Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on June 2nd, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

It's 3:30. We'll come to order.

Welcome, everyone.

I would like to acknowledge that we're meeting today on unceded Algonquin territory and we're very grateful for that.

Before we get to our witnesses today from the National Association of Friendship Centres, I want to just get a sense from members. We have only one organization visiting today, so it leaves us a bit of time on our agenda. What I'd like to propose to do with the order of questions is what we did on Tuesday, which is to complete the first order and repeat, and then go to the second page and do the top half, the seven-minute questions. Wherever that leaves us, we'll leave it there, and we can proceed to two pieces of committee business on the draft suicide study budget and communications plan. Does that seem reasonable to everybody?

It looks like I see assent.

Okay, with that decided, I'm very happy to welcome today on behalf of the committee Christopher Sheppard, vice-president of the National Association of Friendship Centres, and Yancy Craig, director of strategic development.

Christopher has travelled to see us today from St. John's, Newfoundland. Yancy Craig has travelled across the street to see us.

We welcome you both. We're very happy to have you here.

I am happy to offer 10 minutes to divide between yourselves as you see fit. When nine minutes comes along, I will hold up the yellow card. When 10 minutes is up, I will hold up the red card. I would ask you to bring it right to a close at that point so that we can get to the questions.

Without further ado, I cede the floor to you.

[Christopher Sheppard, Vice-President, National Association of Friendship Centres]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Distinguished members of the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs, it's an honour and privilege to appear before you again today.

I wish to acknowledge the Algonquin Nation, upon whose traditional territory we are meeting today.

I thank you for this opportunity to share with you the work of the friendship centre movement and the National Association of Friendship Centres relative to the issues of suicide among indigenous peoples and communities.

As you may recall from my previous appearance before the committee, my name is Christopher Sheppard. I am an Inuk from northern Labrador, and I now live and work in St. John's, Newfoundland.

I grew up in the friendship centre movement. I became actively involved with the aboriginal youth council, and I am currently the vice-president of the National Association of Friendship Centres, also known as the NAFC.

Throughout my career within friendship centres, the topic and concerns of suicide have been constant, even after I left my home community in the north and moved south.

Accompanying me today is Mr. Yancy Craig, the NAFC's director of strategic development.

With our time together, I would like to give you a brief overview of the friendship centre movement, the NAFC, and the urban indigenous population of Canada. I would also like to share with you some of the programs and supports of friendship centres and the NAFC in regard to suicide prevention within urban indigenous communities. Time permitting, I will do my best to respond to the questions you may have.

I would like to begin by sharing some facts with you to set the context for the work of the friendship centre movement.

As you may know, 75% of Canada's indigenous people live off reserve. Nearly 60% live in urban areas. Furthermore the indigenous population is growing at a faster rate than the Canadian average. This means there are approximately 840,000 indigenous people living in Canadian cities.

The Canadian indigenous population is also young, with approximately 50% under the age of 24. This presents a tremendous opportunity for Canada's future social, cultural, and economic development.

Among this growing demographic, there is a growing need for mental health supports being observed. Current estimates suggest that 15% of young Canadians between the ages of 14 and 24 cope with some form of anxiety, depression, addictions, or other social distresses. Estimates among indigenous populations are twice the national average, with addictions and suicides being five to six times the national average. Friendship centres know this first-hand, and they have identified the need for additional strategies and capacity for mental health programs for urban indigenous communities, especially among youth.

As I shared with you during my previous appearance, friendship centres emerged beginning in the 1950s out of the need for indigenous people migrating to urban centres to have a friendly and welcoming space to gather and to express their culture. For over half a century, friendship centres have helped urban indigenous people access the vital services they need to succeed in urban settings across Canada. Friendship centres understand the challenges facing our communities, and with the unique wraparound service delivery model, we ensure that we are well equipped to tackle them.

Across the country, friendship centres provide culturally appropriate services for indigenous people living in urban centres, and they have become places for indigenous and non-indigenous people to come together, share traditions, and learn from one another.

Friendship centres are a significant part of Canada's social infrastructure, with more than two million client contacts annually, serving Canada's most vulnerable urban indigenous populations and making the friendship centre movement the country's most significant off-reserve indigenous service delivery infrastructure.

The NAFC was created in 1972 to be the voice of its members nationally and internationally. The NAFC's membership now comprises seven provincial and territorial associations, and 118 member friendship centres across Canada in each of your ridings.

The NAFC has a long and unique relationship with the Government of Canada. For the past 30 years, the NAFC has been the administrator of national programs delivered to friendship centres and other urban indigenous organizations on behalf of the Government of Canada.

While we are a not-for-profit network rather than a politically representative organization, the NAFC enjoys a productive relationship with many other indigenous organizations.

The effects of colonization and residential schools have led to high levels of psychological distress within indigenous communities, elders, and youth. No one is immune to those effects.

This is a concern not just for those indigenous people living on reserve, but also for those in Canada's urban centres. Statistics Canada's report “Lifetime suicidal thoughts among First Nations living off reserve, Métis and Inuit aged 26 to 59: Prevalence and associated characteristics” found that one in five off-reserve indigenous adults has contemplated suicide, and recent reports have shown that this number is continually growing. In the mental health program of one friendship centre alone, over 50% of all current clients have a risk factor for suicide.

Many indigenous people prefer cultural- and heritage-based services that are offered outside of the mainstream medical system. These often include a more holistic view of mental health and its treatments. Friendship centre programming is exactly that.

Friendship centres support culturally safe delivery of these much-needed services in innovative ways. Many centres have health outreach workers to ensure that the health needs of community members are addressed in a cultural and holistic way that addresses the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects of individuals. These services are available on a one-to-one basis or in a group setting, where action plans are developed to help meet short- and long-term goals of participants.

There are also healing and wellness programs at friendship centres, which provide support to community members seeking to access traditional services and supports, and through which action plans are also developed to help meet the goals of community members.

Friendship centres with addictions and mental health programs offer cultural spaces for individuals with mental health and addictions issues to find the help they need in moving toward a healthier lifestyle. The program also works to make better connections between urban indigenous communities and non-indigenous health services. This is done by educating non-indigenous staff about the specific needs of indigenous people and creating partnerships to connect them with a friendship centre.

Many friendship centres also have elder and youth programs providing the opportunity for open and honest discussions around the topics of healthy lifestyles, where elders share their experiences as survivors of the residential school system and information on other topics that youth may be too intimidated to ask about.

These are but a few examples of how friendship centres help heal our communities, but more needs to be done. Many of our centres do not have the funds or capacity for clinical mental health services. As we have seen with the tragic events in La Loche, Cross Lake, and too many other communities, friendship centres are heavily relied upon for their unique support programs.

The NAFC has taken on efforts to promote healing and wellness in our communities. In 2012, the NAFC's aboriginal youth council embarked on a suicide prevention and awareness project for urban aboriginal youth ages 10 to 24. This included a proposal and call-out for a suicide prevention kit, and resulted in much-needed research on indigenous youth and mental health. More recently, the NAFC launched newjourneys.ca, an online friendship centre resource. The newjourneys.ca site is home to a unique online searchable database that lists programs and services for indigenous people across the country. The site also features engaging stories, news articles, and blog posts written for the most part by indigenous youth.

As part of the development of newjourneys.ca, the NAFC has partnered with Kids Help Phone. This partnership has not only allowed the NAFC to refer indigenous children and youth to a critical emergency service, but it has also allowed Kids Help Phone to become more responsive to the unique needs of indigenous callers.

The friendship centre movement will continue to support individuals and communities, and is a willing partner in suicide prevention and mental health. The friendship centre movement and the NAFC look forward to working with the government and opposition parties to improve the lives of indigenous people in Canada. This will be achieved through core funding investments in friendship centres so that they continue to have the capacity to operate and to meet the needs of their communities, as well as to look at ways that friendship centres can expand their current successful programs that support individuals affected by suicide.

In closing, I would like to reaffirm that there are community-based solutions to complex problems like suicide. Friendship centres work every day to harness the creativity, energy, and knowledge that can unlock new ideas and new thinking that will lead to enduring social change and contribute to the healing and full inclusion of indigenous people in Canada's economic, cultural, and social fabric.

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak to you today. Mr. Craig and I look forward to addressing any questions you might have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

Thank you very much for that, Mr. Sheppard. I'm very proud of the work that the Mi'kmaw Friendship Centre in Halifax does in my own community as well.

We're going to go right into the first round of seven-minute questions, with the first question from Michael McLeod.

[Michael McLeod, Liberal, Northwest Territories, NT]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you to the presenters today.

This is an interesting presentation. It's something that I'm quite interested in and was historically very much involved in. I'm one of the founding members of at least one friendship centre in the Northwest Territories, but I worked on several projects that resulted in friendship centres being established. I spent a lot of time at the national level trying to convince people that we needed more friendship centres in the north.

I did that because I saw the benefit of friendship centres. I've worked as a band manager. I've managed band councils. I've been involved with the Métis. I've been involved with the political organizations quite extensively, and I always found that the restriction to serving only members was too confining. We needed an agency in the community that dealt with everybody on an equal basis, and friendship centres really fit that bill for us.

I've seen the community really benefit from the programs in many different areas, such as language development. We've seen cultural programs where drum-making programs were established. We had elders come in and talk about history. We've seen community gardens being worked on so as to provide food for the community. We've seen services provided out of the facility, a facility that was built out of logs. People are still wondering why we built it out of logs, but that was the only resource we had. It's not very energy efficient, but it still serves its purpose.

We've also seen a lot of good programs, such as moms and tots programs. You would think that everybody had a skill for dealing with children and young babies, and you would think that everybody would know how to handle situations, but those things need to be taught in the communities now because of the residential schools syndrome. A lot of people don't have that skill.

We've had courses put on about FASD. There are support programs run through there, such as alcohol and drug programs and so many others. It served as a drop-in centre for all these years. It also has worked as a homeless shelter, because there's nowhere else to put people who have no place to go.

I have several questions, but I wanted you to talk a bit about the funding gaps, about what problems you're not addressing because you don't have the resources. I know that the cuts to the friendship centres in the last while have been pretty drastic. I know that they've cooled off all the programs that were needed, and I also know that there's been nothing in the area of infrastructure funding for putting facilities in place.

You talked about people living off reserve, but in the Northwest Territories, we don't have reserves, so friendship centres serve us well there. They're there for everybody.

Maybe you could talk about the gaps first. Then I'll ask another couple of questions.

[Christopher Sheppard]

Thank you.

In the last few years the funding program that supports friendship centres has gone through what I would say is a fundamental shift. Once upon a time, friendship centres received their money through the Minister of State. It transitioned to the aboriginal friendship centre program, AFCP, and then most recently into the community capacity support program, which falls under the urban aboriginal strategy.

The AFCP, which no longer exists, was a program designed for friendship centres based on the 40-year or 50-year history between friendship centres and the Government of Canada. That has led to, I would say, a substantial shift in how friendship centres are funded. We used to have core funding. It's no longer core funding. That fundamental shift has really changed the way friendship centres are able to operate.

Questions around our eligible expenses, like receptionists and.... I try to explain to people what a friendship centre receptionist is like, so I'll give you the experience of, say, my friendship centre where I come from.

We have a mental health team that consists of a social worker, clinical psychologist, cultural support workers, elder. The receptionist isn't simply saying “Hello, this is the friendship centre, how may I direct your call?” Sometimes the receptionist will say, “Hello,” and there's a person in serious distress on the other line, so how do you prioritize that work? Is it someone that needs to speak to someone right now? Is it someone who can wait an hour? A receptionist isn't just someone who picks up the phone and says, “Hello”. They could be the first one to deal with a huge emergency. They could be the first one to make sure someone gets the help they need. Therefore, for us the idea of having no receptionist in a friendship centre isn't only about someone picking up the phone, it's about whether someone will get the help they need in the amount of time they need it.

The fundamental shift around how friendship centres are funded has been quite significant. It's something that I know the last time we were here we presented on, and we would love to engage with anyone in the room around that, but there has been a fundamental shift in how friendship centres are supported and it creates huge challenges.

One thing that we hear from the north is that funding a friendship centre in the north is very different from funding a friendship centre even in St. John's. I come from the north. I know exactly what that looks like. The costs associated with being able to have a building open and available—

[Michael McLeod, Liberal, Northwest Territories, NT]

I think you've made your point. I want to ask another question before we're cut off.

In my opinion, every community that has an aboriginal population, or every community that has huge social issues, should have a friendship centre. I think they have a very valuable purpose. I would ask if you agree with that line of thinking.

[Christopher Sheppard]

A few years ago, working with Statistics Canada, we actually did some data around communities where there should be a friendship centre. It was significantly different from where we are right now. For instance, in my province there should be nine. There are two.

We look at it as the number of aboriginal individuals in a community and some of the other concerns in that community, but it is very different. The difference is that in the 1970s and 1980s, there was funding available if you wanted to start a friendship centre.

[Michael McLeod, Liberal, Northwest Territories, NT]

I have one more question.

Are you currently engaged in the review that's taking place right now?

[Christopher Sheppard]

I get reviewed next Thursday.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

Thanks.

The next question is from David Yurdiga.

[David Yurdiga, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here today. I do have a great passion for friendship centres. I'm not sure how the communities would be without them. I have three friendship centres in my riding.

Over the years, friendship centres have evolved. Before, they were a place to meet, and now they're a place for refuge, for counselling. I know some of them even have food banks within their organization, so it's much appreciated. Some municipalities are even helping with the cost, for example, by giving them a grant for a year. It's a necessity that we all recognize has to be supported to a greater capacity. For many indigenous people, friendship centres are the first point of contact, whether it's socio-economic programs and services.... I know some friendship centres even have employment courses and drafting of resumés, that sort of thing, so it's much appreciated.

What kind of funding would make the friendship centres able to complete their mandate? I'm sure every friendship centre is a little different and in every community the issue of mental health is a big thing. Can you describe what funding is necessary, the magic number that would enable one to carry out the mandate?

[Christopher Sheppard]

We always ask friendship centres how much money they really need to do what they're doing. A lot of friendship centres are very good at leveraging money. On average, if they receive $120,000 to $170,000 in core-like funding or whatever, they're really spending on average over $300,000 to make sure that they're still able to hire the people they need and that they have the space, so well over double what is being received now. The reality for friendship centres at this moment is that we don't have a friendship centre funding program.

It is open. Anyone who meets the criteria can apply, which I'm totally open to, but at the same time, if we want to recognize the work that is expected of a friendship centre and to fund them at a level that's appropriate, it's nowhere near what the current number is. It's $43 million in total. It's way bigger than that. When you say numbers like over two million client contacts a year, it's significant. In St. John's it's 33,000 contacts a year in multiple areas.

This is the thing I try to tell people, that providing funding to a friendship centre isn't just “here you go,” and you'll keep doing what you're doing and do the baseline work. When you're leveraging it at one to seven for every dollar that you're getting from the federal government for your core-like funding, there are very few organizations in this country that can leverage at that level. Every dollar shouldn't be looked at as the dollar they're getting; it's these additional dollars that you can get.

The last time I was here I said it's around double what we're already getting to support friendship centres to do what they need to do. Right now they're moving along, applying for every cent that they can, and creating their own revenue to make sure, because when someone does walk through our doors, regardless of who they are, what background they're from—most of them are in really busy downtown parts of the city—you help them. If it's an aboriginal person, you help them; if it's a non-aboriginal person, you help them, because at the end of the day they need that support. They're doing all this work, but really on very little money.

[David Yurdiga, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

The biggest thing right now is addressing the suicide among our youth. I see even in my riding that from one friendship centre to another they have a different program. Does your national association have a program they can share among all friendship centres? Are there certain minimum guidelines that you have? Do you have one, or are you guys working on a national strategy that can be shared with other friendship centres?

[Christopher Sheppard]

Because there is really no central pot of funding for a suicide prevention program or even mental health for that matter, every centre's response is based on the capacity that they have. The friendship centre that I mentioned where 50% of the mental health clients have a risk of suicide, half of the money is coming from Health Canada. The other half is being paid for by the friendship centre itself because no one is able to fund it.

They realize how important it is, but there is no funding, so every friendship centre's reaction or availability of programs is different, depending on what resources they have access to.

I guess our biggest centralized effort around it is especially in the youth council. This is something that came up when I was on the youth council. We looked at a strategic plan, and we asked young people across the country, and this came up as a huge risk factor. They said to develop a proposal, shop it around, and we need to do something about this. We were never able to get traction on it. As huge an issue as it is, we were never able to create a centralized effort because, depending upon which province you're in or which city, there are different resources available. A lot of the time they are supplementing it with their own money.

[David Yurdiga, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Another thing I noticed is some of these friendship centres are very resourceful. They go after funding from industry. They have bingo and they have other things that they do to raise money. Some of them are doing an excellent job in providing mental health services but, as you said, it all depends on where they can draw the revenue from. Do you think that the federal government should have a funding specific program just for mental health issues?

[Christopher Sheppard]

If we want to make a difference in how mental health is looked at and treated in Canada, especially in indigenous communities, I don't think there's really another option.

[David Yurdiga, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

Thanks.

Niki Ashton, please, for the next question.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Thanks so much for being here today and for the important work you do. I'm very proud of the work that the four friendship centres in our constituency in northern Manitoba do. It strikes me that oftentimes friendship centres are really the only option for so many young people in our communities, and also for young people who come in from the neighbouring first nations, whether it's for visiting family or coming to school for a few months. Really, it's the friendship centre that's there for them.

I know there's a robust discussion around the needs for mental health supports in communities. I'd certainly like to hear your thoughts on that, but the first thing I want to say is that one of the discussions that came up post-suicide crisis in Pimicikamak Cree Nation or Cross Lake, in northern Manitoba, was about kids wanting access to recreation services. In fact, Amber Muskego, a very articulate and courageous young woman, came out and talked about the lack of recreation services. She was talking with me one on one and asking why they don't have something like a friendship centre, because she knew of the friendship centre in Thompson.

How important do you think it is that there be recreation services in first nations? Obviously, this being a clear federal jurisdiction, how important is it for the federal government to support recreation services on first nations as a way of preventing suicide?

[Christopher Sheppard]

Maybe I'll give some personal background on myself. I'm originally from an isolated Inuit community in the north. I lived there for 17 years. It's a super-strong recreation community. Most of the communities in my area have very strong recreation and sports programs and very strong after-school programs. When I moved, it was one of the more shocking realities to see communities that didn't have that. I'm from a community that isn't a reserve. We have an Inuit government. We have self-government, so we don't face some of those challenges.

One thing I have noticed, which is even relatable to the city, is that when you have young people who have nowhere to go, nothing to do, nowhere safe to be, and all these other barriers piling up, it is not difficult to see how you go down this road of.... I like to remind people that suicide.... I used to be a suicide intervention trainer. It was such a huge concern for our friendship centre that it's what I did. I trained young people, individuals, in how to keep someone alive long enough to get them to someone who could really change their circumstances.

Recreation, the safe space, and the ability for these young people to have somewhere to go are life changing. Most friendship centres have youth programs, after-school programs, that they can go to. It doesn't mean there aren't other barriers that are challenging. When these small things all pile up, sometimes that's what it takes to get a young person to that place, but if there's nowhere for them to go and talk to someone about that.... We've done suicide interventions over Facebook Messenger. We've done them through email. We've had young people walk through the door. It is such a huge concern that even with after-school programming and everything else, there will still be those challenges, but recreation is a game-changer. It's a safe place for people to go to and do an amazing activity.

For those of you who have worked in a community or who have community experience, recreation is also another area that is challenging to fund. We have friendship centres that self-fund volleyball teams for young people and also access to sports. Access to recreation is so challenging, but it can be a huge game-changer because it provides that safe place for young people to go to and have something to do, when maybe they don't even have a safe home to go to. We always look at recreation as so much more than just an activity. It's team building. It's building self-confidence. It's all these things wrapped into one, and trying to explain that to a lot of people is really challenging, because they don't get it or they've never worked in that area.

I worked in youth programming at a friendship centre. I did it for three years. I can see the difference it can make when young people have something they can do. Access is really challenging everywhere. When I see communities that don't have access to this, I find it really shocking that they don't have a safe recreation space to go to.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Thank you for sharing that and for infusing it with your own personal experience as well, which makes it definitely more powerful.

I did want to refer to a news release that was put out in early May by the B.C. Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres in which they refer to facing a dire crisis, particularly with the ongoing delay and uncertainty about the urban aboriginal strategy funding from the department. I'm wondering if you could speak to that. What is the current situation? What needs to be done at this point?

[Christopher Sheppard]

As you know, a portion of the UAS sunsetted March 31 of this previous year. It was recommitted in the current budget, but it has not been released yet. It has not been released to the NAFC or friendship centres yet. As of this point, no friendship centre has received their core funding. Any friendship centre that's currently open is running off of other revenue or other resources to keep their staff and to keep their doors open.

We've been working as closely as we can with department officials to have it released, and to have it drawn down, but right now it still hasn't happened.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Do you have a timeline? Have they given you a timeline? This is pretty shocking.

[Christopher Sheppard]

Yancy can answer that one.

[Yancy Craig, Director, Strategic Development, National Association of Friendship Centres]

Thank you.

Yes, we were asked by the department to adjust our submission to move forward to get to our contribution agreement, which was required because of the authority change coming from the budget commitment, and we remade our submission yesterday. We're quite hopeful that we'll get some feedback and that funds will flow very quickly, but we haven't received a response to that submission yet.