Status of Women Committee on April 26th, 2007

[Melanie Omeniho]

There are things that we do to work on issues like that. Actually, I have to tell you, from a national level, that most of these things happen at the regional or provincial levels. For instance, I come from Alberta, so I can speak about the things there that I really know well. We sit on the chief of police's hate crimes committee, which helps develop awareness so that we can let our people know how they can access the things they need when a hate crime is perpetuated against them. Most of the time our community is desensitized; they believe racism is part of their everyday life, so they don't respond to it. So we're trying to change these things.

We are involved and proactive in the area of human rights, and we have tried to bring awareness about human rights and the violations of some of those rights that have gone on. But the biggest challenge we have—and it remains so today—is that a lot of the racism is actually done in systemic ways, where policies and things we're not involved in developing are actually developed based on racist values and insights. So it's a matter of us being able to identify and put our finger on those things to help work towards changing them. I mean, when we see obvious things, such as when they used the face of an aboriginal woman for target practice in Saskatoon, we were able to bring public attention to that and help change that. It wasn't a picture of an aboriginal woman, but it was somebody dressed to appear as an aboriginal woman, which they used for target practice in the police gun ranges in Saskatchewan.

So there are things like that, which we continually work to change, but it's hard to work inside those institutions to find exactly where those policies are that need to be changed. Often we meet with some resistance to changing them, because the one thing I've learned about Canada is that nobody wants to admit to racism. As long as nobody says there is racism, it can exist. So it's really challenging to go and do that later.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Dickson, I just want to clarify if you said you used to receive funding from Heritage Canada and that the funding has gone to INAC.

Okay, because I think Ms. Smith was telling you that Status of Women would have funding on its website and also how to figure out how to access that funding.

Correct, Ms. Smith?

[Jennifer Dickson]

Thank you for that clarification. I appreciate that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you.

We now go to Ms. Mathyssen for seven minutes.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much for the information. It's so wonderful to have you here and to be able to have this dialogue.

I hope, Ms. Dickson, that you'll follow up with the committee. I'd be very interested to find out how successful you were in regard to that funding. I think that would be an important thing for the committee to know.

I'm very interested in the things that have been presented, and I wanted to ask Melanie a question. You talked about the need for statistical information, when Ms. Demers asked you about that. What statistical information would be most useful in achieving the goal of addressing the issues facing Métis women?

[Melanie Omeniho]

We actually have been working with Stats Canada to try to pull out whatever stats they have from their available sources. But one of the issues that happens with Métis people—an issue that we like to call the “Métis identifier”, because of a lack of a proper term for it—is that we don't know what health services are missing or what health services aren't being resourced, because nobody will ask if you're Métis. I can give you several examples. If you're a first nations person, they immediately ask you or make the request, because there are resources allocated for first nations people to pay for health care services, but if you're Métis, they don't ask that question. They tell us it's racist to ask us if we're Métis. Then those stats aren't collected and we don't know.... From a community level, we know that children don't have the same access to health care services. Sometimes it's because people don't know where the health care services are, or women won't access them, or the services are not affordable. There are many things. We're only assuming why those things are actually in existence.

Even in the work we've done on homelessness, for instance, which has been a big issue, people won't ask if you're aboriginal when they do the homeless count in our communities. They won't ask if you're Métis, they won't ask if you're first nation, because it's racist. So they have volunteers who go around on homeless-count days to ask if you have somewhere to sleep at night. Then there's a little ticky box saying whether or not you're aboriginal. If that volunteer thinks a person is aboriginal because they physically look aboriginal, they'll mark the ticky box. If the person doesn't visually look like they're aboriginal, they won't mark it, because they won't ask, as they say it's racist.

I want to tell you, as a Métis person, I'm very proud of who I am. If anybody asks me what my nationality is, I have no problem ever telling them, nor am I ever offended when somebody asks me what my culture is. In fact, I'm always happy to share my identity, and I'm very proud of that. My grandmother was proud of that, my great-grandmother was proud of who we were, and I've raised my children to be proud of who they are. So nobody is ever going to feel like you're committing racism against me if you ask me who I am and where I come from.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you.

I noted in the data that only 5% of Métis women, and I say only 5%, were able to converse in their aboriginal language.

I wonder if everyone could answer this. How important is language to enhancing the quality of life of Métis people and Inuit people? What is the effect of the loss of the language funding? We've seen that disappear. Does it impact negatively?

[Melanie Omeniho]

For us and Métis, Michif is our national language. It is one of the languages that is being lost and could possibly become extinct, because there are fewer and fewer Michif speakers all the time.

Our language is a part of our culture; that's what makes us who we are. Our language is a living language; it's a language made up of verbs. If somebody were to tell you a story in our language, you will see a bunch of people sitting in a room who understood the language just roar with laughter at the story. If they were to translate it into English, it wouldn't sound funny any more. So it really is a living language and a part of who we are, a part of our culture. It is being lost, as we have fewer and fewer Michif speakers who can share and translate it.

In fact, in our Métis communities in my generation, my grandmother only spoke Cree and my great grandmother never spoke any English at all, only a Cree-French mix, which is Michif. We understood everything she said, but we were not allowed to speak it, because it would identify us and target us for the racism that came to be. And it was because they had been in the residential schools and had the experience that their languages were bad, so they would only talk in their language amongst themselves and family. For my generation, often the words we learned were from the dirty jokes that were told, in words we weren't supposed to say, but they were the words we would pick up.

So it's really important now that we develop programming, and we are trying to do that, so that our young people will be able to take that part of our culture and grow with it. Without our language, we lose a piece of our culture and our heritage.

[Jennifer Dickson]

I agree.

For the Inuit, to go back to what you were asking about a few minutes ago, the data are abysmal, as everybody knows. When people travel to the Far East, to China and Japan, and say that the people there are all the same people, it's that offensive when people lump together all of Canada's aboriginals, including first nations and Inuit. I won't speak for the Métis, but I do know that the Inuit feel very offended never to be disaggregated from first nations. So that's my response on the data.

The language is critical. Inuktitut is a very difficult language to learn. They say it's slightly easier to learn than Mandarin Chinese, but not by much. I've been working on it every single day, all day, for four years, and I'm hopeless. I can say quyanamiik and several things. Again, it doesn't translate; it transliterates. So the humour is lost, or the meaning of a story is lost, or the tradition is lost, when you try to translate it. I don't want to get into who is funding what, but I think it's a huge loss for the world to lose this language, if it is lost. There are so many spiritual truths that are carried on by it.

Pauktuutit did manage to scrape up $50,000 last year and reproduced a book called The Inuit Way, which I think all of you have, as we sent it to every single member of Parliament in the fall. So read it, as it's about the Inuit culture.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

We now go to the second round, for five minutes.

Madam Jennings.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Thank you very much, Chair. Merci beaucoup.

Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and experiences, and all of the facts.

I want to get to one of the points that has been raised by both you, on behalf of Inuit, and you, on behalf of Métis, and that is the fact that there is a serious lack of statistical tracking. The reason I am interested is because up until recently my own community was significantly underreported by the Stats Canada census.

In the mid-nineties I actually participated as a sort of honourary chair of a task force headed by a professor from McGill, Jim Torczyner. He was able to get money from the federal government to actually conduct a census using...and to redefine “black” in order to ensure that all people of African origin were captured there.

To give you an example, in Canada there are people who define themselves as Brazilian, but they are black. There was a 40% underreporting of them. That then meant the government resources--whether municipal, provincial, or federal--health services, educational services to African-descendant communities in Canada were underfunded. It also meant that the organizations in the communities themselves did not have a scientifically proven statistical basis to show the case for more moneys for certain services, etc. I think this is a major point for all of our first nations, whether they are first nations aboriginals, Inuit, or Métis. That's the first thing. This is something this committee may wish to explore a bit more and actually make some recommendations on.

The other point where I wanted to get more information from each of you is on the issue of racism. Racism is alive and well and thriving in Canada. Discrimination is as well. I think if we don't recognize it, then we are not on the road to finding solutions to it. I understand that people have an auto-defence mechanism. When we talk about it, a lot of people start to tense up because they think they're being accused.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Madam Jennings, you'd better pose the question.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

How much time do I have? Seven minutes?

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

You have one minute and 30 seconds left.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

Sorry. I didn't realize I had such a short time. I thought it was seven minutes.

My question is, are you able to find any kind of government support in order to deal with that as an issue, whether it's in transitional housing, in education, or in your advocacy? Are you able to find any kind of support, financial or otherwise, from government?

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

You have one minute to answer. Go ahead.

[Jennifer Dickson]

We have not found any government support to talk about racism at all. But I must confess that we have so many crises in the north that this isn't one of the priorities at the moment. We haven't looked hard for it, but we would love to see it, if there is any.

I couldn't agree more...and this is an offer to help, if you're interested in getting the right stats out there. Everything you said about that absolutely resonates with us.

I'll just give you one example: teenage suicide. People say aboriginal teenage suicide is seven times higher than regular Canadian suicides. Well, if you disaggregate for Inuit, it's 18 times higher. I don't know a single Inuit family that hasn't had a teenage suicide. Just imagine that in your own life. That is one example; I could give you all kinds of them.

The situation in the north is at a crisis level, and Canadians don't know it. The reason Canadians don't know it is because of stats.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Would you like to add something, Ms. Omeniho?

[Melanie Omeniho]

I would say that there has been no government funding or support. We do work with the Northern Alberta Alliance on Race Relations to try to create awareness around racism. We work with young people to try to change the attitudes when they're young, so they don't always perceive us as the drunken guy in the gutter.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you.

We go now to Mr. Stanton, for five minutes.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

I'm with you, Madam Chair.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

You're benefiting from my lack of knowledge.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Before I start, I would like one clarification. You briefly talked about the expanded funding programs under Status of Women Canada. I think you'd be interested to know that one of the key priorities under that program is in fact for aboriginal women. There were three different areas: visible minorities; aboriginal; immigrant and senior women. In fact, there were four distinct areas that take a priority in those areas. It's a larger pool of funds, so I think it's worth checking out.

Back to Melanie, if I may. In your presentation, you made a statement and I wonder if you could expand on it a bit for us. This is in the section where you're talking about the go-forward economic security issue. You said:

As Métis women we recognize that a part of our economic security will be accomplished by empowering Métis women and taking back our traditional role within our own society.

Could you talk about taking back a traditional role, what that means, and connect the dots as to how that would expand economic conditions and circumstances for Métis women?

[Melanie Omeniho]

First off, traditionally and historically, Métis women were always workers in the home. They were always a provider of an economic source in their home for many, many generations. That's a reality of who we were. We were a very matriarchal society. Very often, the men would leave our communities for months, and sometimes years, and the women would take care of all the necessary things that would provide for their well-being and their existence in that community.

Part of when we say we need to empower women and take back our traditional role--and I'm not blaming anything or anybody--but the reality was that once there was more European contact with our communities, with the churches getting involved in our communities, the attitude started to change amongst our men. It went to more of a patriarchal kind of role. Many of our men...and statistically I can't prove this, but I believe that's part of where the violence and aggression in our communities comes from. Some of the traditional ways and cultural things that we were taught have shifted, and now we need to shift back to where we were.

Often, women were the mainstay of the family and they provided the majority of the income and economy that it took for that family to exist. They were the ones who saved the pockets of money so there was money when they got older. That was the role they had within our community.

If we can bring some of those cultures, traditions, and values, and also find a place in our communities where our men could be comfortable with the empowering roles that women play, I think we will be a healthier community for it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Mr. Stanton.