Evidence of meeting #24 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was schools.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Thank you, Madam Crowder.
Now we'll go to the last question of this first round. That will be from Mr. Duncan.
Conservative
Conservative
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
Thank you.
I'm going to try to move away from money for a minute and talk about achievements. You made a reference, Christine, on page 8 of your English document that “the largest gains in Aboriginal education were found in provinces that use assessment programs for school and student improvement planning”. And that sentence references a study.
I guess my question is whether that study included all of the provinces and territories. If so, which provinces came out looking much better than others?
Director General, Education Branch, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
What the study did was look at success stories across the country. So they weren't comparing one province with another; they were looking for best practices and what actually would make a difference. What they were trying to do was to identify what actually helped in educational outcomes. And they were looking at provincial schools, in particular, and how the aboriginal students within the provincial schools did better.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
Was there a relationship between having accreditation and not having it? In other words, were better results associated with accreditation, for example?
Director General, Education Branch, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
The study looked at particular success stories in provincial schools, not first nations schools.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
So you were looking at aboriginal education contained within the public school system.
Director General, Education Branch, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
That's right.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
Okay.
We seem to be focused considerably on Quebec education, because of the presentation on Tuesday. I want to know if my numbers are correct, and maybe Céline can offer some clarification.
The FNEC numbers were based on the year 2001-02, I believe. And I believe at that time the non-James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement first nations school population was just over 9,000. In 2007-08, that population was just over 9,100. So there was a net change of 100 students. Would that be a correct assumption?
Director, Policy and Intergovernmental Relations, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
That is in the figures.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
What is the reason we see so little growth in that school-age population in the province of Quebec?
Director, Policy and Intergovernmental Relations, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
It is difficult for me to answer this question about the birth rate. I'm sorry.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
It does tend to defy the demographics in the rest of the statistics.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Education and Social Development Programs and Partnerships Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Maybe, Mr. Duncan, I could just add to that.
The way the student population was probably calculated was by using the nominal roll system, in which case the number of students actually attending school are counted on a particular date, and then there are some subsequent follow-ups to see if that's changed. Usually, it takes place in October of each year, I believe.
So one of the issues could be non-attendance.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
I have seen comparisons of per capita or per student funding for first nations students within band-operated schools in Quebec versus the first nation student body under the James Bay Agreement. Those comparisons are quite stark, in that per capita spending on the James Bay agreement students was approximately double that for normal first nations students.
Is that a normal phenomenon? Is it related to the fact that they're under the James Bay Agreement, or is it really related to the fact that these are smaller, isolated communities? Or maybe it's a combination.
Director, Policy and Intergovernmental Relations, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
These agreements were negotiated in James Bay. It is therefore rather difficult to compare first nations schools. Since the budget rules are comparable to those in place for the Government of Quebec, it is difficult to explain the difference, but it has to do mainly with the negotiation of these agreements.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
Am I reading the statistics correctly to say that INAC's elementary and secondary school funding in 2001-02, the overall number, was $1.029 billion, and currently it is $1.3 billion?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Education and Social Development Programs and Partnerships Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Yes, that's correct.
Conservative
John Duncan Conservative Vancouver Island North, BC
So this is significantly more than what would be indicated by a 2% cap in terms of incremental change.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Education and Social Development Programs and Partnerships Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
The 2% is on the basic services. Since that time, we have also introduced new programming. That is over and above the 2%. About five different programs, I think, have been introduced since then: high-cost special education and teacher retention, just to name two. Those all added incremental dollars. Then, in addition to that, there was what I already mentioned about Budget 2008. That's over and above the 2% by which the total INAC basic services pot has expanded.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Thank you very much.
Now we'll go to the second round of five-minute questions, starting with Mr. Russell.
Liberal
Todd Russell Liberal Labrador, NL
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
There is no doubt that it must be difficult to work with limited resources.
All I'm trying to get at in terms of my line of questioning is that if there are going to be additional resources, there has to be an admission within the department itself, when briefings are being prepared for the minister or you're looking at memoranda to cabinet, somewhere along this line, that more resources are required.
My understanding is that you have limited resources, so you're trying to do more with it or you're trying to change it a little bit or adapt it. You add on a little bit here and there, such as these two new programs, and hopefully this will yield some type of result. I understand some of the challenges you're faced with, but when it comes to resources and we talk about libraries or sports facilities or additional resources for technology and things like that, I'm under the assumption that if you as an individual or I only had enough money to build four walls and put up a few partitions, we ain't gonna build on a gazebo. I think that's the sort of challenge people are faced with in these communities with the limited resources they have.
I want to go to a couple of other issues. First, the finance minister has identified that INAC is one of those departments under review, an asset review, for the selling off of government assets. He names INAC as one of the four departments. Has your directorate done any review? What could those assets possibly be?