[Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]
ᐊᑎᓕᔭᐃ, ᐆᓪᓛᒃᑯᑦ, ᑯᕆᔅᑕᕗ ᓴᐳᑦ ᐱᔭᑦ -ᖑᕗᖓ.
[Inuktitut text translated as follows:]
Hello. Good morning, I am Christopher Sheppard-Buote.
[English]
I will tell you a little bit about myself. I am a beneficiary of the Nunatsiavut government. I was born and raised in Nunatsiavut. Currently I am the president of the National Association of Friendship Centres and reside with my husband Jacob on Treaty 6 territory after moving to Saskatchewan, where he is a medical resident.
This reality, combined with knowledge from the friendship centres that I work with, gives me a unique and heightened insight into the current situation.
I am joined by the National Association of Friendship Centres executive director Jocelyn Formsma. I also want to acknowledge my fellow friendship centre colleagues, Edith Cloutier, executive director of the Val-d’Or Friendship Centre; and Larry Frost, executive director of the Native Canadian Centre of Toronto.
It's a rarity that we get to present together, but it's definitely a pleasure to be on the panel with both of you.
Also thank you to the committee for the invitation.
My local friendship centre colleagues would be much better to speak to what is happening directly on the ground, so my focus will be on providing the national picture.
The NAFC represents 107 member local friendship centres in provincial and territorial associations in every province and territory except for Prince Edward Island. Collectively, the movement is the largest and most comprehensive urban indigenous service delivery network in this country. Last year our members served about 1.4 million first nations, Inuit and Métis as well as non-indigenous people across over 1,200 programs in 238 buildings. We employ over 2,700 people.
We are proud to be a largely indigenous, women-led network, which is also a rarity, with over 70% of our local friendship centre executive directors being women and five of our six provincial and territorial executive directors also being women. The majority of our board is women, and the majority of our executive is women.
What I really need you to hear today is this. Friendship centres' COVID-19 response has been nothing short of heroic in the face of enormous systemic barriers. They have become food deliverers, elder caregivers and shelter providers.
Among the systemic barriers to this essential work is the distinctions-based approach to COVID-19 relief funding, which left many urban indigenous community members we serve as unseen due to ongoing jurisdictional wrangling between federal and provincial governments; the lack of resources, training and protective equipment; and the fact that we are not being engaged nationally on urban-specific approaches.
Despite these significant barriers, the friendship centre movement has once again demonstrated the effectiveness of its community-driven principles. We remain trusted and culturally relevant, and we continue to provide those holistic supports for all indigenous people living in urban, rural and northern communities from coast to coast to coast.
The NAFC continues to seek funds to ensure that urban indigenous communities are served in this time. We are extremely concerned that reopening parts of the economy will cause the first wave to spill over onto the people we serve. We are still very much in the first wave while trying to prepare for the second wave that may come.
Friendship centres should not be at risk of decimation because we answered the call when others could not or would not, because we spent and served without proper equipment, because we put aside any regular fundraising and social enterprises and because we showed up. This is what's at risk if Canada continues to refuse to develop an action plan based on its own population data.
When this is all over, the communities we continue to serve will still have all the underlying and pre-existing matters to deal with. Properly equipping and resourcing friendship centres to appropriately respond is but one way to invest in restarting the economy. As you know, friendship centres, as civil society hubs, offer or partner to offer supports in such areas as health, education, child care, economic development and training.