Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses for being here and sharing their insight.
I want to join my colleague in complimenting you on your French skills. Thank you for making that effort.
Ms. Eisan, I believe you said “meegwetch” at the end of your opening remarks. In Wendat, we say “tiawenhk”. That's how we say thank you.
I'm a member of the Wendat nation. Unfortunately, Wendat is mostly a dead language. We've seen efforts to revive it in the past few years, with some language classes being offered, but Wendat has disappeared from everyday use. I myself took classes eight years ago, but it's very hard to keep up your skills in a language that people don't commonly use. Still, we hope that efforts to revive and revitalize Wendat will continue and that it becomes popular again among the people of Wendake.
My first question is for you, Ms. Eisan.
We know that the CAF was aiming to increase indigenous representation to 3.5% by March 31, 2026. That deadline has passed. According to the numbers we have, 2.9% of regular force and primary reserve force members self-identified as indigenous in 2024‑25, whereas indigenous people make up 5% of the population. That means indigenous people are under-represented in the armed forces relative to their numbers in the general population.
Indigenous recruits accounted for 4% of recruits in 2022‑23, and 5% in 2023‑24 and 2024‑25.
With indigenous recruitment at 5%, why is overall indigenous representation still hovering around 3%? Is there a problem with recruitment? Is there a problem with retention? Is it due to a lack of trust in the institution?