Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Feb. 8th, 2011

[Kenn Richard]

Certainly we disseminate envelopes of funding: we have it at three levels of government and across different departments within those governments. That is a challenge for us. I mentioned the words “administrative burden” in terms of putting that together in a fashion that does not compromise the rules--because funding comes with a lot of rules--and at the same time makes it work for the kids in an integrated way.

We've gone through plenty of machinations associated with hiring people for specific funders to do their specific job. We're moving beyond that and trying to do something that is much more integrated and much more cost effective, in fact. That would leverage a health-funded worker with a Ministry of Community and Social Services worker and a recreational worker from the City of Toronto, all working on the same team, working with the same community.

We find with this that we can also handle our administrative burdens more easily, and we can in fact give a complete experience to a child who otherwise might be confused about it and say, “Well, you're my worker for this program, but oh, she's coming over here from that program.” We're trying to get away from that because we don't find it effective, it frustrates the staff, and the outcomes aren't really as promising because of the confusion built into the programs.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Rickford.

We have time for one more question.

Let's go to Ms. Neville.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, and my apologies as well for arriving late. The transportation system here is leaving much to be desired today.

I have just come back from a lengthy tour with another committee, travelling primarily in western Canada on the issue of violence against aboriginal women. We certainly saw an underbelly of Canada that is not one we would be proud of.

There seems to be a very definite relationship between the apprehension of children and violence against women. Women are frequently fearful of reporting violence for the very real concern that their children will be apprehended.

Both of you have spoken about prevention and the need for support to keep the children in the home. It's such a complicated issue, but my question—to each of you, from your very different vantage points--is on what your recommendations would be in relation to supports for mothers, primarily, and children in their homes. What we heard clearly on the trip was that if a child is apprehended, a foster parent gets a significant amount of resources made available to them that a natural parent does not.

I would welcome your thoughts.

[Mary Polak]

I first want to thank you for raising this issue because I think, again, it goes to Ms. Crowder's point of recognizing that there is an urgency and a consequence when we don't deal appropriately with this.

Let's imagine that we are in a family situation where there is abuse, where there is violence. Interestingly enough, instead of responding by removing the violent perpetrator, what we tend to do is remove the mother and the child. Why, from the child's perspective, would we be punished for the fact that our father beats our mother or beats us? Yet that is the system in which we largely operate.

I want to address something that is, I think, of overarching importance. It again comes back to the theme of integration, to the theme of a holistic approach. It isn't a foregone conclusion that a child who is taken into “care” will have terrible outcomes. Certainly, the child is more challenged. What we need to address, though, is the fact that for aboriginal people, we can have a child successfully reintegrated into a community to have positive behaviours normalized when we have done community development, when the placement of that child is as part of a whole community system, and when the cultural makeup of that community is supported and the means by which they are addressing the needs of that child are in concert with that.

It really is about breaking down the old ways we have thought about this and asking what the outcomes are that we want for that child, for that family, and what are the things that we do, again, out of good intentions, that in fact exacerbate the very problem we're trying to solve.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Just give a short response.

[Kenn Richard]

In apprehensions, 80% of them involve a combination of either alcohol or drugs and violence. Child-witnessed violence is now recognized as a form of maltreatment. As you know, as a society we are obligated to respond to that, and we often have to apprehend these children.

In the program response to that, we have developed two transitional houses. They're not shelters per se, but they are places where moms can go with their kids that are free from violence. They can start building on a number of issues confronting them.

Family violence does not operate in a vacuum. Usually there's poverty, unemployment, a whole number of life challenges facing that mom. With the apprehension of the child and the mom together, and their removal to a safe place with a program to get her on her feet, or some kind of reconciliation with a previously abusive husband who is taking therapy or culturally appropriate kinds of interventions, a whole combination can ensue so they can eventually in fact return.

But it takes special practitioners. It takes a little bit of money, though not as much as many other programs. It's certainly something you must handle very carefully because the lives of people are at stake, including the little kids involved. It's a tough one.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We're out of time, Ms. Neville. Thank you very much.

First of all, I want to thank our witnesses today for the clarity and thoroughness of their responses, and I thank members for their questions as well. This has been very helpful to our study.

Members, we're going to suspend for about five minutes. We do have some business items to take up before we adjourn formally for the day.

We'll suspend momentarily to bid goodwill to our guests.

[Proceedings continue in camera]