Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on June 9th, 2016

[Chief Isadore Day]

Yes, and I want to reiterate that the strategy the national chief talks about, I'm bringing the representation of his ideas around that plan forward today as the chair of the Chiefs Committee on Health. I do believe that strategy is required.

I do want to focus for a second on the issue of addiction, and I want to bring you back to a point in history, in the early eighties, when NNADAP was coming on stream in this country. An alarm was rung that alcohol addiction in our communities was crippling our first nations and killing our families. What happened was the federal government, through a cabinet approval process, recognized that it must always support addiction programs, and so NNADAP was created. I understand by that type of political will and investment that much of the healing, and much of the strength you see in our first nation communities today, was as a result of NNADAP, but what has happened is there's been reduced funding. There's been a dwindling and a watering down of that investment, and we need to bring that back up.

I think to your point on suicide prevention, we still need a heavy emphasis and focus on addiction. I might add that the face of addiction has changed. The OxyContin issue and the opiates have done so much more damage. We should have left NNADAP alone. We should have continued to invest, and so addictions is a strong point in the strategy.

[Michael McLeod, Liberal, Northwest Territories, NT]

I wanted to talk about delivery agents. We heard from Jack Hicks yesterday on some of the studies he's done. He talked about current programs that are there and haven't been expanded, like aboriginal head start and friendship centres that should be looked at and expanded.

Can you talk about how these would work and how these could be used as agents?

[Chief Isadore Day]

I think it's going to be important to recognize that when we see our first nation people, and the condition of many of our first nation communities, we're seeing an out-migration of our people going to urban centres and finding themselves falling through the cracks. I'm a proponent of strategic partnerships. I think those are going to be important, as we look at the health and the continuity of services. Those delivery agents and the programs that are very desperately needed should be across the board, no matter where our first nations people go. I think we are going to have to take a serious look at suicide prevention being fluid throughout all organizations, and we're going to have to create a culture of partnerships in this work. So your point is well-taken.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

We have a final question from Cathy McLeod.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

You appropriately recognize that there's a whole continuum, and of course you need to engage in all the different points along that continuum. I want to focus on an aspect you have been talking about, primary care and primary prevention, the wellness workers, and the programs that are offered.

In British Columbia, of course, we now have the First Nations Health Authority, which has combined the monies from the federal government, the health authorities, and the province.

From your perspective, is that something that other communities are looking at? Is it something that has been supporting more effective delivery? I would assume there's some flexibility. How is it working? Is it something that would be helpful?

[Chief Isadore Day]

Absolutely.

As the chair of the National Chiefs Committee on Health, I know that one of the things we have come to an agreement on is that we need a health accord task team for first nations, to go across the country in all of our regions to look at what the issues are and what the best practices and models are. We will be ending up in the BC region in some of that work, and looking at the success in that particular region.

Again, I want to underscore the health accord negotiations that are going to be so vital going forward, and looking at those strategic relationships with the various health providers across each province and territorial government. I have to say that those relationships, and innovating within the partnerships, are going to be vital.

In Ontario, again I'll say that the recent half a billion dollars provided by the Ontario government is a huge marker of where other regions need to go. I think that Canada working with its partners, and recognizing a collective effort towards indigenous health across the country is going to be important.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Yes, because here I see that all the partners have actually put the money into the First Nations Health Authority. Rather than the province maintaining control, it is the health authority that looks both at the wellness programs and at how the nursing stations are running. There is a good spectrum in that primary care area.

I'm going to do a quick deviation away from the topic, but it sort of builds on something that Cindy Blackstock said. It's something that we talked about in regard to the murdered and missing indigenous women. I really want your perspective on the need for data, statistics, and information that's not there in many different areas.

I remember that in the 1980s, in British Columbia as an example again, there was identification on the health care card. At that time, people were very angry about that because, of course, they said there was no other group that was identified that way for statistical analysis, so that was taken away. They recognized that the first nations communities were offended by having data collection done in that way.

First of all, data collection is important. Could you talk to me about how data collection is important and how we can provide the information you need to run programs, but not in an intrusive way?

[Chief Isadore Day]

I think it's a very good question.

At the end of the day, governments will always require data. They're going to require aggregate information to be able to make assumptions and design programs.

The issue is going to be control and jurisdiction. I think we've come to a point in time where the first nations have become much more educated. If we had governments continuing to work with us on building up our statistical database, this is going to be an issue of first nation control and co-jurisdiction, and helping build institutions like health authorities. It will be important that we start to define what first nation jurisdiction means.

I'll go back to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, and I'll again point to the modern self-government agreements where that jurisdiction and authority rest with the first nations. I think it's going to be important data, and the information is required to design effective programs and to evaluate them, but the control and the jurisdiction needs to be recognized from a first nations perspective.

I think we have to sit down and have that discussion, and figure out how we start to dismantle some of the bureaucracy within Health Canada. Then we start to affect central government, and start placing those controls and those structures in the hands of first nations.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Do you think your community members would be supportive of that, or might they be a little bit nervous?

[Chief Isadore Day]

I don't think it's individual communities either. We've got health authorities like SLFNHA, if you will. We've got groups of first nations and authority models already being developed. I don't think it's one community. I think we're seeing models right across the country that are ready now for self-government in the area of health authority.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

Thank you. We've come to the end of our time.

On behalf of the committee, Regional Chief Day and Mr. Young, thank you very much for sharing your time with us today. We're very grateful for that.

[Chief Isadore Day]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

Before I adjourn the meeting, I have a quick question on an unrelated matter for members.

Staff from the office of the Minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs have asked me to put a question to you. Earlier this week, the minister tabled Bill C-17 in the House to amend YESAA, the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Act. Typically, we wouldn't get the background information on that bill until it's redirected to us for study. That hasn't happened yet, but the minister's staff is offering that background information now if we'd like to have it.

It probably wouldn't be redirected to us till the Fall, so it's just an offer to have the stuff up front, a little bit earlier. If everybody's willing, I'll let them know they can forward that.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Yes. That would be outside the committee. It would be a technical briefing on the bill, would it not?

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

I didn't hear the phrase “technical briefing”. It was called “background information”. It's documents.

Thank you very much for that.

May I have a motion to adjourn.

[An hon. member]

So moved.

[The Chair, Liberal, Andy Fillmore]

The meeting is adjourned.