Qujannamiik.
Thank you.
Minister, when your predecessor for ISC—Patty Hajdu at the time—decided politically and without evidence to suddenly cut the hamlet food voucher program of the Inuit child first initiative, some of the language that she used to explain why you've used yourself: to say that it's because some people were taking advantage of the program.
I think what you need to realize is that the people who were taking advantage of the program are people in poverty and people who don't have many opportunities for employment. I've done an Order Paper question regarding the food voucher program and have learned what the totals for Nunavut were. It's estimated that it helped about 15,000 Inuit children. That's a lot for Nunavut.
When we calculated the overall amount, that figure came to about $18 per day per child. That's not a lot of money, I don't think, to help people in poverty. That program was so helpful to Inuit families, and when it was suddenly cut, they didn't understand why. Then, for this government to say that people were taking advantage of it.... It just tugs at my heart when you say that.
When all of a sudden Inuit families had to do a lot more paperwork with the changes, it meant, for example, that a single Inuk mother of seven children had to do tons of paperwork to try to access that program only to be denied, most likely. Even though she's a single mother of seven with no job, for some reason she was not eligible for the program.
In addition, her story is not unique. Nunavut has a poverty rate of 42%. Nunavut has an unemployment rate of 13.2%. When we're thinking of the backlog for indigenous peoples across Canada, we know, for example, that it's been reported for Jordan's principle cases that the backlog is at about 140,000 cases. That is a lot of children and that is a lot of indigenous children's families who are being left in limbo because ISC can't decide if those children's treatments deserve to be paid for.
This is why we're so passionate about making sure, for example, that there are no cuts to Indigenous Services Canada, that there are no cuts to the Inuit child first initiative and that there are no cuts to Jordan's principle.
When you're celebrating your successes because of what was reported in the Auditor General's report, please remember those stories: those families who can't feed their children, those families who can't get medical care and those children who, in the Department of Education, can't get better equipment so that they can learn better.
You need to make sure that you're a bit more careful when you're talking about what successes are.
In the 10 years before the Liberals came in and the current 10 years while the Liberals have been here, what first nations, Métis and Inuit have experienced are constant cuts every year, cuts to these programs that indigenous people rely on. I need to remind you that indigenous people, because of the way that systems have worked, are forced to rely on federal programs. We are forced to take, because there are no other employment opportunities.
Especially in Nunavut, where all the communities are fly-in communities, there's no screening available for children to get their screening in schools in the community. They have to be flown out. To see cuts being made to the non-insured health benefits program is also a concern.
We have all these major issues and we need to have you here to say you will commit to making sure there are no cuts.
Indeed, the national indigenous organizations in their pre-budget submissions were calling for more funds, and they were also ignored.
Could you respond to some of these national indigenous organizations? Why were you okay with the cuts that were made, when they were calling for more funding for programs and infrastructure?
