Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Nov. 24th, 2010

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Just think back to what the model was before this: there was a perverse incentive in that you got paid per intervention. It was creating the exact opposite result to what you were really seeking--at least the financial incentive was the exact opposite of what you were seeking.

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer, AB]

Certainly.

Could you update us on the progress in bringing other provinces into this prevention-based approach?

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

All the prairie provinces—Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba—are now covered. So are Quebec, P.E.I., Nova Scotia.... I get a little confused, because Jordan's Principle overlaps somewhat here.

We hope to have the other provinces covered by 2013, and they're certainly expressing interest. People want to take their existing agreements and move them a little further.

I think those Alberta statistics are quite dramatic. The public maybe doesn't appreciate how much change there has been. It's very good stuff.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Dreeshen.

Minister, I think you indicated that you have to get on your way at this point.

If you'd like, members, we're going to have a brief suspension of two minutes, and then we'll pick it up.

Ms. Johnston and Ms. Cram will be able to hang back for the remainder of the meeting.

We'll suspend momentarily to see the minister off.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We'll continue.

I don't know that we gave proper introductions in the first part of the meeting.

Ms. Cram is back with us. She is the assistant deputy minister in the education and social development programs and partnerships sector of the department.

We also have Odette Johnston, who is the director of the social programs reform directorate.

We'll continue where we left off.

We'll continue with Mr. Lemay, who has five minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I know that, under the tripartite agreement, approximately $59.8 million is paid to Quebec for the implementation of this program. How is that amount allocated? Does a portion go to aboriginal people, or is the entire amount transferred to the Government of Quebec, which administers the tripartite agreement? If you can't give me the answer today, you can send it to me. However, I would like to have an answer.

As I don't have a lot of time, I'm going to ask you my second question right away.

Is there a monitoring committee? We're seeing results. Things appear to be going well in Alberta, but I'm not sure they're going very well in Quebec, from the information I've received. How do we ensure implementation of the program? Have you put a tripartite committee in place consisting of representatives of the Assembly of First Nations, the Government of Quebec and your department?

I will let you answer these two questions.

[Odette Johnston]

For Quebec, we do have a tripartite group in place that is working with the first nations on reviewing the business plans and trying to get those in place. It is taking a little bit longer in Quebec to actually get those plans in place, but we are working through those and we're confident that mostly all of the resources will be used this fiscal year.

With regard to the distribution, most of those resources are going to first nation agencies or communities. Where we don't have agencies, we will be working with the province in trying to ensure that similar types of services are provided.

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

All right.

Who's monitoring implementation of the tripartite agreement? Who's responsible for that? I'm thinking of Quebec in particular, but that could apply to the rest of the provinces.

[Odette Johnston]

In Quebec, as I mentioned, we do have a tripartite group. We work very much with the first nations commission of Quebec and Labrador to work with the agencies to make sure that these are functioning. In every jurisdiction we work jointly with the province in trying to have regular meetings with the agencies to review progress against the business plans they have put in place and to assist agencies when some problems might have been identified.

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

Has a representative of your department or a legal representative asked the Government of Quebec to delay full implementation of the Youth Protection Act, which could impede the introduction of this tripartite agreement?

[Christine Cram]

Mr. Lemay, as you know, that act is the responsibility of the Government of Quebec. The act is already in place, and it is up to the province to implement its acts. The federal government cannot intervene with the Government of Quebec.

However, I must say that we have worked with the APNQL and we have had discussions to determine how we can improve prevention services in order to minimize consequences and to ensure that children have access to necessary services.

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

I don't want to make you disclose any secrets. However, we know that the implementation of Bill C-3 is imminent. It will soon be passed by the Senate; that's clear. In our view, it's a matter of weeks.

The next budget is coming. Perhaps I should have put the question to the minister, but here it is. In preparation for that next budget, is the implementation of these tripartite agreements being taken into account in order to make requests? Have you prepared any items for the next budget taking into account the requests for implementation of these tripartite agreements?

[Christine Cram]

Mr. Lemay, I'm going to tell you that we've obtained funding under every budget since 2007.

Our objective is to have signed agreements with all the provinces and territories by 2013. So we're still trying to move this file forward.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Lemay.

It's now Mr. Payne's turn for five minutes, and then it will Ms. Crowder's.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My question is to our members from INAC, and I welcome you today.

There has been a bit of confusion about the estimated number of aboriginal children. I believe it's been said that the number is 27,000, but if I heard correctly, the minister talked about a third of them being under INAC care.

Can you confirm whether that's correct, and also tell us about what INAC is doing in terms of care for these children?

[Christine Cram]

The total number of on-reserve children between the ages of 0 and 18 is actually 163,637. As of March 31, 2010, about 8,682, or 5.4% of those children were in care, out of the parental home.

I think the minister was using a number from the Alberta report that referred to all the aboriginal children identified to be in care in Alberta. But that number includes both the children normally resident on reserve and the children off reserve.

On the other part of your question, the federal government has a number of programs directed toward children. There's this child and family services program, but we also have education programs. The federal government spends about $1.4 billion a year on kindergarten to grade 12 programming for first nations children normally resident on reserve.

There are also programs related to young children. A number of departments have programs for preschool-aged children. I'll ask my colleague to talk about those in more detail.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

I'm particularly interested in the family services aspect of this.

[Christine Cram]

Okay.

[Odette Johnston]

For first nations child and family services, we have increased the funding over the years. We were spending $193 million in 1996-97. For 2009-10 our funding has gone up to $550 million.

We work very much, in child and family services, with other programs we have, such as the family violence prevention program--$29 million is being spent to assist families in that program--and early childhood development programs. In Health Canada there are also programs such as Aboriginal Head Start, and in HRSDC there is child care. Those programs all come into play in assisting with these children.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Okay, thank you.

I believe Ms. Crowder made some reference to Jordan's Principle. Maybe you could fill us in on how the first nations are involved in implementing Jordan's Principle.

[Christine Cram]

I could start. We already have some agreements. We have agreements in two provinces, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, on implementing Jordan's Principle. We also have discussions under way in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, and New Brunswick on implementing it. And there are other provinces that feel they have the processes in place to handle any situations that may arise.

I would say that since the passing of the motion on Jordan's Principle, the federal government, working with provinces and first nations, has put processes in place to ensure there is no child who doesn't get the service they need because of jurisdictional squabbles. In the provinces where I've said we have agreements, or where we're talking, we've been taking a case-conferencing approach. You bring together the various parties that provide services to children and you consider any cases raised where there appear to be gaps in the services being provided. Some of these may get resolved right there in that there's no problem; the parties agree around the table at the case conference that the service will be provided.

I have to say I'm not aware of any circumstance where that wasn't worked out, but we have dispute resolution processes in cases where we can't resolve it. The protocol is that whichever jurisdiction is currently providing the services, it will continue to do so until a resolution can be found so the child isn't without service.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you very much, Mr. Payne.

Now we'll go to Ms. Crowder, who will be followed by Mr. Weston and Mr. Bagnell, and then Mr. Clarke.

Let's go to Ms. Crowder.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I have a quick comment. You indicated there were principles outlined around “culturally appropriate”, as a result of the public accounts committee and the March 19, 2009, response by the deputy minister. I don't see it in the response, so if you could supply that to us, that would be great.

Actually, in the response it says this transition requires the development of tripartite and health prevention frameworks in partnership with provinces and first nations in order to clearly establish culturally appropriate but, for practical purposes, equivalent services to be provided over a five-year period.

I don't see that as a principle. If you could provide that to us, that would be great, because I don't see it in that response.

I want to come back to the comparability again. In 4.49 of the Auditor General's report, she indicates that in some provinces they are actually delivering the child welfare services where first nations do not, and that, in those provinces, “INAC reimburses all or an agreed-on share of their operating and administrative costs of delivering child welfare services directly to First Nations and of the costs of children placed in care”.

So it seems to me that in some provinces you recognize the provincial rates, according to the Auditor General. If in some provinces you recognize the provincial rates because they deliver the services, why in other provinces don't you give the first nations agencies the provincial rates?

[Odette Johnston]

Actually, in all jurisdictions we have provincial rates for the various types of care and we reimburse those actual rates.