Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on April 20th, 2021

[Marilène Gill, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thanks very much.

We go to Ms. Gazan for six minutes.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you so much, Chair. I'd also like to thank the minister for joining us today.

Minister Bennett, year after year, records show that your department spends more than $100 million annually fighting indigenous rights and status. My question is this. During the pandemic, with this new budget, how much have you budgeted to fight indigenous peoples in courts? You talk about reconciliation, but I would argue that fighting against fundamental indigenous human rights is not an act of reconciliation.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

We know that we have to do better. We also know that certain rights affect other rights. Within indigenous communities, whether it's survivors of residential schools or children in the child welfare system, our job is to make sure we go forward with fairness and justice. Unfortunately, when we are taking part—

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

I'll give you a couple of examples. One is the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruling to immediately stop racially discriminating against first nations kids. Another is the fact that your department continues to fight St. Anne's residential school survivors, sixties scoop survivors, in court.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

With due respect, my job is to get out of court on so many of these aspects. Whether it's specific claims, whether it's comprehensive claims or whether it's all of these—childhood litigation, for example—we have settled from Anderson to the sixties scoop. We just keep settling these claims. There are some that are a bit more difficult than others, but we want to do right, and right past wrongs.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Minister, with all due respect, I think the survivors of St. Anne's residential school would say otherwise, or all the kids who continue to be racially discriminated against, with your government indicating that you will not pay what's been ordered by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruling. I say this, Minister Bennett, because you have the power to immediately implement article 22 of UNDRIP in Bill C-15, which states the following:

Particular attention shall be paid to the rights and special needs of indigenous elders, women, youth, children and persons with disabilities in the implementation of this Declaration.

Knowing all of this, why do you choose instead to keep fighting first nations children, for example, in court, and why have you failed to implement a national action plan to address the epidemic levels of violence and murder of indigenous women and girls and two-spirit persons across this country? I know you had a budget announcement. However, the report was released on June 3, 2019. There's no action. Where is the action plan?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

I thank you for that, but I also want to say that Minister Miller has been very clear. The children will be compensated, and there will be a fair compensation that meets the needs of those who were in care for their whole adolescence and those who were in care for a very short time. This has to be done properly, so that people aren't revictimized.

I'm very optimistic about the 100 women and two-spirited people working toward a national action plan. I think I was a bit optimistic two years ago that we would be able to get that done in a year. I am just so proud that we said we would need to get it right, and with the partners we have working on it, it is so impressive, and I think they—

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Minister, I think we need to move on here, but I have to say, I'm not very proud of this current government and the fact that on their watch women and girls—and children—continue to die because of this incremental approach to justice that your government has shown.

I want to move on specifically to the bill. There have been several recommendations that have been brought forth to the committee in testimony and written submissions.

For example, the first is deleting paragraph 6 from the preamble.

The second is adding a subclause 2(4): “For greater certainty, the rights of Indigenous peoples, including treaty rights, must be interpreted flexibly so as to permit their evolution over time and any approach constituting frozen rights must be rejected.”

The third is another amendment, adding a subclause 2(5): “For greater certainty, nothing in this Act is to be construed so as to diminish or extinguish the rights of Indigenous peoples, including treaty rights.”

Is your government open to amending Bill C-15 to honour what has been called for by nations across this country, to include the living tree doctrine?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

I just wanted to go back to say that I find it hard to hear you say there's been no action on missing and murdered..., when we've been building, really since 2015, on the determinants, the causes and the cause of the causes, with $2.2 billion in yesterday's budget.

I think this is what we have to do to stop the tragedy. These are concrete actions to stop the tragedy.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Minister, that wasn't my question, but I think you should tell the three women and young girls who lost their lives in my riding since the pandemic that your government is doing enough. I would argue it is not.

I think that's the end of my time.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

No.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Yes. I'm sorry, we are at time.

We'll go now to a five-minute round.

Mr. Vidal, please go ahead.

[Gary Vidal, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair; and thank you, Minister, for being here today.

Before I get into my own questions, I want to follow up on where my colleague, Mr. Schmale, was ending his round with you, in that whole discussion around FPIC and a veto. We've had many witnesses tell us in the last several meetings that free, prior and informed consent does not mean a veto, and you confirmed that again today.

Why do you not actually just put that in the legislation? Would the government be opposed to an amendment that would include that in the legislation?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

I know Minister Lametti and the government are looking at all the potential amendments being put forward, including what Ms. Gazan said. I think most people feel that free, prior and informed consent needs to stand on its own, as it does in the declaration.

There's nothing about free, prior and informed consent in the legislation itself. It is embracing the declaration as it is, and I think what has formed not only the preamble but the body of the bill is not going to frighten people, because we want to just be able to go forward.

[Gary Vidal, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

However, the fact of the matter is, from the number of people I've talked to, especially indigenous business organizations that make an income in the natural resource sector, those dividends—those proceeds from that sector—go back into their communities to address social issues, to reduce poverty, and to recreation, housing and suicide prevention. Those people who have a mandate to reduce poverty in first nations in Canada are the ones who are raising the concern about the lack of clarity or the lack of certainty around that definition.

I push for clarity on behalf of those folks who are trying to do tremendous work in the first nations communities in my riding and across the country. I'm going to come back again to that question: Would you personally support the concept of just bringing that clarity by actually saying in the legislation that this is not a veto?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

Where we know we need to go forward is that in the duty to consult, the duty to accommodate, that is a broad approach without definition, and again, that the norms for that continue to evolve. I think there is a complete consensus that this is not a veto. We are obviously going to consider all the possible amendments, but I worry about that one.

[Gary Vidal, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Thank you.

I would come back and say, if all these people say it's not a veto, let's just put it there and then we have clarity. Let me move on to something different, though.

Before the pandemic began, in the early part of 2020, the front pages in Canada were very much centred around who has the authority to withhold or provide consent in linear projects, and obviously you're right in the middle of that.

My follow-up question to you would be, would it not seem appropriate to allow some time and space for indigenous communities and their leaders to find the answer to the question as to who has the authority—who has the ability to speak on behalf of their people—before we jump into some of these things?

I get the importance of this. I support so much of what's in this legislation, but with the lack of consensus even within the first nations communities, does this lead to some challenges for us down the road—challenges that you were walking through, literally, personally, in the early part of 2020?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

It really speaks to the urgency of our needing to invest in nation rebuilding and being able to decolonize and support nations rebuilding themselves so they can take decisions as a group. However, the decision is taken based on the wishes of the community.

These aren't taken by any particular group. Whether it's a treaty organization where they take a decision as a treaty governance, or how we move forward.... It's exciting to see some of these communities really building a hybrid model between traditional and hereditary leadership, and the elected leadership. It's just amazing to watch because, again, the UN declaration and its push for self-determination really is inspiring in terms of getting that hard work done.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you very much. I'm sorry, we're at five minutes.

Ms Zann, you have five minutes. Go ahead.

[Lenore Zann, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Thank you very much, and I come to you today from the unceded territory of the Mi’kma’ki.

Thank you, Minister. It's great to see you again, and thank you for all your hard work. There's so much to do on this file, and I just want to say I think you're doing an amazing job.

I was really glad you made a point in your notes earlier today, when you said it's very important that UNDRIP deals with more than consultation on resource development projects with impacted indigenous communities. This was a very good point, because last week we heard here on the committee from Beth Symes on behalf of the Pauktuutit, who also made this point. She asked us to look at this through the lens of indigenous women, and specifically articles 21 and 24 of UNDRIP, which deal with the promise of better social conditions for indigenous peoples.

Could you please speak to us more broadly on the nature of the principles in UNDRIP, and how important that is as a framework for everything from health care to family services to other issues of social well-being for indigenous people across Canada?

Thank you.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

It speaks to what decolonizing means. People were saying.... I think in the Hollow Water study it said that what was once seen as healing is now decolonization therapy. It means that this is about leadership. This is about, as settlers, having the humility that was missing when Europeans arrived to think their ways were better.

What I see in article 21 is that it's about first nations, Inuit and Métis developing their own health and social programs, education, vocational training and retraining. All of that needs to be indigenous led. We certainly have seen that, Lenore, during COVID. When the indigenous leadership know exactly what needs to be done, and the government is there to support their priorities and support their way forward, we know we get much better results, as we've seen even during the third wave.

It is about humility and being able to support a way forward designed by indigenous professionals, but also their political leadership.

[Lenore Zann, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Thank you. I would have to agree as well, coming from Australia, where the aboriginal people, the first peoples, were put in jail for burning off their land at a certain time of year. The colonials did not understand why they were doing that, and now, years later, they realize they were doing it because it helps to prevent major forest fires. They knew 60,000 years ago what needed to be done to the land to keep it healthy. If we had only listened to more of them all around the world, we wouldn't be in as bad a place with climate change, or in any other way.

Minister, your remarks also note that in addition to the specific Truth and Reconciliation Commission calls to action 43 and 44, which call on governments to fully adopt and implement the declaration and develop an action plan to achieve those goals, the declaration is referenced through the calls to action. It's also referenced in the final report of the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.

Could you please expand on why you think the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the national inquiry both have emphasized the declaration as such a key part of reconciliation? I would like to hear some of your own views on why this international document is so essential to advancing reconciliation here in Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We have less than a minute. Go ahead.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, Toronto—St. Paul's, ON]

It is so important. It is about self-determination. Both the truth and reconciliation commissioners and the commissioners for the national inquiry understood that it is with that recognition of rights, respect, co-operation and partnership that we have to move forward. That's really what the UN declaration does. It says that this is the right to self-determination, to make your own decisions and to be able to design the programs as you see fit. The health, education and economic outcomes will then soar, as we know.

This is a really important time in the history of Canada. We get to turn this around, from paternalism to true partnership.