The Correctional Service of Canada makes an attempt to understand the social history of aboriginal prisoners when making any decisions respecting aboriginal prisoners. I think it's an issue that they try to consider factors, but then they're unclear how those factors should impact their decision-making. For example, before placing a prisoner in segregation, they are supposed to consider cultural factors and social history, and they do. They at least make a cursory attempt to do that, but it is my position—and my position is particularly with respect to my experience with male aboriginal prisoners—that it fails to have any impact on their final decision.
Understanding what those factors are, for example, what home life they're coming from, what sort of intergenerational trauma they have experienced, their economic experience, any family member involved with the residential school system, any impact with respect to the child welfare system, their employment history and their economic history, whether they were on or off the reserve, what sort of dislocation they have experienced, what sort of violence they have experienced.... All of these factors play a role in terms of the indigenous person we have in front of us. The system is struggling to deal with it appropriately, clearly, given the numbers.