Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on May 15th, 2007

[Doris Young]

I totally agree that there should be appropriate consultation and that time should be given to do it; it should not just be in a rushed fashion. Our people can't provide the proper knowledge to the government about what it is we need when we're asked to rush into this process. Rush in and rush out; that is not the way we do things. I don't think it's the way anybody should do things, especially on legislation or an issue as important as human rights.

Dialogue with a computer is very difficult. Most of our people don't speak the language. The suggestion of working with and through a computer is good for those of us who know how to do it—and sometimes we're not so good at it—but not for the community.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Can we move on to the government side? Mr. Storseth, please.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much for coming forward today. I found this to be, as always, very educational, very interesting to listen to. I find these consultations, or whatever you want to call them, to be very informative.

I want to start out by asking Ms. Harvard a question.

You talked today about how your organization has been fighting for this for many years, and my colleague pointed out the number of attempts the previous government had made to repeal section 67. This has been a topic for several years. It seems a stretch to me to think that in all those attempts and all those years a proper consultative process has never taken place.

Is that what we're saying here today, that with all those attempts there has never been a proper consultative process?

[Esther Sanderson]

Not that I know of in our community.

[Dawn Harvard]

Not to my knowledge, but I'm a relatively young person.

[Esther Sanderson]

We've been around for a while, so we know.

[Doris Young]

We've been around as long as Dawn's mother has been around. That is correct.

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

So then, if you don't mind my asking, what is your vision of a proper consultative process? You must have a vision of what you perceive as being.... And I ask you to be somewhat definitive with it.

We talk about grassroots, but in point of fact, we're talking about a general Canadian population in which 64% actually vote, and 50% of those who don't vote say they aren't learned enough to have an opinion even to vote. So I don't understand how we're going to find this great process where 100% of people who are going to be affected by this legislation are going to get this proper consultation that we've talked about.

Lots of times it is after people have the ability to reach out and utilize these human rights that they become entrenched and they take it upon themselves to learn them.

So I just ask you that question.

And I ask the chair, if you would, to let me know when there's about a minute left.

[Esther Sanderson]

Can I be the first to answer that?

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

Absolutely.

[Esther Sanderson]

In the prairie provinces, there are more aboriginal young people than old people. The aboriginal population is fast becoming a major issue within those provinces. If our people do not understand how the Canadian human rights are going to affect them, then it's not going to be a very effective law anywhere within those provinces—and I can speak for Manitoba.

With the consultation process, what I would like to see is that we ask the question of our people: What are human rights to you? What does that mean to you?

It may not even be the same as what's coming down from this area in terms of what human rights mean, but I'm sure there's a meeting place in there. We do not want to be discriminated against because we're women or because we're old or because we're disabled. I know those are principles that we certainly would want within that human rights law, but the rest then is up to the people to define: how are we going to carry this out?

The people in our communities know what they want and how all of this is going to affect them, but no one has ever come to ask us, what is it that you want?

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

Sorry, could you be brief, Ms. Harvard? I have one more quick point.

[Dawn Harvard]

I consider myself a fairly well-educated person. I will have a doctorate in August. It was not until well into my studies that I realized section 67 even existed. Many people do not realize until it affects them personally. So a large portion of our community is that way. You'll never be able to get 100%. That's just a fact. But certainly there has to be somewhere between 100% and nothing.

Again, I point back to the problems with the MRP. We had a consultation, expecting women to come from our communities to one centre—

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

I don't mean to interrupt. I just want to make my last point.

That's exactly my point. Until these people are actually affected by this legislation...that will be one of the catalysts to get them to become more engaged with it.

I find it rather rich to have the opposition sitting across the way and saying that we're trying to jam this down people's throats after 30 years and they're just wanting to do things properly. If they're going to accuse us of one thing, I think they should own up to the fact that they are trying to delay this process.

Mr. Lemay consistently threatens to bring a motion of suspension toward our witnesses, and I find it rich to have the Liberal opposition point out the fact that their government didn't provide any consultation process over the last 15 years.

Anyway, I'm sure my time is up, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

It is.

Mr. Lévesque, please.

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

Ladies, thank you for having made the effort to come here. You really have to love what you are doing to do so. You may say that I am paid very well to love it, but I do it out of love as well.

I remember having heard a prime minister say that you would be consulted in the future and that significant changes to the act would be discussed with you. I think that this is a significant change. Just as we have done with other witnesses, I would like to draw you attention -- I do not want to force or pressure you -- to the fact that we now have a minority government.

I would like this bill to be passed and to be sensitive to the situation of first nations people. I wonder if you have looked at the changes that could be made to Bill C-44, an application protocol with an interpretation clause, in order that it could go into effect gradually. Other witnesses have mentioned a notwithstanding clause. If you suggest the time necessary for the bill to come into effect, we will see if it is feasible.

I will give you the floor.

[Doris Young]

The question of amendments being made and enforced gradually is the thing that we're against, because we need to let the women know, and they need to let us have a dialogue with them about what this bill is actually supposed to be all about. If it's passed and they have the opportunity to come and speak about it after it's passed, it's not the same. It's not the same, because they're being asked to speak to something that is already in place, and then it's more or less like a rubber stamp.

I don't think that's good consultation.

[Dawn Harvard]

I would like to say that nobody has ever yet asked for my opinion on what I think amendments should be, so I am not yet prepared, but I'm positive we have some that we will certainly look at and be able to forward.

On the concept of gradually enforcing human rights, I really struggle with these things, because on the one hand, a fundamental principle that my elders, my grandmother and my grandfather, have always taught me is that we were the original people. We are human beings, and so there really shouldn't, in principle, be any problem with that expectation that we be treated as such, the same as everybody else in Canada. So I think we really do need to just make sure we have those legal minds, those who have the knowledge of those possible consequences, to help guide us through that process of ensuring the safety and protection of those who are vulnerable, because they are the ones who are most in need of the protection of their human rights, and they are the ones who are least likely to be able to come here or to have their voices heard.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

On the government side, Mr. Bruinooge.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, witnesses, for coming today.

I was happy to hear your presentations. Perhaps, Ms. Harvard, you could talk a bit further about your own family's experiences in relation to, in your own opinion, becoming second-class citizens in your community.

[Dawn Harvard]

Actually, I find this very interesting because I do know a lot about what a consultative process is not or what a bad consultative process is.

My mother's experience when she went to court was that our women in our communities had to ride Greyhound buses, they had to bake cookies for bake sales, raffles, to come here to Ottawa to fight her own court case. The National Indian Brotherhood at the time was paying women to come to speak against her. Chiefs were flying in airplanes and staying in deluxe hotels to come to speak against her, and that is not a fair process. It clearly was biased. And these are the kinds of things we need to keep in our minds, not to berate anybody or to point fingers but to remember what has happened in the past so that we do not repeat these mistakes, so that we make sure that those who do not have the financial ability do have the ability to speak. I am pretty sure that is what Canada is all about. It's not about only the rich having power and voice. It's supposed to be about everybody having equal voice.

In my own experience, again when my mother was going through her court case, is that it's not always easy to be the person who stands up. Initially she was supported. There were times when there were members of our own community—those who had non-aboriginal wives, those who had status children but who were only half aboriginal by blood—who were afraid of what they might lose if she was successful, so rather than seeing the benefit of bringing these women back to our community and broadening it, they were afraid that their status was going to be taken away.

So there was a lot of division in the community. She was told, “You will be having accidents; people have accidents, you know.” She was threatened in the hope that she would stop, in the hope that she would not pursue her rights. Luckily, she is very stubborn and it takes a lot more than that to stop her, and eventually things were changed. But again it took many years for us to realize it wasn't the solution she had hoped for.

Interestingly, there have been others recently who have come forward and criticized her and said that she had ruined it: “My mother was white and she could have been Indian had you not done that”, or “Now nobody gets to pass on that status unequivocally, so you made it worse for everybody.” She said she was standing up for her rights as an aboriginal woman and she was certainly not responsible for the consequences that happened afterwards.

Those are the kinds of unintended consequences that we need to be very careful of.

[Rod Bruinooge, Conservative, Winnipeg South, MB]

You said everyone should have equal representation. I think those were your words. Do you think providing a forum such as the Canadian Human Rights Commission, able to offer a forum to first nations people on reserve to voice their perceived human rights afflictions, is a good thing?

[Doris Young]

Let me answer that. I believe any forum that the public, and particularly in this case the first nations people, are engaged in is a good thing. But it shouldn't be about that particular topic that you're.... It should be about human rights and what they believe human rights are, and how they could be involved in addressing them.

I'm really saddened by the situation of Dawn's mother, that this has happened. I think it is so important right now that we not go into this process without consultation. What is happening right now is that it's continuing. People are pointing fingers at this woman who was so brave many years ago, and it's still following her around as though she's a culprit, because adequate consultation wasn't made about Bill C-31.

I mentioned earlier that we were really happy that it was going to be finally ending discrimination. There was no consultation made in the communities about that Bill C-31 before it was passed. We do not want that to happen again. It's just so sad. It breaks up communities; it breaks up families.

I don't think this government wants to be involved in a situation like that again.

[The Chair, Conservative, Colin Mayes]

Madam Crowder, do you have any more questions?

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

I want to come back to Bill C-31 for a minute.

One of the points that have been made is that under the current Bill C-44, in five years' time we would be able to take a look at it. Bill C-31, I think, was passed in 1985. In 1986 there was a report out by a couple of people called Clatworthy and Smith. These researchers did a bunch of projections, based on section 6.2 of Bill C-31, and demonstrated when key communities across the country would actually have no status Indians left in their community as a result of section 6.2.

I've raised a couple of times the issue of the impact of Bill C-31 and what we can do about it. What I've understood is that no action will be taken until some court cases have unfolded. Anecdotally, there are already nations in Canada where the last status person has been born.

When we're asked to trust that a five-year process on Bill C-44 would enable us to examine unintended consequences, I just see that with Bill C-31, here we are, however many years later—22 years later—not able to currently address the impacts it is having on communities.

And it's not only the impact of people's loss of status; all of you talked about resources. One of the things that happened with Bill C-31 was that there weren't adequate resources in the communities to allow women to return to the community and have access to adequate housing and adequate education.

I wonder whether you could comment on that.