Yvonne Jones

[Business of Supply, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly want to thank my colleague from the Northwest Territories who brought forward this motion today and with whom I have worked on a number of issues in the north, as I have with other colleagues in the House of Commons.

I want to say yes, communities that are isolated across the northern region of Canada should be included in the program. Communities that have high costs for food and are unable to access nutritious food need to be included.

The other piece the member talked about was a way to ensure that the subsidy is provided to northern residents and that there is improved support for traditional foods. I spoke to that in my speech. I talked about examples of where this is being done in a number of communities across the north right now. It is something to be explored to see whether it is a model that can work as part of nutrition north. I would certainly be supportive of having that happen.

In terms of direct support to families, I will give an example. If we crunch the numbers and the amount of subsidy that was paid out to retailers in Nain, Labrador, for example, and divide that among the number of individuals in the community, a family of eight, and as we know, in the north most homes have eight, 10, or 12 people living in them, would have received around $8,000 directly through the subsidy. When I asked people if they think they received this kind of discount based on the subsidy for food in the store, the answer was “absolutely not”. I just put that out there for the record.

[Business of Supply, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague's question is very reasonable. Again, nutrition north speaks to nutrition. I think we all agree with that. Talking about snowmobile parts and using them as items that should not be subsidized really shows the lack of knowledge of the north and the culture of northerners and people who live in the Arctic region.

For example, I grew up in isolated communities that were fly-in, fly-out. I can tell members that snowmobile parts were essential. They were essential for every single family that was fortunate enough to actually own a snow machine, because that snow machine was what got wood to heat the house in climates that went below 50°. It was that snow machine that got traditional food from the land to feed the family. In many cases, if they did not have that, many families would go without. The cost of getting those parts into those communities was very expensive, and they are still expensive today. While that would not be directly related to nutritious food, it is an essential item for many northern communities.

[Business of Supply, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, yes, most of the communities I speak of are included under the program currently. However, in terms of how the subsidy works and the fairness of the program, that needs to be evaluated. There are some communities that are not included that still could be included. That is not just in the Labrador region I represent. My riding borders the Quebec north shore, and there are communities in that area that have the same issues and problems. I communicate with them on a regular basis as well because our ridings are adjacent. I know that there is a huge area in the Quebec-Labrador region of northern Canada that is impacted.

However, there are lots of other regions as well. I talked about income levels. It is unfortunate that we do not have the long-form census any more, but if we did, we would see that a lot of people in those regions live below the poverty line. The amount of money they have to spend to provide for the necessities of life is far less than what other people have.

Earlier my colleague talked about eggs in Rankin Inlet costing $2.35 or $2.65 a dozen. Nain, which is in my riding and is not nearly as far north as Rankin Inlet, receives about the same amount in subsidies. Actually Rankin Inlet receives more. In Nain, those eggs are over $5 a dozen. I just had someone call and check. Milk is $6.50 for a carton of milk. It is not $3, as it is in Rankin Inlet.

The other thing we need to look at is that water by the case, depending on whether it is 12 or 24 bottles, comes out at anywhere from $20 to $40. In many northern communities there are boil orders right now, and people need to buy water.

[Business of Supply, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today to speak to the motion before the House of Commons. The motion talks to nutrition north Canada, a program that is in place to help provide nutritious food to northern communities across Canada, so many people who live in those northern regions can have a healthy diet, can have access to nutritious food in their communities and to ensure that those foods are affordable.

However, while nutrition north was supposed to make nutritional food more accessible and affordable to northerners in a very transparent way, four years after its launch, the Auditor General has slammed the program as an abject failure. People in many areas of the north, we know for sure in Rankin Inlet, are scrounging for food in waste sites, in dumps.

What has the program actually done for the amount of money that has been invested? This is where the key question begins. We know this program is currently seeing millions of dollars being invested into it. However, the question remains this. Why is this money not reaching the families who need it? Why is it not reaching northerners who need to have nutritional food that is affordable for them and their families? These are very good questions, and questions that became very evident in the Auditor General's report. However, there were other things as well.

The Auditor General has outlined, very clearly, that when we look across Canada's north, we will notice there are 50 isolated northern communities that are only accessibly by air and are not currently eligible for the full subsidy under this program. First, we know that is wrong. We know of situations where communities are completely adjacent to each other, only miles apart in some cases, yet one community is getting a subsidy that is nearly double what the other community is getting.

We need to look at the fairness in the program. Why is it not being applied fairly to communities that are of similar distance, that have similar needs, that have similar transportation mechanisms and that have the same challenges in accessing nutritional food?

The other thing we need to look at is why so many communities are being omitted from the program, communities that are completely isolated and communities that are only accessible by air. Why are those communities not being added to the list? This is not a new issue. It has been around for quite some time. The Auditor General has pointed that out on a number of occasions. However, there has been no action by the government to include those communities. Again, that is unfair.

We are not seeing fairness being practised in how the program is being delivered to northerners. What is even more concerning to me is we are not seeing where the subsidy is going.

I represent a very northern region in our country, in Labrador, that is actually a part of the nutrition north subsidy program. Before that, it was a part of the food by mail program. I have listened to government members being critical of the food by mail program, yet they are not prepared to address the flaws that are in the nutrition north program simply because it is a creation of their government. It is irrelevant who created the program. The relevance is in ensuring that it works and that it reaches the people who actually need it.

However, there are so many other communities in the north like the ones I represent. I have travelled through Nunavut, through the Northwest Territories, through Yukon, all areas which have many communities that depend upon nutrition north programs, and so many others across Canada. I know for a fact what the high prices of food are in many of those communities and I know for a fact that many people in those communities live below the poverty line. They are Canadians who often do not have employment opportunities available to them, at least on a year-round basis, because of climate and other factors that affect their regions. They live on marginal incomes if not very low incomes. Accessing food that, in some cases, is three times more expensive than most Canadians would pay is very unfair.

What the motion today is asking is that the isolated northern communities that have been omitted from this program be added and be eligible for the full subsidy. It also asks for a comprehensive review of the nutrition north program, and that northerners be full partners in that.

One of the things we have learned is that, while there is a review process with nutrition north, that review process does not allow all the communities that participate to actually give feedback. It is up to the board of nutrition north to decide which five communities it wants to go into and review, or which six communities, or whether it is only going to go into two communities.

First of all, we think there should be an ongoing review of the program, and at some point all communities should have an opportunity to have feedback into the program.

We really believe that, for this work, northerners do have to be full partners, but they also have to have the opportunity to give input and to provide solutions for the program on how it could work better, how monies could be better invested or better distributed, and how people could be more accountable to the program and to government for the investment. That definitely has to happen.

The motion talks about improved supports for traditional foods. Obviously I am a huge supporter of ensuring that we have traditional foods available in northern communities and aboriginal communities, in particular, where people are very dependent on traditional foods as part of their diet.

We also know that there are regions across the Arctic and across the north where a lot of traditional foods are not as readily available as they used to be. For example, in my area we have a ban on hunting cariboo right now. Cariboo was the main diet of people in that northern region. It was the main protein, next to seal meat, that these communities were consuming.

Now with a ban on cariboo, many people are left hungry, having to go to the local Northern Store to try to find foods to feed their family. They are not able to hunt from the land as they used to. Those kinds of restrictions are having a huge impact on the diet of northerners.

However, I have seen some good models that are being developed. Some of those models include community freezer programs, where people who are able to get some traditional foods by hunting from the land can make them available in the community through a community freezer program.

I would encourage the government, if it wants to look at ensuring traditional foods in those communities, to support those programs. Some of them do get some funding from government, but most of it is done through charitable donations and fundraising. It does work.

I have also seen programs called the community pantry, which is not always nutritional foods but staple foods like flour, milk, tea, and those kinds of staples that people need to be available in communities, mostly dry ingredients. There are no food banks in many of these communities. If people are hungry and they cannot afford to buy from the store because of the prices and they cannot access food any other way, community pantries allow them to have the very staples they need to be able to provide some food for their family.

I have seen those programs that are working fairly well. There are things out there that are being created by local northern people themselves in their own communities, which are a fit for them. I would like to see the government look at those things and see how they are working.

In fact, only a short time ago, I met with a group that is looking at food security across the north. I suggested a number of these measures to it in terms of what it could or should be doing, based on my experience and what I have seen that works. There are a lot of people out there who are keenly interested in ensuring that there is food security in the northern, Arctic, and aboriginal regions of this country, ensuring that food is affordable to people. Therefore, I think we have already established a lot of resources that we can draw upon to help us put together what would be seen as an ideal program to meet those needs across the north.

The motion is also asking that sufficient funding be made available to meet the needs of all of the northern communities. This is an issue that really bothered me when we were talking about funding the nutrition north program this year, and the fact that the program was not adequate, and there was a lot of media attention around what was happening in Rankin Inlet. The stores were sending expired food to the dump and local people were scavenging in the dump to get that food. That is a full indication that people are hungry. This is not about want; it is really about need.

When all of that happened, the response from the government was to announce that it would put another $11.3 million into the nutrition north program this year. That was met with great applause from all of us who work in the north. We know that revenue is needed. However, what the government failed to say was that in 2013-2014 the program had already spent nearly $64 million. Therefore, the $11 million that it was putting in only topped up the program to what it had actually spent. It is not new money. It is not to say that it would put another $11 million over and above to ensure that subsidies are administered more fairly to the communities that get them or that more communities would be added. That particular investment only really brought the program up to what was being spent. In fact, the addition of the $11 million really only brought the program to a total of $65 million in subsidies, while last year it had already spent $64 million, so it is an extra $1 million we will have this year. However, if the demand for food goes up in any of these communities, that $1 million will be used up.

The subsidy was needed anyway, just to cover off the everyday costs of the program. This subsidy is not enhancing the program in any way. It is not allowing the program to grow to add additional communities in any way. I think it is important to point that out.

I would also point out that $65 million in a subsidy program for nutrition north is a very fair subsidy amount if we know that it is reaching the people who need it. What has been most confusing about all of this is that, although this program has what I feel is a fair investment in funding going into it, unless there is accountability for how that money is spent and assurances that it reaches the people who need it, I have to ask if the money is getting the best use.

That was the point the Auditor General was really making when he talked about the accountability measures. He also talked about the fact that there was a lot of money going into subsidies that were in place in the program, but there was no way to monitor it to ensure that the subsidies were being passed on, and there was no requirement by retailers to ensure that there was accountability. This was one of the huge concerns pointed out in the Auditor General's report. That has to be looked at. I do not think we can ignore those points. They are very important points.

If we are going to make sure that we deal with food insecurity in northern regions of Canada and ensure there is affordable food in these communities, we also need to ensure those subsidies are going to be passed on. There has to be a new process of accountability put in place to ensure that the retailers that participate in the program are passing on the subsidy.

We also have to look at what the profit margins are. Sometimes, the subsidy is being passed on in its entirety, but what is the profit being earned in a lot of those regions in Canada? If we look at where the $64 million subsidy goes, we will notice that a large percentage of that subsidy goes to one store or provider across the northern region. It is important. If we are going to pay out more than half of this subsidy rate to one retail company servicing the north, the very least we should be doing is ensuring that there is a level of accountability being provided.

Before I conclude, I want to say that nutrition north is a very important program for northerners. It is very important for those of us who live in northern regions and represent northern regions, because we see the struggles day to day in many of these communities. Those struggles are not just around food. They are also around housing, having a good water supply, infrastructure, poverty, and all of those things. In order to deal with them, people need to have their basic needs met. One of those basic needs is ensuring that they have a good diet and nutritious food, so that they are able to function and address the other challenges and stresses they have in their life.

I would say this to the government opposite. Do not be pushed back by the fact that there are some serious issues around the program, but push forward to address them. Be on top of the game and provide the very best program that can be provided to northerners. Do not accept as good enough the fact that what we did four years ago might have been a little bit better than what was done four years before that, because it is not good enough. We are seeing that it is not good enough. Be motivated by what the Auditor General said, which is that the program is flawed, it needs to change, and we need to ensure that these subsidies are reaching the people who need them.

I would support members in the House who are prepared to do that, because that is what needs to happen. In doing so, we will be supporting many northern families across Canada.

[Business of Supply, June 4th, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member opposite as he read from his speech. When he started to say what the prices were in Rankin Inlet, it was tempting me to go and shop there. If eggs are a little over $2 a dozen in Rankin, I would be absolutely shocked. I live in a riding that receives a subsidy on many items and I have never, ever seen prices that low.

I would like to ask the member why the Department of Aboriginal Affairs is currently paying an Ottawa-based consulting firm to work in Ottawa to develop more made-in-Ottawa solutions to revamp the nutrition north program. We know that will not work for northern families. Why are people not going into northern communities, consulting with the users of this program who need the subsidy on food, and developing a plan in conjunction with them? Maybe then we would see some results. Since nutrition north came into effect, in the last four years northerners have seen nothing, only critical analysis of the program and how the subsidy is being used.

[Yukon and Nunavut Regulatory Improvement Act, June 3rd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from the Northwest Territories was part of the hearings in Yukon as well. He heard the messaging, as I did, the very desperate and justified pleas of many Yukoners on the changes they wanted to see made. The member also brought a number of amendments to committee to be looked at, but unfortunately they did not passed.

On his question with regard to the influence of the governing party and what should have happened, one would have automatically thought that when there was a trilateral agreement or any kind of self-governance treaty that was signed by the Government of Canada, that it would be upheld first and foremost. I believe the Government of Canada has a responsibility to adhere to all treaties and agreements that it signs with aboriginal first nations, Inuit and Métis in our country. We expect no less, no matter what government is in power.

[Yukon and Nunavut Regulatory Improvement Act, June 3rd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, first, trilateral means three. It does not mean one. It is not just the Government of Canada. It is not just the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development. It means that there has to be real decision making and consensus building around how governance is going to occur by all parties. When the treaty agreements and trilateral agreements were signed, that was done by three governments. Why can it now be changed by one government without having consensus and without having the support of the aboriginal entities?

The other thing is that for all modern treaties that exist in Canada today, there should not have to be a statement by the minister that he will uphold those. They are legal documents; they are signed. They are a part of the governance process of our country, and any minister who fills those shoes should honour those treaties if they are in place.

[Yukon and Nunavut Regulatory Improvement Act, June 3rd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to speak with regard to the third reading of the bill before the House. It is certainly a bill that has received a tremendous amount of debate in the House of Commons.

Unfortuantely, the debate has been an exercise that has not really reaped the rewards we wanted to see, nor has it seen the real changes the people of the Yukon and the territorial governments wanted to see. In fact, the whole debate itself has hinged on a tremendous amount of misinterpretation.

I heard the member for Yukon say of New Democrats that they are against mining development and do not support these industries and do not see them bringing benefit into regions like Yukon, but I also want to talk about his government and what it has done in working with aboriginal and first nations groups.

In fact, it was the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development who first indicated that these particular self-government groups in the Yukon were not necessarily governments at all and then had to backtrack and clarify his statement.

If we want to talk about misinterpreting and misunderstanding, first, the minister was not even identifying in a factual way the groups he was dealing with and identifying the fact that this was a government-to-government-to-government relationship of 11 different groups and entities in Yukon and that only one of those governments was entirely supportive of the changes that were happening. In fact, it was the first nations governments that were not. In my recollection, that was the first error.

In addition to that, there were 76 recommendations that came forward in this report. Of those 76 recommendations, 72 were decided upon through a process of discussion, consultation, and consensus. That is a fantastic way to do business. It really is, so why did the same pattern not apply to the other four recommendations within the report that were debatable, recommendations on which people had serious issues and that people in the Yukon wanted to see changed? Why were those four not dealt with in the same way?

When we went to Yukon for public hearings, I sat in that room, as did a number of other colleagues in the House of Commons that day, and we heard speaker after speaker present to our committee. They presented serious, legitimate concerns to us about how the bill was drafted and how those particular clauses were being implemented by the Government of Canada. They had very serious concerns over what these measures would mean to aboriginal self-governance and what it would mean in terms of eroding the powers they have within their own lands and their own governance.

They were very legitimate concerns, and we heard speaker after speaker point them out. The committee asked question after question and received very good and very clear answers.

I came out of that hearing with no doubt in my mind that very legitimate concerns were being presented. I could certainly see the perspective from which aboriginal governments were coming and I could see their need to have these changes implemented.

In a very respectful way, they asked the Government of Canada to come to the table and reconcile with them on those recommendations, which I thought was very reasonable. Speaker after speaker also said that they did not want to fight the government on this and did not want to have to go to the courts to make changes. They wanted to reconcile their differences. They wanted a table to sit at. They wanted a fair hearing at which they could make the changes that were required.

In fact, they did not get that, and they never did.

Unfortunately, none of the changes they proposed to the bill that were taken to committee and that were presented by different members of committee, a number of motions, were accepted by the government members sitting at that committee, the colleagues of the member for Yukon. That is what I found so disappointing in all of this. People bought into a process in which they believed they would present recommendations for change and the government would listen. In fact, the government never did listen. It never acted on any of the amendments that were put forward by the constituents in Yukon. The member for Yukon did not support those amendments. Nor did his colleagues who represented the governing party at that table.

What was the exercise all about? Was it an opportunity for aboriginal first nations and others in the Yukon territory to come out and vent? Is that what we spent all the money on, to go there and hold these hearings so people had a room to go into and vent their frustrations? I can guarantee members that if that was what we advertised, people would not have gone to the hearings. They came because they were sincere. They really feel that this is a violation of their government-to-government agreements with the Government of Canada. They feet it is a violation of their treaty rights. They feel it is eroding their powers.

In fact, they also spoke about when land claims and land jurisdiction were being settled and how many of the aboriginal governments in Yukon gave up certain areas of land and control over that land. They believed that they had a fairer process with a seat at the table, as a government with the Yukon and as a government with the Government of Canada. Because of that, they gave up certain provisions that they did not negotiate because they trusted the process. However, aboriginal governments today in our country do not have trust in the government opposite.

We are here today talking about truth and reconciliation for survivors of residential schools, truth and reconciliation for our first nations, Métis and Inuit. What are we doing on the very day that we are saying there is going to be truth and reconciliation for our indigenous people? We are forcing a bill through the House of Commons that would erode the powers of aboriginal and indigenous governance in our country.

It is unbelievable that the government, or the member for Yukon, could sit there today and get on with such foolishness about who said something on the radio or who made what amendment. The member did not even show up at committee nor even support the motion, yet he is allowing his government to ram a bill through the House of Commons that would impact his constituents and erode the rights of self-governance. That is wrong.

I believe the Conservatives should have to answer to the indigenous people and the aboriginal governments of Yukon as to why they feel the need to rush through the bill and not listen to the very recommendations they have put forward.

[Yukon and Nunavut Regulatory Improvement Act, June 3rd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, there are no Liberal senators. I wanted to clarify that for the record—

[Yukon and Nunavut Regulatory Improvement Act, June 3rd, 2015]

Mr. Speaker, I can tell you that if you want to hear political platitudes, you will hear it today.

I make no apologies for any remarks that I made on CBC up there, but the member for Yukon should be making a lot of apologies, starting with some to his constituents for, first of all, not even showing up at committee to support the recommendations that they basically drafted and asked members of the House of Commons to put forward on their behalf. They are his own constituents, yet the member for Yukon never showed up to vote on these amendments and his colleagues did not support them either.

If we want to talk about who made up their mind on this bill, it was the government opposite when it went through the Senate with the support of all of the Conservative senators and was forced into the House of Commons without consultation from members in the Yukon and from first nations governments.

I would like to ask the member opposite why he did not support the amendments that his own constituents asked for at the committee stage of the bill if he was so committed to listening to them and doing what they felt was just and right.