Thank you for that question.
This is real stuff. For people who don't understand and who don't do this work every day, seeing the rehabilitation of the trauma enforced, it's all because of a system of systemic racism that has been dealt to indigenous people.
There are two key cases that highlight when we talk about fairness between a non-indigenous person and an indigenous person when we're going through the court system.
Colten Boushie was killed by a non-indigenous farmer. What happened to him? He was acquitted by an all-white jury. Even the first nations people couldn't become jurors. It's a system that has to change. Yes, we're doing our best to do that, but why does it cost the life of an indigenous person?
Look at the Neil Stonechild inquiry of the Saskatoon city police back in the day, 20 years ago. We are being targeted as indigenous people.
Those sentences should be carried as life sentences, but because they have the money and the power, they are not carried out. However, if you look at an indigenous person who gets charged, they're sent to jail, sent to prison, because they can't afford the best lawyer. They can't pay for this kind of stuff.
Michael Spratt hit the nail on the head. This is the reality. Where is the fairness in justice? When you talk about rehabilitation, the reason our people are committing these crimes as indigenous people is that they've been tortured and traumatized by a system. That system was residential schools and it leads to incarceration.
I say this honestly and openly. When you haven't dealt with people sitting in an office like we are, being out there inside that correctional centre and at the federal prison, and talking to these individuals who are saying they want to change because they don't like this life.... They're not waking up and doing this every day. It's because they have been traumatized and nobody's supporting their trauma to stop them from doing this.
Imagine if we took the 80% away from the incarceration system. There would be no work for CSOs inside the facilities. Take out 98% of female youth. We wouldn't have a female youth jail.
Doesn't that make sense to anybody?