I'll give you a little bit of my background. I'm an aboriginal man, a status Indian, and I have five children.
Unfortunately, I went through two marriage breakups. Right now, I'm a single father, so I know personally some of the realities of separation, the emotions, and some of the issues that can be involved.
I've also been an Ontario Provincial Police officer for 32 years, and I've worked on first nations communities throughout Ontario, both on and off reserve, so I'm speaking from some of my experience in that time.
Unfortunately, because of the nature of the fiduciary relationship to reserves—and I'll call them reserves because everybody seems to understand that “reserve” concept as opposed to “first nation”—the provincial laws don't apply when it comes to divorce court and different separation agreements. That complicates things and it makes this very problematic.
I've had personal experiences where, let's say, an aboriginal man is living with an aboriginal woman who is not from that community. When they break up, she is basically kicked right out the door. They have no protection under law. As a police officer, I've gone there. We keep the peace, but there's a band council resolution that has been passed telling her that she has to leave, and she's escorted off that first nations or reserve community.
I know personally that right now there is no protection. In some communities, but very few, they have created their own laws, basically divorce laws or matrimonial division laws—