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.