Yes.
I'd like to thank the witnesses for their testimony.
I'm coming to you from the Eskasoni reserve, a Mi'kmaq community. We have a community of about 5,000.
I don't want to paint all situations with the same brush because I know it varies, but one of the thoughts and one of the things that is noticed by indigenous leadership is that there is a lot of intergenerational trauma that exists currently in our communities from residential schools. This often leads to bad situations at home, and that often leads to people fleeing their home situations. Often, addictions are seen as the main cause of people getting into positions where sexual exploitation is possible.
I know there's more to the story, but is addiction too commonly used as the reason for sexual exploitation? Tell me a little bit about how the basic income guarantee would deter that if addictions are a problem.
Also—just because I know I may only get one question—with regard to funding autonomous women's organizations, which organizations are we looking at funding? Should we be funding the national women's organizations? Are we looking at funding the French centres or the rural support? In my community, we have the Jane Paul Indigenous Women's Resource Centre, which is set up in an urban location. What is the best, most efficient use of the money—the $2.2 billion—that we're putting towards missing and murdered indigenous women?
I want to start off with Ms. Smiley and then go to Ms. Skye, if I can.