Evidence of meeting #37 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 money.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Paula Isaak Assistant Deputy Minister, Education and Social Development Programs and Partnerships Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
That's roughly accurate. Children go on and off. They transfer quite a bit over the course of a year, so those numbers change quite a bit from year to year, but it's approximately that amount.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Thank you.
In British Columbia, of course, we're pretty proud of the organization that we have created around education. However, I know that not all communities have gone down that path, which is why, certainly in the past, it was felt that there needed to be a lot more done. I just want to take this quote from the reports on the estimates from the parliamentary budget officer. I understand he also has another report coming out in a couple of days. I wish that report had been here before we were having these questions because I'm sure he's going to bring some additional things to our attention.
The Education program's goals include supporting Indigenous students to achieve...outcomes comparable to those of other Canadians and funding culturally-appropriate education.... Given these authorities, [we] may wish to seek clarification on metrics to meaningfully assess the Government's effectiveness in implementing the program.
Certainly your most recent departmental performance report priorities do not contain anything in terms of a comprehensive, provincially comparable suite of performance metrics. You know, I'm one who believes like FNESC and like the provinces that money is important. However, without having some structure, we're heading down a bad path. If you could, just give a short answer to that question because I have a whole host of others. Where are you at in terms of developing these metrics?
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
As we learned through the education act debacle, these indicators need to be jointly sorted out, and as we're developing each of the education systems, those systems are going to start out with what indicators they want. We know literacy-numeracy rates between grade 3 and grade 4 are really important. Obviously, attendance is important and leaving high school is important, but the amount of land-based programming, I think, is really important to success, and so are the language and culture programs. We want to see different metrics that are really what the kids know they need to be successful.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Do you ultimately see that there will be or will not be a legislative framework for education?
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
It will depend on what the.... There may be certain agreements that we make that the system would like embedded in legislation. We have yet to make a decision on that.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Every province has deemed that legislation is important, but you're stating that you don't think things like standards, even statutory versus contribution agreements.... It would drive me crazy to be going with contribution agreements all the time, but you're saying that you don't necessarily believe a legislative answer is where you're going.
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
Where we're going is to build systems where there would be a final agreement with terms and conditions for funding. We hope to provide long-term, stable, predictable funding so that the systems actually get the money to hire the teachers, to do the professional development, to do the kinds of things that FNESC is doing in British Columbia. But again, whether that's a legislative framework or the terms of an agreement is yet to be determined.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Again, I'm going to go granular because I think sometimes granular is what matters. Let's say we have a high school student in British Columbia who is going to the Lil'wat school for her education. How much per-child student funding goes to that Lil'wat student if she is in the band-run school versus what would go to the province? Has that per-student funding increased over time, or this year? If you can't provide this today because it is granular....
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
Because we've really increased the investments in language and culture, in special ed student success, and in all of those things, yes, the money has gone up. We're starting to see kids wanting to come back to the first nations operated schools because of language and culture, and those sorts of things. But in terms of what the province sets as their per-student funding, the band has to pay the province for whatever they charge.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
That Lil'wat high school is seeing more dollars for language and education this year coming into their school. Would it be accurate to say that if they have 100 students, they have additional dollars that are supporting language? Are there any standards required for that support?
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
I think I'm going to get another round.
I have to give notice of a motion. I have some concerns that over the last little while.... We've had National Chief Bellegarde, the Native Women's Association of Canada, the Quebec women's association, and the Indigenous Bar Association. Every single person who has come to our committee so far has had serious concerns about the consultation...and through some technical amendments.
I would like to give notice of a motion:
That, in light of recent testimony the Committee has heard during its study of the subject matter of Bill S-3, An Act to Amend the Indian Act (elimination of known sex-based inequities in registration), the Committee: 1) suspend its study in recognition of the Bill’s technical flaws and inadequate First Nations consultations; 2) resume its study once the Government of Canada has consulted with involved parties and ensured there are no technical flaws; 3) recommend that the Government of Canada request an extension on passing legislation from the Superior Court of Quebec, as recommended by Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde; and that the Committee report this recommendation to the House.
Liberal
NDP
Romeo Saganash NDP Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I thank the minister for being here and also for her kind words about me.
I thank the minister for her kind words about my appointment, although I didn't ask for the job. Everybody knows my position on that. We are in this mess because of others, and the burden shouldn't be on indigenous people to fix the problem.
In any case, it's called team work. That is why I'm here today.
I want to start with a point that you mentioned at the outset of your presentation. You said that the 2% cap is now lifted. Can you tell me when that happened?
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
The projections were that budget 2016, with the investments that were there, would take us to 22% over what would have been there with the 2% cap.
NDP
Romeo Saganash NDP Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
The last figures I saw in that regard showed that the 2% was still in place, even after budget 2016, based on the calculation of base funding programs. I recall that the last time you were here, Charlie Angus adamantly contested your arguments on that. Are there any new developments that allow you to say that today?
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
Diane, who used to be in Finance, is probably the best coach we have on this. Diane, do you want to have a go at it first, on how all this works?
Diane Lafleur Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Sure.
Yes, I recall that the last time we were here there was the issue about the 2%. It was really a timing issue, related to when that question on the order paper came in. The budget had been tabled, but we hadn't gone through the process of Treasury Board approvals and actually putting the money into the estimates. That question was addressed at a point in time when, while the budget had been tabled, we hadn't gone through this kind of process—through supplementary estimates (A) or supplementary estimates (B)—where the funding actually flowed to the department and the 2% cap got lifted through the supplementary estimates process.
Now, when we find ourselves with supplementary estimates (B), we are into our second round of significant funding increase flowing into the department. As the minister mentioned, we are now up to $9.4 billion in spending this year, which is significantly higher, and over the next several years it will be 22% higher than it would have been otherwise, under the 2% cap.
It was a timing issue, really.
NDP
Romeo Saganash NDP Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
Right.
The supplementary budget adds $71 million “to support urgent investments in the First Nations Child and Family Services Program”, but we know from experts and groups, such as Senator Sinclair, Cindy Blackstock, and the AFN, that this is not sufficient to close the immediate shortfall that we have in child welfare, identified as racial discrimination by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. That is why I think the House voted unanimously to push for an additional $155 million by voting for a motion on November 1.
My first question is pretty simple. When will the $155 million flow? Will it be reflected in supplementary estimates (C)?
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
That's a really important question. We explained the $71 million, and now we've explained the $25,000 and $75,000 that are going to each of the agencies across the country that isn't in this. There's also the money around Jordan's Principle, which is significant.
We are going to flow the money as urgently as we can. We're still sorting out the cost of best practices, and we are probably going to be able to do more. We just don't want the money to be flowed to perverse incentives. We are hearing, unfortunately, that there are incentives in the system where agencies get more money for apprehending children. There are many chiefs and grand chiefs across the country who are also very worried about the clawbacks from the provinces.
We have to make sure the money gets to the kids, and then we will flow the money. That's the work we're doing right now in terms of establishing needs-based funding, but not reinforcing perverse incentives, and making sure more money can actually get to communities.
NDP
Romeo Saganash NDP Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
The $71 million, which was announced, I believe, over the summer, without any consultations by the way—
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal Toronto—St. Paul's, ON
The $71 million was in the enhanced prevention dollars that were in the budget that everybody had asked for, and was literally what we knew we had to do pretty well coming out of the platform.
With that discrimination of some provinces getting it and some provinces not getting it, it was very clear across the country that everybody needed enhanced prevention dollars, and that was the $71 million.
NDP
Romeo Saganash NDP Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
Did you provide the explanation, the underlying analysis of that money, as required by the tribunal?
