Sure, it was Grand Chief Beaucage.

[Grand Council Chief John Beaucage]

Yes, I guess that's one of the aspects that concerns me in terms of the right to education. The right to education is ameliorated by the aspect that there are not enough dollars to go around. Most communities have long waiting lists of students who wish to partake of the post-secondary education funding, and just about every community has a different policy on how to allocate the dollars.

I'll even refer to my own community, the Wasauksing First Nation. I was chief there for eight years, and we had enough funding to fund around 50 to 60 students per year in post-secondary. We would often have 100 applications. So then you would have to hold back some applications, and they would have to either wait another year or get student loans to carry on with their education.

We would allocate first to the people who lived on reserve and allocate next to the people who lived off reserve, and if there was enough money to go around, it was a first come, first served kind of situation. But somebody was always left out, and somebody was always upset.

Whether or not that could result in a human rights complaint...perhaps it could in terms of how some first nations are made up. Some first nations have chief and council all from one family. Say that all the applications for housing and education were allocated to members of that family; then maybe there is a human rights violation. But it really can be in the eye of the beholder, I guess, because each first nation has its own policies.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

So academics aren't necessarily the primary reason for allocation.

[Grand Council Chief John Beaucage]

Some communities probably do have academics. I know that many communities will require the students to have a minimum grade point average to carry on. Initially, it just could be all over the place. But mostly, it's that the people who live on the first nation come first.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

So the band council can choose to allocate based, really, on their own jurisdiction, their own decision-making. It's really based on whom they would like to see receive the funding. For instance, if a student on reserve wanted to make an appeal because he or she was the best student in the high school based on academics and didn't get any funding because, as you said, the person might not be part of the right family, do you see the Canadian Human Rights Act as a vehicle for the student to lodge a complaint?

[Grand Council Chief John Beaucage]

It could very well be, yes. Normally what would happen, and I've seen it happen several times, is that the student who was turned down would actually make a presentation to chief and council and present a case to chief and council. In my own community this happened several years back, and the young lady came to the chief and council, made a very good presentation, and we were able to find some extra dollars. Eventually this lady took a business course at Harvard University and graduated with a master's degree after that, because she was very high in marks and a very driven young lady. We congratulated her. She is now working with first nations throughout Ontario.

There are some success stories, but the fact of the matter is there are too few resources. It's a very, very difficult job to spread out funding for 10 people between 20 people who are asking for it.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

I agree with you. That is a challenge that's faced throughout our country in a lot of communities.

Don't you believe that if section 67 was repealed, this would help ensure that all communities might achieve that degree of success that you talked about, where academics are considered more of an important factor?

[Grand Council Chief John Beaucage]

At the Union of Ontario Indians we believe that section 67 should be repealed. We see no problem with it being repealed. We're just looking at the aspect of how it's implemented, the timeframe of implementation, the capacity to have what we consider a local dispute resolution process, rather than a dispute resolution process with, say, a non-native human rights commission. I believe there should be a first nations human rights commission to look after some of the issues and some of the traditional and customary aspects of what's required at a community level.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Okay, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Madam Crowder.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

On the matter of education, I think it's simplistic to indicate that simply a repeal of section 67 of the Canadian Human Rights Act will somehow or other afford band members who want education the access and opportunity, given the very serious underfunding, which of course this committee studied, and we made some strong recommendations about additional funding. A simple repeal of section 67 will not improve water, housing, or education on communities, given the detailed analysis that's been done across the board on the underfunding.

On the back and forth around the questions here—and I'm looking at language like “giving people the rights on reserve”—there was some suggestion that perhaps the traditional ways weren't respectful of human rights.

Grand Chief Archibald, I really take your point about thousands of years of history, that people lived in peace and harmony and respect for each other. The crux of this really seems to be the lack of recognition on a nation-to-nation status. It seems to me that without appropriate consultation, what we again have is one nation imposing their laws on another nation. That's how it seems to me, and I wonder if you could comment on that. You've talked about the seven sacred teachings and the way your people have lived for thousands of years. I wonder if you could comment on that—and others as well.

[Deputy Grand Chief RoseAnne Archibald]

First of all, I want to go back to your original comment, which came from the other member's comment about education, and to add to what Grand Chief Beaucage said. The repeal of section 67 won't be a great valve that will open up educational opportunities for people in our communities. It is one part of a larger picture.

In terms of our own status in Canada and the nation-to-nation relationship that is evident in the history of our country, if I think about the question in a pragmatic way on the issue of self-government and what government was like prior to contact, if we had real consultation and meaningful discussion about where first nations would fit into Canada, I think we'd be in a different place today. There would have been more of a mutual respect for us as nations for building Canada into the new society it is today. But it didn't happen.

A lot of negative things have happened in the past that have brought us to the state where we are today. First nations are continually inundated with policies, procedures, and legislation. Everybody focuses on those things as the solution and are blinded to the fact that there are thousands of years of history.

When I talk about this forum, a place where we could have meaningful dialogue, I don't have a specific idea on how we can do it. To me, it would be making the same mistake that Canadian governments have always made with us, which is to suppose and to think they have the solution, to bring it forward, and to ask what we think.

I'm not going to put myself in a position to bring it forward. I'd only say that if we mutually build the process, then the society in which we live in Canada will be more just and we will have this sense of equality we're all striving towards.

At the same time, there has to be room to respect the perspective from which first nations come. I heard a member talk about individual rights being the paramount thing in Canada. How do we reconcile these two ideas so that they can live side by side in this country? I think that ultimately individual rights need to be balanced with collective rights.

We have to start talking about those things in a meaningful way. We have to actually start coming up with mutual solutions, as opposed to coming at each other with our own perspectives or with what we think is right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

To follow up on some of those points—it's again only an opinion, but I'm a politician with a few opinions.

In my view, Canada is seen in the world as a beacon for human rights. In fact, people from nations all over the world, with histories dating back tens of thousands of years, are travelling to Canada because we have a human rights record that is second to none. Yet we have this problem where we don't extend human rights to our first nations people. It's been in place for 30 years now through this exemption.

I'd have to ask you this question, Vice Chief Archibald. As a parliamentarian, knowing we're in a minority government and we might not have the opportunity again to repeal this blight on our history, and knowing the world looks to Canada for human rights and they see this terrible blight on our record, how can I sit here and not actually move forward with this important exemption? What am I to do, as a parliamentarian? Should I sit here and not repeal it?

[Deputy Grand Chief RoseAnne Archibald]

I think you're focusing on section 67 as being this magic solution that will transform first nations societies, when the real transformation has to happen on two levels. One is internal. We have to take responsibility for our own healing from the different impacts of colonization. What are we going to do to heal ourselves and bring ourselves to a place of health, where we can be contributing to a picture of Canada that is more positive? That's one part of that.

The second part of the equation is that government has to start talking to us and finding those solutions to bring the standard of living up to the levels of other Canadians. Part of the issue in the past has been serious underfunding. I recently read a memorandum that was circulated in Indian Affairs that said continued underfunding of first nations is killing them. That is one part of it as well.

But if we can come together and really find solutions that meet the objectives we both have, then I think we can get there. This process of our coming to you and offering recommendations, to me, is not the building that we really need to do in this country. I'm thinking forward and trying to have leading-edge thinking in terms of where we are going in this country. How do we reconcile our human rights record internationally when it comes to first nations? I really want to see our first nations people have the same opportunities and the same standards that everybody else has. Right now, when I go to some communities—not all—I see sad situations that need to be corrected.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

And you think that just funding and resources alone will correct that?

[Deputy Grand Chief RoseAnne Archibald]

No, I didn't say that. I said that's one component.