Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on May 7th, 2019

[Grand Chief Constant Awashish]

Yes, it was successful. Quebec adopted our recommendation.

[Robert-Falcon Ouellette, Liberal, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Excellent.

Richard De La Ronde.

[Richard De La Ronde]

The same socio-economic factors that bring children into care also prevent those adoptions from happening, and also prevent fostering.

In those circumstances where families are interested, because the provincial process of adoption is quite arduous, we circumvent that through a simple application of guardianship. When we have an aunt, an uncle, or a kookoo who want guardianship of their nieces, nephews or grandchildren, we simply ask them to apply for guardianship in Manitoba.

I don't know if you're aware, but anybody can apply for guardianship of anybody's kids. We do an uncontested application for guardianship in those cases where families want to adopt their nieces or nephews. It goes more quickly.

There are issues around financial support, and there is subsidized adoption in Manitoba. Again, engaging in that process is quite arduous, so we have found that doing applications for guardianship are quicker, cleaner and they cost less money for families.

[Robert-Falcon Ouellette, Liberal, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you very much. I have probably about another three minutes left in my time.

With Jordan's principle, and also in clause 9, it discusses the concept surrounding the following:

(e) in order to promote substantive equality between Indigenous children and other children, a jurisdictional dispute must not result in a gap in the child and family services that are provided in relation to Indigenous children.

The federal government is saying that no matter what happens in clause 22, which talks about jurisdiction between provincial laws, indigenous laws and the laws passed by indigenous governments or even federal laws, that at no time should there be a gap—meaning in funding or in the types of services because we're talking not simply about funding but also the quality of the services offered for children.

Do you believe this is enough in this legislation to lay it out? If, for instance, some government decided not to fund indigenous child welfare at the federal level, if there were a different government that said this was not their priority, could you take them to court and obtain redress?

We can talk about it with Natan or Jenny.

[Jenny Tierney, Manager, Health and Social Development, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami]

I guess it could be a possibility. We did have large discussions around substantive equality and its inclusion within the bill. It was really important for ITK to ensure that was there and to know whether we would be able to go back and take somebody to court over it. We would need to study that option further with our regions and with legal counsel.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Thank you very much for coming out. Your testimony is part of the official transcript. We invite others who may be watching and wish to submit briefs to do so.

If you require translation to allow us to bring in the appropriate language if it's an indigenous language, we can make that happen as well.

I want to thank you for participating in this very important discussion.

Meegwetch.

We'll take a short break and bring in our new panel. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

This is the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs, and we are in our third panel. I want to thank everybody for coming to order. We have a lot of people who are speaking to this very important bill.

We have the Métis National Council, Metis Child and Family Services Authority, and the Metis Child, Family and Community Services.

I understand we are starting with the Métis National Council. We have President Chartier here. Welcome.

You can begin any time you're ready.

[Clément Chartier, President, Métis National Council]

Thank you, Chair, and good morning. Good morning to members of the committee.

I'm pleased to have an opportunity, on behalf of the Métis nation, to speak to you today on this most important bill, Bill C-92. This proposed act holds the promise of a better future for our children and youth, our families, our communities and our nation. The reality today is that too many Métis nation children and youth become institutionalized through mainstream child and family services systems, alienated from their personal identities, their family relations and their cultural roots.

The proposed act provides a road map for overcoming that reality through four main areas, at least, for the Métis nation.

The first area is the promotion of the right of self-determination possessed by the Métis nation through recognizing self-government and jurisdiction in the area of child welfare. Should this act be passed, the right of the Métis nation and its governments to exercise responsibility over the upbringing, training, education and well-being of our children will be recognized. Where indigenous governments enact child and family services laws, these will take precedence over provincial laws where negotiations over a period of one year do not result in agreement.

The second area contained in the proposed act is the promotion of culturally competent, equitable, responsive and effective care on the basis of substantive equality compared to non-indigenous children in Canada. The Métis nation has developed capacity in positive culturally based practices that have proven results, some of which you will hear about shortly from my colleagues this morning and in future hearings from other Métis nation leaders and care providers.

The third area concerns placing the best interests of the child as paramount, including rights of children to know their parents, families, communities and history.

The fourth area relates to placing prevention and early intervention at the centre of child and family services, replacing the current model and practices of intervention.

During the co-development process the Métis nation assessed the standards and rights contained in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

This proposed act is one of many steps needed for Métis nation children, families and communities to fully realize their right to survival, dignity and well-being. The co-development process must continue in order to develop a regulatory framework for implementation of the act. Tripartite tables engaging Métis nation, federal and provincial governments will need to be established. Financial commitments required for the implementation of the proposed act will need to be made.

It is important that these next steps are not misconstrued as barriers to immediate adoption of the proposed act. It is important that each one of us who holds a leadership role takes the necessary action to ensure that this proposed act is adopted. Now is the time for transformative change that will positively impact, throughout Canada, the children and youth of the Métis nation, first nations and Inuit.

The Métis nation is appreciative of the support we believe we will be given by all parties to the passage of this bill. This legislation is about the future of our children and ensuring that they have the best possible opportunity for happy, healthy childhoods, living with their families and in their communities and culture.

I look forward to the passing of Bill C-92 and its implementation. I encourage all members of this committee to do their utmost to ensure that this happens.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

You were shorter than expected. I mean your speech.

[Clément Chartier]

I am shorter than expected. My dad was disappointed, but what can I say?

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Thank you for your comments.

We're moving on to the next presenter and that is the Metis Child and Family Services Authority, Billie Schibler, chief executive officer.

You are on video conference. Thank you for participating, and start whenever you're ready.

We cannot hear you. It looks really interesting, but we cannot hear a word of it.

We have a technical glitch. We are going to suspend for one minute to see if we can get it fixed.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Are we good? Okay, we are better than good. We are great. We hear you now.

Please go ahead when you're ready.

[Billie Schibler, Chief Executive Officer, Metis Child & Family Services Authority]

Good morning. I'm Billie Schibler. I'm the CEO of the Metis Child and Family Services Authority in Manitoba.

I want to begin by acknowledging our members of Parliament as well as our Métis leader for our Métis National Council.

I want to begin by indicating that in my presentation—I don't know if you received any copies of it—I spend time discussing things from the perspective of someone who has not only been a service provider in child welfare in Manitoba but also a person who has been a recipient, been affected by and cared for many children who have been part of the child welfare system.

It's important for me to begin from that place, because it provides you with the greater context of my understanding of Bill C-92 and its importance.

I also want to acknowledge, as we begin to look at this, that there has been a lot of work done by the federal government and our indigenous political leaders to recognize this and bring this bill forward, and I'm grateful for it.

From a personal level, I've been very blessed in my life to have been able to live with my mother and grandmother as a child. My mother was 13 years old when she had me, and it was at a time when there was very little support provided to young single mothers. I'm able to look at life and my career in that context and through my own eyes, growing up as a child and having been provided that opportunity, when so many of our other families have not had that. I'm very welcoming of the legislative changes that are proposed.

My background is as a social worker. I've also been a foster parent for over 30 years. I have had more than 45 children come through my home, at any given time. I'm currently caring for one of my own grandchildren, whom I've had since he was a baby. He's now 10 years old. That's a very common thing with our indigenous families, as you know. If we're given the opportunity, we provide care when some of our family members are not able to do so.

I lost one of my brothers during the onset of the sixties scoop. We never found each other until we were in our mid-thirties. We learned a lot from each other's experiences, and it told us a lot about the child welfare system and what needed to change. That is so reflective of the history of our families and our people.

I have had the opportunity to deliver child welfare services in both Manitoba and Ontario, in leading child welfare in first nation communities as well as urban settings, and delivering front-line service. I've had a fairly rounded understanding of what needs to occur, and also look at it as a former children's advocate in Manitoba.

For those of you who don't know Manitoba's child welfare history—I'm assuming most of you do—we have a history that is deeply entrenched in a lot of pain. We have a long history of unclaimed struggles as Métis people. We now have some strong Métis leaders who have brought our matters to the forefront in their negotiations at the federal level, and we're very please about that. We have a larger number of children in care per capita than any other province. I'm sure you've heard those statistics.

Our Métis child welfare system is part of a devolved system. That happened 15 years ago. What ended up occurring in our devolution of child welfare was that the child welfare system never fully devolved the way it was intended to, and our ability to make our own decisions as to how to best support our families never occurred. While we were considered to be partners as part of the four authorities that existed, we never developed our own legislation. We were not able to control our own funding.

Currently as the CEO, I can say that we have two agencies. My colleague will speak on one of our agencies in a few minutes. We have the entire jurisdiction of the province for those who choose to come to us for service or for Métis families and Inuit families that we're mandated to serve. That is large.

We currently have 1,275 children in care out of the nearly 11,000 children in care in Manitoba. Even though our practice is to try our best to preserve families, many of these children are coming to us as permanent wards, with wardship granted through the courts. Once they have been made a permanent ward, they go to their culturally appropriate authorities if they're not being serviced there already. A lot of those children are coming to us through a permanent order of the child welfare system. We have not had any opportunity to provide service to their families, so it becomes very challenging for us to accept the children at that time, when they should have been part of our system right from the beginning.

We know from looking at any proposed legislation and the bill, that there has to be a complete mechanism whereby our system is notified of any Métis families coming to the attention of the child welfare system so that we can have early involvement. Otherwise, we're doing a major disservice to our families and to our children.

We know that it's very difficult to undo the history of child welfare services in Manitoba—or anywhere—that were not culturally appropriate to begin with. As we look at Bill C-92, first of all, I want to commend the way that it begins. The preamble clearly identifies and recognizes the history and the true issues that exist for our people. Most importantly, it acknowledges the significance of working together to accept and address the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's calls to action.

With the history of indigenous peoples in Canada, we know what that looks like. We know about the residential and day schools, the sixties scoop, murdered and missing indigenous women, and the increasing number of indigenous children in care. We know that the effects of these tragedies have existed for decades and centuries. How, then, do we undo these effects? That's really what I think any changes in legislation—any proposed bills—need to take into consideration.

We need to look at how we can undo these effects and at how long that will take, considering the trauma and the impacts of racism, addictions, mental health problems, the high number of suicides, homelessness, non-sustainable traditional lands, family and community violence, gang affiliation and the overrepresentation in the criminal justice system.

We have fragmented family units and a disconnection from land, culture and identity that continues to afflict our people. We acknowledge that it is mental health week here; I'm not sure if that's across Canada. The current mental health of indigenous peoples and the escalating addictions crisis are further symptoms of generational pain and blood memory from trauma.

If we are still living out these effects and we see them every day on our streets, in our cities and in our services, how does the child welfare system move away from a protection mindset and practice? If we recognize that the truth is the entry point for reconciliation, then what brings us to reconciliation beyond that first step of telling our truths?

If we say “no more band-aids” and that we want to see legislation that allows us to reveal so that we can heal, then it must be recognized that the reveal is our truth of generational accounts of government policies and historic wrongdoings. How do we move forward into reconciliation without a focus on healing? What does that healing look like?

From our own individual value base, it's going to look different. Some might think that an apology is the road to healing, or that residential school payouts are the road to healing, or that changes in legislation are the road to healing. We can all agree that healing is a process of becoming healthy, but it isn't a one-size-fits-all. Healing is the purging of a lot of emotional pain and trauma—generations of it.

Healing and the anticipated transformation needs to be recognized as a journey. It needs to be a place where people feel safe to be able to tell their stories. It needs to be offered through positive solutions and planned options that support healing in everything we talk about in terms of prevention and support. In fitting with Jordan's principle, there needs to be jurisdictional accessibility to these services. There needs to be accountability and support from each level of government for the funding and provision of these services.

Yes...?

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

You've run out of time.

[Billie Schibler]

Can I just have one final statement, then?

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Go ahead.

[Billie Schibler]

Okay.

Most importantly, I want to say that we know that our child welfare system is only one portion of service. We really are in full support of what we're seeing as a beginning step with Bill C-92, but we're only one service in the whole realm of this journey. All of the other services—justice, education, health, mental health—need to see a similar type of legislative change.

I thank you very much for your time.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Thank you.

Now we'll move to Metis Child, Family and Community Services. Greg Besant, the executive director, is at the same location there.

Welcome. You can start any time you're ready.

[Greg Besant, Executive Director, Metis Child, Family and Community Services]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank the committee for the opportunity to speak to you all today and for your work on this important topic and legislation.

I'd also like to thank our indigenous elders, leaders and politicians who assisted in bringing forward the issues faced by indigenous people when working with and for the welfare of indigenous children.

I would especially like to thank the leadership of the Métis people, both nationally and provincially, for supporting Bill C-92. For the Métis people most especially, this bill can lead to substantive and meaningful change.

I have had the honour of being the executive director of Metis Child, Family and Community Services in Manitoba for only the past one and a half years. I came to this role after working within and around child welfare systems for more than 25 years, and I have seen many changes in that time. I've worked in three different provinces during that time.

In child welfare, we see ourselves as helpers. One of the important lessons that we all learn eventually is that, without hope, there is no change. Bill C-92 gives me hope that we can finally have a child welfare system truly designed and controlled by indigenous people. Metis Child, Family and Community Services, for those who are unfamiliar, is a fully delegated child welfare agency. We deliver services in the city of Winnipeg, as well as in the Interlake and Eastman regions of Manitoba. Our specific mandate is to deliver services for Métis and Inuit, although the structure of devolved services in Manitoba is such that we also serve some non-indigenous and first nations people.

As a fully delegated agency, we provide services both to families to prevent children from entering into care but also to families as they work toward the reunification of children in temporary or permanent care.

Currently, 929 children of the 1,200 that Ms. Schibler referred to are in my agency's care. We are a very large agency. This number of children in our care has remained generally stable for the past five years, but it's disturbing that the proportion of those children who have been permanently removed from their parents is steadily increasing. At the end of the last fiscal year, 668 of these 929 children were in permanent care. In our agency, we still support families to have regular involvement and meaningful engagement with their children, even though they're in permanent care. They see them as often as weekly. Hopefully, they're placed within their families, and those families are involved in every important decision regarding them. It's a very important principle that we follow within our agency.

The reason for this change in the proportion of children in care being more permanent than temporary is not only that we're working hard to reduce the number of children coming into care through apprehension or temporary orders, but permanent orders are relatively long-lasting. That's the main piece of that, but there are systemic issues within our legislation and the justice-related systems that have really impacted how children end up staying in care.

Those of you familiar with the state of child welfare in Manitoba will recognize that we've been in a state of crisis for many years, despite having travelled a path toward devolving powers to indigenous agencies more than a decade ago. Where some would see this as a cautionary tale about empowering indigenous people, I would counter that it's cautionary insofar as Manitoba did not go nearly far enough with the meaningful sharing of powers, and Bill C-92 provides a mechanism to resolve this.

Currently, as a fully delegated agency, we can do what any other child welfare agency in the province can do. That's the problem. We can't do things differently. We have to do what child welfare has always done. The legislation in Manitoba is set up so that, once children enter care, the only exit point is adoption, except for those children we have a guardianship application for. The legislation supports adoption and the funding structure supports adoption, and we cannot follow that path.

When a child comes into care in Winnipeg, it's long been the policy that children be placed with their family or extended family. It's been that way precisely as Bill C-92 proposes. It's been that way for decades.

We have 270 related family caregivers in our agency. However, before a decision is ever made that a child must go into care, we created a family conferencing program to support and engage families and extended families. In many cases, the families themselves are the ones involved in the decision to have the children leave their parents' care, and they have come up with their own plan for that child's care.

Even though the provincial policy is for children to be placed with family, we receive no dedicated funding from the Province of Manitoba for either our kinship care program or our family conferencing program. Instead, I have to divert funding that is meant for child protection staff for that.

The province funds shelters and emergency care foster homes through private agencies. The vast majority of the children in these third party homes are indigenous, and yet the vast majority of these homes are not. As a result, we have had young Métis children speak Tagalog as their first language, and teenagers tell us that they're Filipino, not Métis. We've had other children raised within traditional Mennonite communities, and this has been a fact since devolution.

This continuing practice of funding third party care providers rather than funding culturally appropriate agencies is continuing the process of colonization. The historic funding structures and the relationship simply do not match the outcomes we are trying to achieve. This bill would allow us to work around these remnants of the colonizing structures and processes to further create specific Métis resources.

Another example of a Métis-specific resource, which has received considerable attention, is our living in family enhancement program. Within these homes, children live in a foster home along with their parent, ensuring that attachment is never broken or that it can be restored if they had previously been separated.

I want to emphasize the incredibly hard work and deep caring that is prevalent within the child welfare system across the country. However, listening to some critics, one would have to agree with a provincial MLA, who expressed to me in the context of a legislative review in Manitoba, that social workers act like they are crazy.

Child welfare systems are supposed to be designed to help families and protect children. People working within child welfare were attracted to it because they want to support families and protect children. Yet, we are caught between finely written principles that we wholeheartedly believe in and the dangerous situations we find children to be in. The only solutions that are funded by mainstream government are the removal of children from their family and nation, and bringing our own people into an intimidating court system that they have only experienced as being punitive towards them.

By supporting indigenous people to create alternative solutions, Bill C-92 creates hope. As noted earlier, with hope, we can create change.

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Liberal, MaryAnn Mihychuk]

Thank you very much for those presentations. I think we'll have a good round of questioning.

We're going to begin with MP Dan Vandal.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

Thank you very much.

First of all, thank you to all three presenters. I appreciate the time you've taken.

I only have seven minutes, so if I cut you off, don't be offended. It's because I want to get to another question.

I'm going to start with Clément Chartier.

Mr. Chartier, Senator Murray Sinclair called the co-development process around this bill a model for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's calls to action, yet around this table, we've heard from several groups saying that the co-development process has been lacking.

Can you talk about the process from your perspective and offer your thoughts on that, please?

[Clément Chartier]

From the perspective of the Métis nation, it really could not have worked in any other manner. We have a national government. We have five—for your sake—provincial governments; we call them “governing members”. We have our institutions in place.

We were fully engaged, at all levels, in dealing with this process with the federal government in recognition of section 35 and, of course, the right of self-determination, including the inherent right of self-government .

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB]

In the traditional territory of the Métis nation which is parts of Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta, B.C., those territories were engaged and know about the legislation.

[Clément Chartier]

Yes.

In fact, our homeland covers the three prairie provinces and extends into a small portion of northwestern Ontario, northeast B.C. and the Northwest Territories. In the United States, we've had national conferences, and we've had provincial consultations and regional consultations. We have been fully embracing our citizens.