Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Nov. 19th, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 12 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs.

We recognize that we meet on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Wednesday, September 24, 2025, the committee is continuing its study of indigenous policing and public safety.

I remind everybody to please be cognizant of our great interpreters here. There are little points on how you can interact with your microphone. Make sure it's on and off—off when you're not speaking. If the earpiece is not in your ear, make sure it's on a little circle on the table.

Thank you again to our interpreters.

We're going to have an opportunity to hear some more testimony on this important study.

The Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario are here.

We have James Killeen, vice-president, chief of police, United Chiefs and Councils of Manitoulin Anishnaabe Police Service. Welcome.

We are also joined by Kai Liu, executive director, chief of police, retired, Treaty Three Police Service; and Jeff Skye, chief of police, Anishinabek Police Service.

Welcome to the three of you. You will have five minutes to present.

We also have Karen Bell, chief of Garden River First Nation and a police officer as well. She is trying to get online. We've been experiencing some IT issues here on the Hill, so we will be monitoring that. We may have to suspend to allow her to participate.

From Six Nations Police Service, we have by video conference, Darren Montour, chief of police.

All three of you will have five minutes. We'll start by hearing your testimony. If we need to suspend for a brief minute to allow Karen to get online, we will. I will start first with Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario.

Jeff, please begin.

[Chief Jeff Skye, Chief of Police, Anishinabek Police Service, Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario]

Thank you Chair.

My name is Chief Jeff Skye. I am the chief of police of the Anishinabek Police Service, situated out of Garden River First Nation. I am starting my 34th year in first nation policing.

We are here representing the Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario, also known as IPCO. IPCO was founded in 2019 and represents the nine self-administered first nations police services that operate in the province of Ontario. In total, IPCO member police services serve 85 first nations in Ontario.

We advocate together for equitable policing for all first nations in Ontario. We also advocate for serious and significant changes to first nations police. Some recent successes include working with our funding partner, Ontario, to provide a provincial pension plan for our members equal to the OPP's. We're part of the Community Safety and Policing Act, 2019, which was co-developed with first nations and allows first nations to opt in to legislated standards for community safety.

Four years ago, this committee heard about the struggles of first nations policing and how we were asked to do more with less in extremely challenging conditions. The committee also heard about the extensive failures of Canada's first nations and Inuit policing program, FNIPP. In particular, the committee heard about how the FNIPP, which launched in 1991, was built on a promise. That was the promise of equitable policing for first nations comparable to non-first nations communities. The committee also heard how the promise was never fulfilled.

Since the FNIPP launched, the promise has never been forgotten, but the underlying policy was quite literally disappeared. We call it the phantom policy. Instead, Canada imposes unfair, discriminatory rules through the terms and conditions, which fail first nations people. As my colleague, Kai Liu, will explain in a moment, multiple courts have ruled that these terms and conditions are arbitrary and discriminatory and force first nations to endure restrictive rules that would never apply to non-indigenous people.

While first nations policing has changed somewhat, there is still significant work to be done. As some examples of the work, some detachments don't even have lockers or change room facilities. Recently, in one of the detachments, through funding, holding cells were built that were made of drywall.

The biggest challenge affecting first nations is drugs and associated violence. While the drug crisis affects everyone, first nations communities are particularly hard hit, with an influx of drugs and gangs from southern Ontario. People, especially our young, are dying, and we don't have the resources to do anything about it.

These incidents aren't anomalies. They are increasingly the norm for first nations communities. Gangs target first nation communities because they know there's nobody to stop them. First nations police services have been chronically underfunded, affecting our ability to provide 24-7 policing and keep communities safe. We simply do not have the resources, the funding, the officers or the equipment to tackle this crisis, and it is killing our people, especially the young.

We are asking you, the committee, to help us encourage Public Safety Canada to help make that happen.

I want to say meegwetch and thank you for my few minutes, as I'm trying to speed up as quickly as I can. I'd like to hand it over to my colleague, Kai Liu.

[Kai Liu, Executive Director, Chief of Police (Retired) - Treaty Three Police Service, Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario]

Good afternoon.

My name is Kai Liu and I'm the executive director of the Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario and former chief of the Treaty Three Police Service.

I want to highlight two key developments. These are the major court rulings confirming discrimination in Canada's first nations and Inuit policing program and IPCO's own successful legal action.

In Quebec, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal and the Federal Court of Appeal found that Canada discriminates through FNIPP by refusing to negotiate honourably and by imposing arbitrary terms and conditions.

In 2024, the Supreme Court went further, ruling that Canada breached the honour of the Crown and describing negotiations with Public Safety Canada as like having “a knife to the throat”. IPCO intervened in that case to share Ontario's experience.

In 2023, IPCO launched its own human rights complaint and won emergency Federal Court relief after three of our police services had their funding cut off. The Federal Court ordered Canada to maintain funding, suspend discriminatory terms and negotiate in good faith, yet Canada continues to delay our broader complaint.

We believe these issues can and should be resolved through honourable, good faith engagements without further litigation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Thank you.

Go ahead.

[Chief James Killeen, Vice President, Chief of Police, United Chiefs and Councils of Manitoulin Anishnaabe Police Service, Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario]

Good afternoon.

My name is James Killeen. I'm the chief of police of UCCM Anishnaabe Police Service in the Mnidoo Mnising area of Manitoulin Island. I'm also the vice-president of the Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario. I'm a proud Mohawk from Akwesasne.

The definition of “essential” is “absolutely necessary” and the definition of an “essential service” is daily services for “preserving life, health, public safety and societal functioning.” Ask yourselves this as you hear those definitions: What part of first nations policing or the communities that we represent do those definitions not entail? The answer is all. We take care of all of those issues.

I want to speak briefly about what we hope this committee takes away from today.

First, the problems with the first nations and Inuit policing program are not new. In 2014, the Auditor General found that the program was not accessible, not transparent, failed to meaningfully include first nations in negotiations and urgently needed its terms and conditions updated.

A decade later, the 2024 Auditor General report found the situation had worsened. Public Safety Canada still had no equitable funding approach, continued to fall short in programs and still has not meaningfully consulted first nations.

Adding to it is the word “program”. We are not an experiment. The word “program” insinuates that we are here part time. It's been over three decades. It is no longer a program. It's not called the “federal policing program”, the “provincial policing program” or the “municipal policing program”. We should not be a program any longer. We are here to stay.

Second, despite repeated court rulings directing Canada to fix this, the federal government continues to act as if these decisions do not exist. IPCO's own human rights complaint, which you heard about earlier, has been stalled in procedure. Canada has twice changed the terms and conditions after an injunction, again without any consultation.

We ask this committee to take what you've heard today and ask Public Safety Canada directly: What is being done to fix this program?

Third, we are concerned because we've now been told that Canada intends to change the terms yet again. This will happen in January 2026. The reason this is so important is that these new rules would block us from obtaining legal advice to challenge any discriminatory terms and would stop us from carrying over unspent funds. These changes are not just arbitrary; they are discriminatory and they further limit our ability to serve our communities. They are also two of the reasons that kept all three of our services alive when their funding was cut off in January 2023. The ability to have that carry-over gave us the ability for us to sustain our police services.

Fourth, this program has existed for over 30 years. The courts have ordered an overhaul. First nations have asked for one for decades. We should not have to win another ruling just to be heard. Canada regularly claims the process is complex and that funding is unavailable, yet in 2023, the minister updated the terms and conditions with the stroke of a pen to finally allow funding for basic policing units, such as crime units, drug units and canine units, which are very sorely needed in our communities, so we know change is possible when Canada chooses it.

Meanwhile in Ontario, the Community Safety and Policing Act now allows first nations to opt in to a framework with mandatory, adequate and culturally responsive policing. That is not true federally. What does that say about Canada and the views of first nations police services?

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

James, I'm going to get you to wrap up. You'll be able to provide more during the testimony for the rest of it, please.

[Chief James Killeen]

Okay.

Finally, I want to close with a question.

In 2023 I attended the federal-provincial-territorial ministers' meeting. At that time we asked if first nations matter. Based on the last two years of delay, silence and avoidance, the answer appears to be no.

We are asking again here today as the representatives of IPCO and our proud first nation communities: Do we matter? We hope we do.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Thank you very much.

Next is Darren for five minutes, please.

[Chief Darren Montour, Chief of Police, Six Nations Police Service]

Thank you.

First, I'd like to thank you for the invitation to speak on this very important issue.

My name is Darren Montour. I am the chief of police for the Six Nations Police Service. I was born and raised here on the Six Nations of the Grand River. I am a proud Mohawk and a member of the Wolf Clan.

I have spent my entire 33 and a half years policing my home community. I am the president of the Indigenous Police Chiefs of Ontario and also vice-president of the central region for the First Nations Chiefs of Police Association.

What I'm going to discuss here are the same issues that my predecessors and first nations leadership have been stating since the inception of the first nations and Inuit policing program in 1991.

Policing in first nations communities has long been shaped by structural inequalities, chronic underfunding and governance models that differ dramatically from those of non-indigenous jurisdictions. These disparities are especially evident in the FNIP program, the primary mechanism through which community police services are funded and delivered to first nations communities.

Despite the essential role police services play in community safety and well-being, first nations policing in Canada is not legally recognized as essential service, which both reflects and perpetuates unequal treatment.

The Auditor General's 2024 report sharply criticized the FNIPP for its systemic failures, including practices that amount to systemic racism in the way services are structured, funded and monitored. That Auditor General's report said that money was left unspent.

With essential service legislation, this will ensure longevity, sustainability and equality for first nations policing across the country. This has been in discussion since 2021 and seems to have fallen off the priority list.

Negotiations of new funding agreements are taxing and take up valuable time and resources that could be used towards policing rather than fighting for adequate funding. There is no such thing as meaningful negotiations, as listed in our tripartite agreement. The timeliness of agreement expiry is left for no negotiation availability. There's not enough time to negotiate a new contract when you're told to sign at the end of January or you don't get funding by the start of April of the next fiscal year.

Being able to have resources and manpower reflective of the population of the communities we police is essential to do the job to the best of our abilities, like those in non-indigenous communities. Recruitment is also a constant hurdle in first nations policing. The IPCO human rights complaint, as executive director Liu spoke of earlier, basically chastises the first nations and Inuit policing program. We also had to take Ontario to court for another human rights complaint for pension equity.

With these disparities in manpower, equipment and resources, it leads to mental health impacts for our own people. The effects of intergenerational trauma from residential schools are still prevalent in indigenous communities.

The IPCO mental health review had 27 recommendations to help improve the mental health of the officers, the civilians and the families. Lack of resources, equipment, infrastructure and manpower, and mental health anguish of members, leads to PTSD, burnout and, eventually, resignations of members, which in turn jeopardizes community safety.

Community policing is important for all our communities. I always say that the epitome of community policing is first nations policing. We are from these communities. We know the culture. We know the language. We know the dynamics. We know the people. We're related to everybody in the community.

Lastly, the lack of resources and manpower can lead to an influx of organized crime into indigenous communities. Speaking specifically of Six Nations here, the influx of organized crime into the tobacco and cannabis issues in this community leads to turf wars. We have had gang violence. We have had shootings. We have had arsons. Luckily, with our partners in the Ontario Provincial Police, we've been able to start tackling this problem, but this problem continues and will continue until there are changes to the way first nations communities and first nations police services are funded.

Thank you for your time. Nya:weh.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Thank you very much to everyone.

We're going to our first round, which is six minutes for questions and answers.

First off, for the Conservatives, I have Eric.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora—Kiiwetinoong, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I just want to confirm that Chief Bell is not able to join us.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Not yet. She hasn't been able to come on. If she does come on in a reasonable amount of time, we'll suspend.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora—Kiiwetinoong, ON]

Okay. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses for being here. Most importantly, thank you for your service and for your commitment to keeping communities across our country safe.

I'm happy to see a good contingent from northern Ontario.

Mr. Liu, we worked together a lot before. I appreciate all of your work, particularly with Treaty Three.

We also had Police Chief Gervais here to speak to the committee. It was concerning and frustrating for me to hear a lot of what she brought forward because they're things we have been talking about for many years.

She spoke of the gaps in service, the difficulty in being able to recruit and the mental toll it has on those who are serving. She said, “No other police service in Canada is asked to compromise so consistently on safety, wellness and sustainability” as first nation police services are.

The frustration I have is that we're here studying this again. It's an important issue, and I'm happy we're studying it, but I'm frustrated that nothing has moved. I want to know if you can speak a little more to what the real-world consequences are for safety in first nation communities, with the lack of action we see.

[Kai Liu]

I could summarize it very quickly. Lives depend on change. Lives are affected each and every day that delays occur for meaningful change to the first nations and Inuit policing program.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora—Kiiwetinoong, ON]

I appreciate that.

We also had some comments from a couple of you—maybe all of you really—about the specialized units. I'm happy there have been some steps forward. Being allowed to have specialized units is obviously an important step in having that discriminatory practice removed, but the resources are a whole other thing. It's one thing to have those conditions removed, but I know that so many units are struggling with resources, particularly when it comes to human trafficking and drugs.

The drug issue is really impacting communities in northern Ontario.

Mr. Skye or Mr. Killeen, can you speak to that lack of resources for those units?

[Chief James Killeen]

I'll gladly speak.

All I did in my previous police service was work on organized crime files, wiretaps, major investigations, so I know what it takes to run those units, and we don't have what it takes. Even with the removal of that, you have to remember that our police services are now 30 years behind. It takes an incredible amount of training.

The smaller the community, the bigger the unit you need. For something such as a drug unit, there's been evidence to show that you need a minimum of five people, for instance, to do surveillance. Right now with the funding we're looking at, they're saying we're possibly getting a unit with three people in it, so it's already underfunded at the start of it.

The smaller the community, the more you would need. The reason I say that is this. If I were to do surveillance in Toronto right now, I would blend in a lot easier, but to go into a first nation community, I'm telling you that I would be instantly identified. People would be walking up to the car, knocking on the window, asking what I was doing there and who I was with. They would be wondering why I was there. You need bigger units to be able to concentrate a lot better. We need massive amounts of training to get people up to those standards.

When I joined a drug unit, I had heavy mentoring from people who were already in there. We don't have any of that, so I'm the mentor. I'm the chief of police and I'm mentoring people because of my past experience, which is still valid. I'll tell you that, as the chief of police, I've been out on surveillance, as early as this year, on a major project. That was a joint force operation that was running between Toronto and Sudbury, and it came onto the island.

We have major gangs around. I don't want to just say the word “gangs”; I'm going to read some of these names to you. Off the top of my head, we have the Chester Le gang, the Driftwood Crips and the Five Point Generalz.

These aren't people we just think are here. These are confirmed members we work with through the Toronto gun and gang task force, as well as OPP organized crime units, who are able to identify these people. These people are in our communities.

We have motorcycle gangs: the Hells Angels, the Outlaws and the newly re-formed Satan's Choice.

We already have full-patch members of Satan's Choice. This is the reason that's such a concern. For those who are not aware, I'm from Sudbury. That's where I was originally a police officer. Sudbury is the only police station in Canada to have been bombed by an organized crime group. That was the Satan's Choice Motorcycle Club back in December 1996. That group has re-formed, and the son of the group's founder is now running it.

We look at the problems that are coming. This is already in my community. It was not even a month ago we had that. These are major issues we have going on. It's not that we think there are gangs here. There are gangs in our area and they are causing a massive amount of issues, and we do not have the training to bring us up to speed.

[Eric Melillo, Conservative, Kenora—Kiiwetinoong, ON]

I really appreciate that. I didn't want to cut you off, but I'm short for time.

You also mentioned some more discriminatory changes being brought forward in January 2026. I know you were pressed for time in your opening remarks. Could you please expand on what those changes are and how they're going to have an impact?

[Chief James Killeen]

Sure. In March 2023, when we filed our human rights complaint, our negotiations had just started. They instantly stopped as soon as we filed that human rights complaint, and our funding was cut off. The reason that's so significant is that doesn't happen to federal, provincial or municipal police. I worked for a municipal police service. You were never afraid that if the chief of police, the mayor and council for the city were looking at a deal and if it didn't work that they would cut off funding, but that happened to us.

What kept us alive were those carry-over monetary funds and the ability for us to hire a lawyer to represent us. We're not lawyers. We're police officers. There are a lot of logistics that go into legal arguments we don't have the expertise on. It doesn't make sense that, on one side, they're able to have 14 lawyers look at an agreement, and on the first nations side for the police service, they don't. Those two conditions they are specifically looking at to change. I look at it as they looked at the two conditions we use to keep us alive, and now they're going to change those conditions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Terry Sheehan]

Thank you very much for that.

Continuing on with the testimony, we'll have Jaime for the next six minutes for questions, please.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso—Antigonish, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for your service, officers, and for coming here to testify today.

Officers Montour, Skye and Killeen, you talked about the influx of organized crime and gang-related activity because of a lack of resources in your communities.

Can you tell us a bit about what kind of collaboration you have with the OPP and the RCMP for these major crimes where you need additional resources that are probably not available to most indigenous police programs in Canada?

[Chief Jeff Skye]

I can answer that.

We actually do have a very good relationship with all policing partners in the province of Ontario, including the RCMP. The problem we have, though, is these are our communities, and we must be funded properly to have our own specialty units. This is where the gap is. When we do need the OPP to come into our communities, we actually have to send a letter of request to the Ontario Provincial Police commissioner to get their specialized units to come into our communities.

Sometimes that doesn't work. As an example, we don't have canines. Some do but most of us don't. We don't have drug units, etc., etc. The list goes on where we need to be sustained, get some sustainable funding, to continue to hire for that. Right now, even if we do get some funding, there's a ripple effect. If you do start a specialty unit, you're taking frontline officers off the road to be promoted into those units, and it leaves a gap at the front line. This is the problem we've been running into for over three decades.

I know, myself, in my career, I was with the Anishinabek Police Service, and then I joined the Treaty Three Police Service—that was my treaty area—and then I came back as the chief of police for the Anishinabek Police Service. The unique challenges are no different across the province. They're all the same. Without the commitment of all those hard-working men and women on the front line, things would be drastically worse. Without getting into the 2019 mental health report, there are consequences for that.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso—Antigonish, NS]

Before I go to Chief Montour, do you think you have enough indigenous police in your current area being trained, or do you think we need an influx of many more? How can we do that?

[Chief Jeff Skye]

We are starting to negotiate for more officers for our police services. We have actually submitted to our funders for those officers through a service delivery model, similar to what the OPP have been doing for its police service. They are now complete and we are having them submitted. We're just waiting for an answer about whether we're actually going to get that increase in officers.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso—Antigonish, NS]

Where are your officers trained?

[Chief Jeff Skye]

They're trained at the Ontario Police College.