Status of Women Committee on Jan. 14th, 2011

[Dawn Harvard]

I would ask the same question.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

What do you think, Christine?

[Patricia Jurivee]

I'd like to speak in part to that.

We have attempted many times to get into the educational system to be able to talk to the teachers and the principals about these situations, about poverty and what this may look like. Just because you're at poverty level it doesn't mean you're a bad parent. It just means there's not enough money to be able to send a sandwich with your child.

She won't ask. She has so much pride that she won't ask her next-door neighbour if she can make a sandwich. She's not going to do that. She doesn't realize, I think, either, that she's looked at differently. She knows it, but on some level also she doesn't understand that child welfare is going to be called in.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

I'm talking about another level. I'm not talking about the mother or relative, but all the organizations like yours and band councils, for example. I don't understand why there is no desire to work together and make the link.

Can you give me an answer on this, Christine?

[Christine Simard]

I think it comes back down to policy. When you look at funding of education, policing, and social services, they're all provincially or federally funded. They all have different criteria to follow. Part of the issue is that they'll say, well, that's social services, that's not a policing issue; I don't want to talk to them about that kid. It's not my problem. That kid hasn't committed a crime, he's just hungry.

In regard to food security, maybe having regulations in place so that kids can eat.... LCBO can sell a bottle of vodka for $26 here in Thunder Bay. It costs the same in Moosonee. Why can't they do that for food as well? Milk costs $2.30 here. Up in Moose Factory it's $14.

So when you think about domestic violence and about providing for the family and stuff, those are some of the policies, etc., that the government really needs to examine and take a closer look at.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

I'm sorry, it's past time.

At the end, I intend to give folks a couple of minutes to say the things they need to say.

Go ahead, Mr. Hyer, for five minutes.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Thank you, Ms. Mathyssen.

Thank you all very much for coming today on such short notice and for giving up your suppertime on a Friday night. That's really appreciated.

You've heard apologies before. I'd like to add my own. I apologize on behalf of past governments, although I wasn't part of them. I apologize on behalf of present governments, although I'm a little marginalized in them. And I apologize particularly on behalf of men, who have not done an adequate job to help solve these problems.

I don't think most men or most of the white community are uncaring about this, and I don't think that most of us are racists, but unfortunately the opposite of helping is not usually overt discrimination, it's lack of action. And unfortunately, the opposite of love is not hatred, it's indifference, and we've been far too indifferent for far too long. And I include myself to some extent in that.

It's clear to me what some of the problems are here. You've talked about some of them: the huge poverty gap, education, educating the public, but also educating women so they can crawl out of poverty. One problem is changing attitudes, but a big one is funding. I have what I call Bruce Hyer's rule of funding, and that is that vision.... And I think all of us share a vision of a Canada in which neither women nor their children are hungry or discriminated against, and in which they feel secure and happy and look forward to equal opportunity. But vision without funding is hallucination. And we're just not funding these programs. It's so clear.

Ms. Harvard said not only do we have $10 million worth of funding, but it's going to the wrong places. Well, $10 million for the kinds of problems we have here--these endemic problems of racism and discrimination against women in Canada--is a bad joke. We're spending $5 billion to $6 billion a year in Afghanistan, allegedly to help women in Afghanistan, and we're spending $10 million to help women in Canada? We're spending $17 billion for jet fighter planes to protect us from what I'm not quite sure, when our real problems are internal, not external. We're spending $60 billion on tax cuts to our largest and most profitable corporations in Canada, and we don't have a few tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to help women? That's worse than criminal.

So this is my quick question, and I can follow up later, and please follow up with me later. Could each of you—Ms. Pierre and Ms. Harvard and Ms. Simard--give me one answer?

I'm a man. I'm white. I'm privileged. I'm a successful business person. I'm lucky. I'm very lucky, and my family is very lucky. It's not my file in Parliament. I have six other critic areas, and Jean Crowder of the NDP, the aboriginal critic, and Irene Mathyssen, the women's critic, do a great job. But despite that, how can I help as a person? How can I help as a man? How can I help as a white person who cares? And particularly, how can I help as an MP to help my people and my caucus and my government? Can you boil down to one or two bullet points how I, wearing all of those hats, can be most helpful?

[Marlene Pierre]

I would really love for you to attend our gathering--because it's all Nishnawbe Aski from this area where you're going to get voted in from--and to listen to them in their deliberations. And besides listening, when you leave you could pick what you could do. Only you know what buttons you can push over there and how successfully. I think if you want to become an advocate for us, you should come and listen to us.

We'll invite you. Thank you.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Ms. Harvard or Ms. Simard, does either of you have a quick response to my very broad question?

[Christine Simard]

I agree with Marlene's comments about meeting with the women of Nishnawbe Aski. Our MP is Mr. Greg Rickford. It would be really great for Mr. Rickford to also attend the women's conferences that we have. I think it's also important that regular meetings occur so that you can take our information back to the House, do what you have to do, and help us lobby for funding for preventive and interventionist projects for domestic violence.

[Dawn Harvard]

If I could just add to that, there was something you brought up earlier in terms of education.

The average Canadian citizen--either immigrant or born, raised, and educated in this country--has no idea of the situation of aboriginal peoples. Everything they know comes from Walt Disney movies: the Indians were conquered and they all live on reserves somewhere in the north in teepees. That's the basis of most people's education and understanding. A lot of well-educated people are still functioning under those kinds of misunderstandings, so that's the important first step: to really start having an understanding.

Second of all, even if I put all the native women and all the native people I know on a contact list and we put all of our resources together, the few bake sales we could have still wouldn't be much. But somebody like you, you have access to a number of, as you said, other privileged people who have the resources, the contacts, and the networks, and to people who have the education and the skills to be able to contribute to what we're doing, not to take it over, but to say they want to support our vision and ask how can they do that. Absolutely, then, that kind of help would be welcomed.

I'm sure there are people out there who have resources and would be willing to start funding some of these important programs, such as the “I Am a Kind Man” program, to get it to all of the communities.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you very much. Unfortunately, there's not enough time for another round, but there is some time, and what I would like to do is to give that time back to the witnesses.

There are five groups, so you have two minutes for each group. Tell us what you weren't able to say and what you really want to communicate.

I'm going to be very strict about the two minutes.

We'll start with Ron.

[Ron Bourret]

Thank you.

Me, too. I'm furious. I understand. I've had enough.

I have to say that a question was asked about how you could deal with this and get away from the silos. In Armstrong, Ontario, years ago when I was going up there for the corrections department, I formed something called a Comsac team, a community services advisory committee. We had the Métis on it and we had the Whitesand representative on it.

We had all the ministries on it, provincial and federal, because I got sick and tired of going to Armstrong and missing the mental health worker who had just given somebody money--or hadn't--or missing another provincial or federal government worker who had just been up there, be it a juvenile probation officer or something, or someone from the corrections department. We formed these teams. Then it went up to Fort Hope. We did the same in Lansdowne House and Fort Hope.

The thing is, that is the way to do it, because.... Not only that, the people aren't stupid. They're going to skive you. They get $200 from someone from the province, from Comsac and then they turn around and ask you for the same $200. You don't know if Comsac just gave them $200; they're not going to tell you. So there are also checks and balances in place. That's one way how that would solve it.

The other way is that we have a northwestern Ontario intergovernmental committee. This is something launched by the Ministry of Labour of the province. We have the federal government representatives, the provincial government, and me. I sit on it representing the Municipality of the City of Thunder Bay with Greg Alexander.

Again, we talk about social issues. In our community, we talked about, somewhat touch-on only, and even though that isn't a mandate.... But the mandates of those committees could be turned into dealing with the issues we deal with, the people on the street. These are the people, our first nations people in this community, and that's really growing, and growing big. I just want to leave you with that.

Those are solutions I'm seeing that are working. They have worked somewhat, but again, when I left corrections, who knows? Maybe it all fell apart.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you. You were perfect with your two minutes.

Dawn, please.

[Dawn Harvard]

There are a few things I wanted to mention.

Number one is that it's important that we remember--and from everybody around, I kind of heard inklings--that not all aboriginal women and not all aboriginal people live on reserves. In fact, in Ontario it's arguable that over 80% live off reserves. A lot of those, especially aboriginal women, are not leaving for education, or for jobs, or for a life in the big city; they're leaving their communities because of violence, because of the situation they're in.

So it's really critically important to remember that it's not only first nations that need support. It's also the communities in Thunder Bay, and Toronto, and Ottawa, and Kenora that are working to help those women who need that support.

Also, looking at the number of women when we questioned on the responses.... It's because of those kind of racist responses that a lot of native women are afraid to go and ask for help. It's not always about pride; it's about knowing that in the past, and in their experience, and in the last 100 years, the automatic response has been to take away their children.

They don't want to go to social services or to food banks, where they write down your name and address. There's this fear that somebody's going to know that you can't feed your kids, and your kids will be taken away.

They don't want to tell the cops that their boyfriend is beating them, because the CAS will think their children are in danger and will take them away. Taking the children away seems to be the end outcome of any reaching out, so there tends to be, “I will deal with it; I will put up with the abuse to try to keep my family, to try to keep my children with me.”

Also, we talked about capacity, about the website, about the programs. People say, well, there are all these funding sources. But the difficulty has always been for groups like the women at the table, for groups like the Ontario Native Women's Association, even though we've been around for 30 years. The strong groups get stronger. Those who write good proposals get all the money, and those who have the really good ideas and a real connection to the community needs don't have the great proposal writers. There's a fundamental disconnect there. Human resources within your organizations can help support those people when they come to you with ideas that are workable. How do we put it in a way that government can understand and see it as fundable?

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you.

Patricia.

[Patricia Jurivee]

I heard you asking, “What can I do as a white, privileged male?”

Go to some of the shelters. Come down and visit my shelter. See what it looks like. Then step into a shelter on a reserve: find the difference, see the difference, see the buildings, see the conditions they're in. I've known of federally funded shelters that were going to food banks to get food for their clients in the shelter. What is that?

I mean, go in. Really go in and get a view of what's really happening inside those shelters. Come and see the work we do. It's very difficult work. It's hard, hard work.

I'm one of those, and I'm very grateful for it, who has a 24-bed shelter. I have a place where aboriginal women can come to. I have the number of workers I have. I'm very well supported. Also, in this community I have good community partners, and I'm very grateful for that. Rob is one of those. I have a sister shelter in Faye Peterson, and we work very closely together. She also has a high level of aboriginal women who go to her shelter.

It shows you the need in this community: two 24-bed shelters are full to capacity at most times. It just tells you the level of violence that's happening here in this community.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you very much.

Marlene.

[Marlene Pierre]

I have one request, and that is as you develop the criteria for funding women's groups in Ontario or federally, I will make myself available for any of those people who are involved in that process and I will welcome the opportunity to get very specific about what kinds of financial needs there are in our territory here. So I offer myself for that.

I would like to thank you very much for all that you've encountered here in the north.

Just as a slight correction, Madam Chair, you are in the territory of the Robinson Superior Treaty people and others. I am from Fort William, so I am very pleased that you chose to come to our community.

Have a safe journey.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you very much, Marlene, and thank you for that. I am honoured to be in the Robinson Superior Treaty territory.

I hope you will make sure that our clerk has your contact information, because I know a number of people who would be very happy to hear from you and converse with you with regard to your suggestions.

[Michelle Simson, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I just wanted to add, quite seriously, a point about the invitations to these conferences. You'd be surprised--if we don't know specifically, we can't be there. I think it's very important that communication be both ways. We're trying to learn, and as part of the education process, especially when you're a politician these days, you can't foist yourself on anyone, never mind other communities. An invitation would be wonderful. I think you'd be amazed at the response you ultimately would get with respect to these conferences. So, again, the contact information is very important.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Irene Mathyssen]

Thank you for adding that, Ms. Simson. I think that's very important.

Finally, to the women from NAN, I'll leave it to you to decide who will speak for two minutes.

[Christine Simard]

I'm just going to say three quick things.

Funding allocations need to reflect the high cost of remoteness for the Nishnawbe Aski Nation. Capital funding regarding housing shortages also needs to be acknowledged, especially with the INAC formulas. One thing, though, with the funding last year, and I forget what it's called--not CMHC, but it's economic development or economic boost--

[A voice]

It was Canada's economic action plan.

[Christine Simard]

Anyway, we had only six weeks of ice roads or maybe less last year. MP Greg Rickford was very instrumental in helping some of our communities get funding flowing so they were able to get some of their housing supplies, diesel, and that sort of stuff up to the community. If we didn't have contact with him, I don't know if we would have received what we needed.