Good afternoon.
I want to thank you for inviting me to your committee to share my experience as an indigenous woman leader and to talk about the economic prosperity of indigenous women, particularly those living on reserves in the north, and mainly in northern Manitoba.
It is very important that your study make recommendations that reflect the specific realities faced by indigenous women. I have been chief of War Lake First Nation for eight years, and I was a councillor for four years before that. I've been in leadership since 1997. It has been very hard, especially if your community really asks you to do a lot more than what they would ask a male chief, actually.
One day there was a funeral in the community. I had to stay up all night to attend with the people. When I was a councillor I still did that, but when I was chief they called me to do it. I left at 11 o'clock and then I still went back out. They called. So there have been lots of challenges.
I am also the longest-serving woman chief in Manitoba. I am one of the two women chiefs of northern Manitoba and a woman chief who represents an isolated first nation. My experience as a woman chief, as I said, has its challenges. One of the things too is that I guess as women, we are a lot more understanding in our way of listening to people. I get more people being upset and yelling at me, and they know, but they know also that I won't get mad or upset. It's a way of allowing them to vent because they won't do that to my councillors who are male, or I don't notice male chiefs being spoken to in that manner.
But I tell them, you know what, if that's how they really feel, I tell them it's best to calm down and then we can talk it through. So they eventually calm down. And that's what they say after a while: they say the reason they like talking to me is because I'm more understanding and I really listen, and even though they get upset, I still manage to talk in a very professional manner.
In leadership, when we attend meetings for our chiefs, there were five women chiefs in Manitoba, and we have our concerns. So we bring up the concerns and we ask our male chiefs to support us, to sign and to second it, if they say no, that this is a women's issue. I was upset one day when they had said that, because women tend to have to get a little bit upset in order to make their voices known. But we have say it in a way that makes them understand that this is not just our issue, it should be everybody's issue. If there are missing and murdered women out there, or issues with education, and taking your daughters and making sure that they're provided with proper lives with their spouses. Another important issue is violence against women, and also I believe more women would run as chiefs if they were given the opportunity, because as I said, we are a lot more understanding. And we encourage our young people to run. That's part of what we do in making sure that these roles are made available to them.
I also want to say to you that on my first nation, it's mostly 100% women in our community offices, except for the band constable and also one who works for child and family services. It's just the two men among the 24 positions.
I've been listening to all the women about the barriers that are faced in everyday life. Aboriginal women share the same challenges and concerns as other women in Canada; however, in many ways aboriginal women are more marginalized. Statistically, aboriginal women and girls make up 4% of the total Canadian female population. The female aboriginal population is growing much more rapidly than the rest of the female population in Canada. From 1996 to 2006, the number of aboriginal females rose by 45%, compared with a 9% growth rate in the non-aboriginal female population.
The aboriginal population is much younger than the non-aboriginal population. In 2006 the median age of aboriginal females was 27.7 years. The fact that we have too many young people, including young women, in our communities means that we also need supports for these youth. That is so very true. We have many young women in our communities, and when they go out to school and bring back their partners, it's difficult sometimes for their partners, their spouses; they have a hard time adjusting.
As for the youth in first nations across the north, there is a lack of funding in terms of education. In fact it has been shown that first nations students on reserve receive a half to two-thirds of the funding that non-aboriginal students receive. Sadly, the lack of funding creates substandard education. The result is that 39% of first nations women in Canada have less than a high school education.
Our youngest children also need supports. Head start and child care programs are often lacking or non-existent in first nations communities. Given that 20% of first nations women are single parents, having access to child care allows them to access opportunities outside the home. These are the programs that the federal government can fund.
It is true that we receive substandard education. My grandson, who is only 10 years old, is concerned about his education. He is in grade 4, but he is worried about going into grade 5, because there are only two teachers and he thinks that going on to the next class he won't learn anything. Then, when he goes on to grade 9 and leaves the community, he knows that he will fail, as they're not being taught the regular curriculum that non-aboriginal students get in rural areas or urban areas.
We've seen it over the past few years, and even now, that many of our youth come home after grade 9. When they do achieve a grade 12 education, it's all specialized. They don't receive a normal grade 12 education; they receive a special education grade 12. When they are employed, they can't do regular math, so they are not hired for any of this work.
Yes, I've been wanting the head start program in my community ever since it started. I've been working on it since 1996.
I don't qualify to access it because my community is very small, but we do have lots of babies. One year we had seven babies born, and it's almost like that every seven years: seven or eight babies, and then two or three in-between.
If we had more programs such as these, it would certainly help the parents, the youth, the young parents.