Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on May 12th, 2008

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank the two gentlemen again for being here today. This is a seminal report, and it's really about what many of us around the table have been talking about. It's a manifestation of the extreme poverty that many first nations communities live in. I don't know whether you require a motion or not--if you do, I'd be happy to have one prepared for the next meeting--but I think it's important that we'll have the minister here on Wednesday, but only for an hour.

I think it's important that we have an in-depth discussion with department officials on this issue, on the number of children in care. The report here gives a figure of just short of 9,000 children identified. We've heard other numbers as high as 27,000 children in care, and I'm not sure how you count them. We've also heard there are more children in care now than were in the residential school system. So I think it's incumbent upon us as legislators today to look at this issue in depth and with more rigour, and if it requires an extra meeting or two, so be it, but I really would like to move forward on this issue.

[The Chair, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

I would suggest that as chair of this committee I notify the minister that we had this discussion today with the Auditor General's office and tell him that to several of the questions asked by committee members the response from the Auditor General's office was that they might more appropriately be answered by departmental officials. He and his officials ought to be prepared to deal with those questions. They can get a good sense of what those might be on the basis of the minutes of today's meeting.

As you know, on Wednesday committee members can take wide latitude in asking the minister and his staff questions. As recently as last week, we kind of agreed on what our priorities were for the coming meetings. If we are presuming there will not be sufficient time on Wednesday, and if you'd like to put a motion forward that you'd like to deal with this or that you think it needs to be dealt with at an extra meeting or something, that might be the better way to do it, rather than having me trying to decide informally that one priority trumps another.

Ms. Crowder, did you have something to say?

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

I just wanted to make the point that the main focus of the two-hour meeting on Wednesday will be the estimates. We will certainly have an opportunity to ask a question or two, but I would suggest that the amount of information in this report actually requires a more in-depth reporting back from the department, and I also believe we need to hear from some of the first nations agencies that are involved in it. So hopefully Ms. Neville will put forward a motion that will accommodate those issues, because I simply don't feel we'll have time to deal with them in the context of all the other issues in estimates on Wednesday.

[The Chair, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

That's my sense too, that probably in two hours we're not going to be able to cover everything. But if such a motion were brought forward, we would certainly deal with it.

Once again, gentlemen, thank you very much.

The meeting is adjourned.