Sure.
Evidence of meeting #136 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was capacity.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #136 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was capacity.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:20 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Sure.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
Who are they working with? What is the funding that has flowed through them? If we can go back maybe 10 years, that will help to provide a bit of perspective on what the flows have been.
To go to the Auditor General's report, how does working with partners who are off-site, not within the civil service, create or not create challenges that were underscored by the Auditor General when he said that there were insufficient mechanisms to track and there wasn't the data necessary in order to evaluate success or lack thereof?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
The program data is provided by the organizations that you're talking about. They provide to us every quarter an update as to how many people they served and so forth, so we do have that data.
What we're lacking—and it's what the Auditor General was saying—is our ability to track people to see how they are progressing along the spectrum, which is much harder to do, by any measure. But we are getting information from them and we compile that. That's how we can have the stats and numbers we use and that we talked about.
We're working with them, trying to see how we can do better in terms of performance management, and measuring how much of a difference the program actually makes in terms of its results. That work is shaping up with them to actually develop the framework that will allow us to move forward on this.
The challenges are big, but we'll see how far we can push it. We need to do better. We all know that. We all want that. It's going to improve, but that work is currently ongoing.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
In the redesign of the programming around indigenous skills and employment training, what were the top three criticisms of the previous program that led to the reformulation?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Go for it.
9:25 a.m.
Director, Program Policy Division, Indigenous Affairs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
What we heard repeatedly.... I can do our top three pretty handily, I think.
Number one was the need for increased resources. The program was built on a foundation that had been put in place in 1999, and those were the resources that continued over time, as I said earlier, in the face of growing demographics and economic changes. Organizations were continuing, in fact, to achieve fantastic results with the same funding they've always had. That was number one that we heard.
Number two was around the amount and the relationship with the department, and the kind of oversight that was being brought to organizations, which was a heavy focus on tracking of expenditures in a pretty detailed way as opposed to looking more broadly at the kinds of results that were being brought by organizations. That's the transformation we're looking at.
Of course, we are all accountable for public funds. The department has in place those kinds of accountability measures, as do organizations that deliver this program, and we would never say any different. But really, we're trying to focus on how best those public funds are used to deliver these results, and that's a change going forward.
Number three, if I had to pick number three, was around the flexibility to provide those kinds of needed supports to the most vulnerable of individuals as they try to access skills and enter the labour market.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
Okay.
Were there any criticisms? Fast forward to 2019 and all programs are now going through a gender-based analysis lens. What transformations has the training program gone through pursuant to that GBA analysis?
9:25 a.m.
Director, Program Policy Division, Indigenous Affairs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
That's a wonderful question.
We've done analysis on clients served and employment outcomes through the program. Typically, clients served have gender parity. That's what that looks like. However, we do know that there is a slight difference and it's not as large as it is for non-indigenous peoples, but there is still a slight difference, with indigenous women having a lower rate of employment following the program than indigenous men. That's something we're looking at with organizations. As I said, they deliver the program and they do that priority setting. What we believe is that the ability to provide additional supports and wraparound services will be something that can start to address that.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
Thank you very much. I appreciate you following up with that additional information.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
February 7th, 2019 / 9:25 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
How many ISET-ASETS holders do you have?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Eighty-five.
9:25 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Eight-five. For example, for my riding, would I be able to get the actual contract?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Sure.
9:25 a.m.
Director, Program Policy Division, Indigenous Affairs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Their contribution agreement?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Yes.
9:25 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
That would be great, if you could submit it to the clerk.
I know the ASETS holder in my community is sort of a combination. It's more the tribal council, as opposed to individual bands. Within the contribution agreement, what mechanisms are there where they are required to report to the communities?
Let's say there are 17 bands. The ISET-ASETS holder is a tribal council. How can a band member know? For example, I know that sometimes there are contributions to day care that are part of the agreement. If I were a band member of Tk'emlúps, am I going to be in the contribution agreement? Is there a requirement for the holder to publicly report to all the members that should be benefiting from it?
9:30 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
The reporting provisions we have in the agreement are essentially to govern the agreement itself, so it's reporting back to us, in terms of being able to account for the program. However, we are definitely paying attention to the governance structure, who is on their board and how the committees are associated with them. This is done more at the working level, just making sure that the discussion takes place and that the connections are established. We are well aware of most organizations and how they interact with their communities. Again, if a community is not necessarily satisfied, they can definitely approach a service provider, and we are approachable as well, if there is a need to.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Within your contribution agreement, is there no requirement for the holder to, in a public way, report to the people that are the recipients of the funds?
9:30 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
No, there is not.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
I think that is a concern because how can communities hold their leadership to account? They can't ask questions, if they don't know what the information is. If they don't know that day care spaces are part of—if I'm doing training in x and maybe I should have some ability to have day care spaces. To me, that is just the transparency of the holders to the communities that they serve. If there is nothing put in, I think that's a real gap and a disservice to the community members that are being served by these agreements.
9:30 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
I agree with you that this is an important aspect of the relationship. They need to be connected and to report back and be accountable to the communities. What we find a bit difficult to articulate is—and we need to think more about this; I will agree with you—is it the role of Canada to go in and tell them how to organize and report back to one another? I think it's a bit of a dicey issue for us.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
I think there is a requirement to publicly report millions of dollars in a contribution agreement. It's not Canada being patriarchal; it's Canada just saying that we want to ensure that the community members have the skills and opportunities to understand how the dollars flow. That is one sentence and then how the communities decide to—maybe it's a public meeting once a year or whatever format it takes, but the requirement that you're getting—I don't know, what's the biggest one? Is it $280 million? What's the biggest contribution agreement you have?
9:30 a.m.
Director General, Indigenous Programs Directorate, Department of Employment and Social Development
Oh boy, you have me there. I would need to get back to you to give you an example for that.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
You have people getting millions and millions of dollars, and there's nothing that a community member is going to know in terms of what is happening. That's number one.
My next point, and I think it's an important issue, is that someone mentioned urban.... I never knew ISET holders could be urban.
