Evidence of meeting #150 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 services.
A recording is available from Parliament.
1:15 p.m.
Liberal
Dan Vandal Liberal Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB
Thank you very much for both presentations. They were very informative.
My first question will go to Lyle Thomas and Bernie Charlie.
What are the greatest challenges to providing child welfare services in your territory?
1:15 p.m.
Senior Resource Specialist, Resources and Foster Care, Secwépemc Child and Family Services Agency
I'll start. That's a very important question to acknowledge.
The work that Secwépemc Child and Family Services is doing is important in terms of reconciliation and connecting children to the families, and the biggest challenge right now is funding.
In terms of developing capacity within the community and building those natural supports for those families, when we're looking at the family unit, it's not just the child, but also the parents and reintegrating that extended family model and that community model. It's building the capacity within the community so that children don't have to come to the urban centres for medical supports or education for their special needs.
In that regard, I'll let Lyle elaborate.
1:15 p.m.
Cultural Advisor, Secwépemc Child and Family Services Agency
The biggest challenge is that we service seven bands here that are in more rural places, and then we have an urban population. We just try to balance. There's a balance to try to figure out who everybody is and where they're from. We try to teach and let the kids understand. They're in our nation, our territory of Secwépemc, and we just share with them.
Looking at it from the aspect of culture, we want to make them feel as comfortable as possible before they go home—if they're allowed to go home—when they go home to visit.
The way I look at it, with our kids here—I call them our kids—from the urban population, there needs to be a new system, a new welcoming system, something new that will involve everybody.
We have a large urban population, but people are from the same territory. We need everybody to work together and come together, if there's a way to do that. We need a way to bring everybody together and help each other to work together.
1:20 p.m.
Liberal
Dan Vandal Liberal Saint Boniface—Saint Vital, MB
Thank you.
The next question will go to Chief Wilson. There's been quite a lot of discussion about the importance of defining the best interests of the child. That was discussed this morning, I believe. I'm not sure if it was your presentation or the prior presentation that emphasized the importance of family, but one of the clauses we have in this bill is.... One of the factors to be considered when talking about the best interests of the child is the importance to the child of an ongoing relationship with the indigenous group, community or people to which the child belongs in order to preserve the child's cultural identity and connections to the language and territory of that indigenous group, community or people.
That's in the current bill. Could you comment on this clause?
1:20 p.m.
Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs
I know there was a lot of discussion with regard to the best interests of the child. We always said it couldn't be under the western view of the best interests of the child, because when the best interests were created, that was without a lot of our input. Again, the indigenous view, as noted earlier through Bernie, is different with regard to the best interests of the child.
Clause 9, the relationship, is key to the child. In our indigenous view, we don't own our children. They're given to us by the Creator. When they're born, they're born inherent to the nation. Looking at the indigenous view of what are the best interests of the child, we all have a responsibility of supporting and raising that child. In our indigenous view, the aunties are just as important. The grandfathers, grandmothers, the extended family, they are all important in connection to raising that child. It's not just the mother and father. It's the extended family. Respecting that indigenous view and the relationships that child has is really important.
It just couldn't be based on a western colonized view of the best interests of the child. That's the important part. The relationship of that child to the extended family and the nation is also important.
1:20 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal MaryAnn Mihychuk
Thank you to both groups for participating on the video conference. We all appreciate it. This concludes our public hearings on BillC-92. We look forward to your briefs. If you're sending them in, we'll all have a chance to look at them.
Meegwetch.
The meeting is adjourned.
