Canadian Heritage committee  Exactly. I think we already made the comment that we would like to have urban...reflected specifically within the bill.

Canadian Heritage committee  We don't want to speak against the distinctions-based approach, but what ends up happening on the ground with the facts is that urban...ends up getting lost within those three streams. We're all of them, and we're none of them.

Canadian Heritage committee  I don't know what the breakdown is percentage-wise, but I was just looking at some statistics that are available on the Urban Aboriginal Knowledge Network website, uakn.org. In some areas—some of the bigger cities like Winnipeg, Edmonton—the percentages for indigenous peoples living in urban settings are anywhere from 8% to 12%, depending on which city you're looking at.

Canadian Heritage committee  Not yet.

Canadian Heritage committee  I think it's important that the urban piece is reflected in here. Even within the definition of “Indigenous organization”, it's not clear whether you're talking about indigenous-owned and -operated organizations or indigenous representative organizations. We're volunteer-run organizations.

Canadian Heritage committee  I learned the only Cree that I know in elementary school. When I was a child in Moosonee—still an urban setting where there's a friendship centre—they had it as part of the regular curriculum. I hear they don't offer Cree as part of the regular curriculum. Also, it was an elective in my high school.

Canadian Heritage committee  I will add quickly that in our report the participants foresaw that friendship centres and the NAFC could be a central repository for materials, programs and curriculums. We could hold things at our national office that have already been developed and be able to distribute them.

Canadian Heritage committee  I wouldn't say we have an accurate sense of how many language programs are operating within friendship centres. These are just the ones that we know about. We do capture the data. However, on a separate issue we haven't been able to mobilize the data that we collect from friendship centres to be able to get a good sense of where our programming is.

Canadian Heritage committee  Friendship centres offer so many different kinds of programming across the country that it's hard to say which friendship centre would be able to provide what. We have alternative high schools, we have aboriginal head start programs, day cares, youth programming, parental programs, mother and child programs, prenatal programs.

Canadian Heritage committee  The role of indigenous media is so important, and I haven't seen it reflected in this act. Television and radio have been used for decades across Canada, especially in the north, to not just utilize the language but to get essential information across. You can look at Wawatay, across northern Ontario, or you can look at the Inuit Broadcasting Corporation in Iqaluit.

Canadian Heritage committee  I have one more point, and then it's our conclusion. We can forgo our conclusion.

Canadian Heritage committee  Through Bill C-91, a commissioner position will lead the implementation and oversight. What is not clear is how it will be rolled out into Canada. It lacks assurance of accountability to indigenous people. This gap leads to the potential implications for key stakeholders in the community, including friendship centres.

Canadian Heritage committee  I'll speak a little bit to what's in our language discussion paper and some of our review of Bill C-91, before we wrap up for questions. In March 2018, the NAFC held a two-day, “Our Languages, Our Stories” forum, with representation from all parts of Canada, to discuss and contribute input into the development of indigenous language legislation; in particular, to discuss the urban perspective on the state of indigenous languages.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you very much. Before we begin our presentation, we'd also like to acknowledge the unceded Algonquin territory on which we are meeting today. My name is Jocelyn Formsma and I am the Executive Director of the National Association of Friendship Centres. [Witness spoke in Cree] [English] I'm from Moose Cree First Nation.