SCYR Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Subcommittee on Children and Youth at Risk of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, October 28, 2003

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1520

The Chair (Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.))

Hon. Stephen Owen (Secretary of State (Western Economic Diversification) (Indian Affairs and Northern Development))

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1525

¹

1530

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1535

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1540

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner (Senior Analyst, Aboriginal Statistics, Statistics Canada)

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

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1545

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

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1550

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

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1555

The Chair

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1600

Mr. Sébastien Gagnon (Lac-Saint-Jean—Saguenay, BQ)

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Mr. Sébastien Gagnon

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1605

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP)

Hon. Stephen Owen

Ms. Joan Atkinson (Assistant Deputy Minister, Socio-Economic Policy and Programs Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development)

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1610

Ms. Wendy Lill

Mr. Andy Siggner

Ms. Wendy Lill

Mr. Andy Siggner

Ms. Wendy Lill

Mr. Andy Siggner

The Chair

Mr. Ovid Jackson (Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, Lib.)

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1615

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Mr. John Finlay (Oxford, Lib.)

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1620

Mr. Andy Siggner

Mr. John Finlay

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

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1625

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Hon. Stephen Owen

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

The Chair

Mr. Andy Siggner

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1630

The Chair

Mr. Ovid Jackson

Ms. Joan Atkinson

The Chair

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1635

Ms. Wendy Lill

The Chair

Ms. Wendy Lill

The Chair

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CANADA

Subcommittee on Children and Youth at Risk of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

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NUMBER 020

l

2nd SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

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EVIDENCE

Tuesday, October 28, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

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[English]

    The Chair (Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.)): I'll bring the meeting to order.

    Let me welcome back Wendy Lill, who has played such an important role in this committee. We're delighted to see you.

    Let me just give you a sense of how we're going to operate. Minister Owen, we're delighted to welcome you. We know you have to be gone at 4:30. The plan today is to have a presentation by the minister first and then another by Statistics Canada. These will be relatively brief presentations, and then we can really open up the discussion for a general talk.

    I'm hoping that at 4:30, if I may, I can ask members to stay behind. There are a number of very short business things we have to attend to for next week and thereafter. As you know, we're operating in a somewhat uncertain environment here, so I need to get your level of comfort with various plan A's and plan B's.

    Let me begin by welcoming our guests. Stephen Owen is the Secretary of State for Western Economic Diversification and also for Indian Affairs and Northern Development. He has brought with him from the department Joan Atkinson, who is the assistant deputy minister for the socio-economic policy and programs sector. Then from Statistics Canada we have Andy Siggner, senior analyst for aboriginal statistics. We welcome you both.

    Just to remind you, I should point out that this is the third of our triad of studies on aboriginal children. This one is for on-reserve aboriginal children from ages six to 12, although we understand that the borders are a little fluid both in terms of being on-reserve and in terms of the age group we're talking about.

    So we welcome both of you, and we will invite the minister to make his opening remarks.

    Hon. Stephen Owen (Secretary of State (Western Economic Diversification) (Indian Affairs and Northern Development)): Thank you very much, Chair and colleagues. I am very pleased to be here today.

    Even with a great deal of thought, frankly, I can't think of a more important subcommittee of the House that deals with social issues, particularly those affecting children. Since in this particular set of hearings it's about aboriginal children, it goes to the very soul of who we are as a country.

    I look particularly at traditional customs and traditions in our country and reflect on the strength and importance that are given by aboriginal culture in this country to the young, the old, and in many cases those who are marginalized in society. I think a lot of what we are continuing to learn as a society comes from the wisdom of that approach. Certainly, dealing with issues of aboriginal children, specifically with respect to child and family services and education services, allows us to go right to the heart of what really defines us as a society.

    Now, we are all aware--and we'll hear more details from Mr. Siggner about them--of the difficulties in aboriginal communities, whether it's about outcomes in education, which are lower than those in general society, or whether it's about other--if I can call them such--indicators of despair. We hear a lot about that, and I think we as a society pay a lot of attention to it. However, I'm not sure we have paid as careful attention to it as we need to.

    But there are also a lot of successes, and I think as we reflect on the challenges ahead, we have to continue to remind ourselves of the tremendous successes across this country. In aboriginal communities across this country the educational outcomes for aboriginal students are steadily improving. The number of students in post-secondary institutions is something like 30,000 now in Canada, whereas perhaps 10 or 15 years ago they numbered in the hundreds, and aboriginal communities are making real progress. We have 101 first nations child and family service agencies across the country with 16 more being developed currently, so this is a major undertaking that's taking place.

    But as we reflect on education and social policy, we have to keep in mind the policy of this government, which is that there is an inherent right of self-government. This was articulated very specifically in 1995 but has really been developing over many decades. If we look at the condition of children and the outcomes of education, I think we'll understand that those lead to self-esteem, which can lead to self-reliance, which can lead to self-determination and self-government, which is the intention of this government and, I think, of people across this country. So let's keep our mind on the successes that are happening, and I may in the course of my brief remarks mention a few of them.

    I'd like to approach just very briefly this issue of children's interests in child-centred policies in children and family services issues and educational issues from, first of all, a jurisdictional point of view and from then from a point of view that considers someone's entire life. Please excuse me, Mr. Chair, if I sort of wander outside of the borders of ages zero to six and of on-reserve children, because I think we're talking about something that's very holistic, which I'll also address briefly.

    Jurisdictionally, we're all very aware of the complexity in this country of any public policy issue, let alone the constitutional issues, the federal-provincial divisions of powers, and the issues when dealing with status aboriginals, whether living on- or off-reserve, and Métis. We also have very different relationships with the territories and with the people of the territories.This is confusing, yet providing effective social services, child and family services, and educational services, as with so many other policy levels or issues, requires that all levels of government not only work together but also work very intimately with the communities involved. Simply put, statutory authority and constitutional division of powers really can't be used as an excuse for not dealing with these matters in a comprehensive way, and I think there are many strides that are being made in both of these areas.

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    Certainly, in education the federal-provincial-territorial ministers responsible for aboriginal affairs meet yearly with the leadership of the national political aboriginal organizations. The two issues at top of mind for one group coming up to its fall meeting are education and the housing situation, and these are both very much related to the concerns before you.

    I've seen the transcript of your previous discussion with one of the co-chairs of the Minister's National Working Group on Education, which reported out earlier this year. Deborah Jeffrey was here with her daughter Amy, and I was very pleased to see how well she was received. That report, with its very critical 27 recommendations, is being implemented--if “implemented” is not too bold a word--in the sense that we are working federally with the AFN and the National Indian Education Council as well as regionally with various provincial governments and first nations, either treaty groups or individual first nations, and those recommendations are being taken very seriously.

    The critical thing is that they're being looked at in an interjurisdictional way. We've signed an MOU with the education minister of the Province of British Columbia, the First Nations Education Steering Committee, and the First Nations Summit in British Columbia to recognize the idea that in 1972 terms, Indian control of Indian education will actually be accomplished. We'll do it together, and we will, as a province and a federal government, make the jurisdictional authority available to first nations in British Columbia so they can create regional education councils and a provincial council. That's very important and in some ways symbolic, but it's highly substantive as well, a first step towards achieving jurisdictional transfer.

    Elsewhere in the country, the Treaty 6 first nations in Alberta have signed an MOU with the federal government on a 19-band, treaty-wide basis to enter into an educational-jurisdictional approach as well, and the Alberta Ministry of Learning is very supportive of that. Treaty 8 is looking at something similar. The Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations is working with the federal government on a province-wide basis. The Manitoba First Nations Education Resource Centre works on a province-wide basis similar to that of the First Nations Education Steering Committee in British Columbia, looking at these issues of jurisdiction and scale.

    In jurisdiction scale is absolutely critical. We have to have some kind of aggregation of interest sufficient to provide the infrastructure, the jurisdiction itself, the funding, and the capacity to actually support teachers and schools in the communities. Whether the schools are on-reserve or whether they are provincial public schools, this is necessary so they can be properly equipped to ensure that aboriginal students get the culturally significant instruction they need. But it's also--and I'd like to really try to stress the importance of this--so the general population in our schools understands the richness of our traditional aboriginal history and thereby takes appropriate pride in it, as this can break down stereotypes and bigotry in our society, for clearly, that's where it starts.

    Interjurisdictionally, on the child and family services side, there are national discussions going on between the federal government and the AFN and first nations child and family services directors from across the country as well. Jurisdictionally, we have to look horizontally as well, as you know, in these topics. HRDC has a big role to play, whether it's in early childhood education or in development on the social side, but also on the skills training side of education. Health Canada, of course, with their head start programs, is critical as well.

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    That jurisdictional complexity has to be addressed. If it's ever happened before--and I can't imagine...actually, I can, unfortunately--we can't hide behind the excuse that, well, it's not our responsibility. It's the responsibility of all of us. Our intergovernmental, inter-ministerial joint efforts have to be the measure of our success.

    The question of the lifelong span is critical to...maybe it's easiest for us to see it in education, but even then I think we often lose sight of it. It starts even prenatally in terms of the totally preventable...and we had a question in the House today about FAS warnings on alcoholic beverage containers, which a member from the NDP brought up. It is very important for us to deal with that totally preventable problem, and having a healthy birth is of course the start to anyone's being able to play a full role in society.

    As I say, the early childhood development activities of HRDC are important, and the Health Canada head start programs across the country are important. It goes right through from K to 12, but it also extends far beyond that in terms of post-secondary education opportunities.

    The funding levels are really being challenged. We know they're inadequate, and not only because of the demographics of the aboriginal community--the average age is actually dropping, we know that--as distinct from those of general society. There are also just the pressures on all post-secondary education facilities across the country, because it's more and more obvious that people simply have to have more training to succeed in society today.

    Beyond that, and to me one of the most important issues, one we often miss, is the importance of adult education. In our aboriginal communities in Canada, for many reasons, many adult--and very sadly, older--aboriginal people had their education disrupted; perhaps they were abused in residential schools or through other socio-economic conditions. But however their education was disrupted, it's particularly important that we have the capacity to offer an educational opportunity to those people so they can go back and catch up, applying in a more formal, recognized way what is in many ways the richest life experience in the fulfillment of their lives.

    In terms of a third one, Mr. Chair--and I know I'm going on perhaps longer than I suggested--looking at both of these issues from a holistic point of view, we can have the most well-equipped schools, the best-trained teachers, and the most appropriate curriculum in the world. Yet if children come to school without breakfast, are without sleep because of overcrowded housing situations, or have a learning disability caused by preventable mental illness or disability, those children are not going to learn and fulfill themselves to their capacity.

    So we have to look at it as a whole socio-economic set. That's why I think it's so important that your committee is looking at child and family services in addition to the educational issues, because they're so intimately related.

    I might just mention one example I think is quite poignant. There's a recent pilot project in the downtown east side of Vancouver that demonstrates this to a certain extent. It has been funded through the Vancouver Agreement, which consists of three levels of government looking at many of those social and economic issues in that part of Vancouver. It has funded a dental clinic for aboriginal youth. It's being demonstrated that there is a very strong correlation between dental health--which would otherwise be unavailable--and general health, self-esteem, and the ability to take part in educational activities successfully. This then leads to a good appearance and the self-confidence to go out and get a job. It's one of those things that is so obvious once it's been shown to be effective but is very sadly lacking in many areas.

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    I'll just finish, Mr. Chair, on the subject of child and family services. I'm a first-term politician, but in my experience in different areas of government over the last while, one of the things that's become most obvious to me is that the hardest dollar for any government to spend is the preventative dollar, and this is for a number of obvious reasons. One, there's not an emergency in front of you, so there isn't all of the energy emergencies have, but it's also because the outcomes of the expenditure are really hard to measure. They're not as obvious as when you're dealing with a disaster that's right in front of you. But there is nothing more important in terms of both just good fiscal policy and, more importantly, good social policy than to deal with the problems before they arise and to do it in a far-sighted, generous, and appropriate way.

    When we look at child and family services and the protection of children with respect to aboriginal people, I think we have to.... We are reviewing and we have the national report, and it does have sound recommendations. We are looking at funding formulas, but we have to move some of that money effectively, with the flexibility to allow kids to not have to be removed from homes unless it's absolutely necessary.

    While we have to be vigilant to not be late, I think we also have to be vigilant as a whole network in society. We have eyes and ears and contacts in society, whether with school teachers, health professionals, or child welfare workers. They should not only be looking for bruises on kids, but they should be looking for stresses on families that lead to neglect or abuse of kids.

    That's the first line of defence. It takes people looking after each other, professionally as well as communally, and then the provision of supports for those families that are in distress so the problems don't lead to neglect or abuse. And if they do, then perhaps our next step should not be to immediately apprehend the child. Why don't we remove the abuser or remove the neglecter if we can't deal with the causes of stress to family? Can we avoid taking the child out and perhaps take the abuser out instead? And if we have to take a child out, then we'd better have foster services and other support services where people are well screened, well trained, well resourced, and supervised, because we know of the many tragedies across the country that have happened because of inadequacy in some of those areas.

    No matter what the courts say from time to time--and they go up and down on this--it's the public's and the government's responsibility to make sure those resources and programs are available. I think we're going in that direction, and I think the real emphasis your committee is giving to these issues is an immensely important step.

    Thank you for your attention.

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    The Chair: Thank you very much, Minister.

    Let's move on now to Andy from StatsCan. Welcome.

    Mr. Andy Siggner (Senior Analyst, Aboriginal Statistics, Statistics Canada): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

    I'm very pleased to be here and to share with you some new data that has just recently been released from our Aboriginal Peoples Survey of 2001.

    The Chair: I think people have the deck.

    Mr. Andy Siggner: I'll also be referring to data coming from the most recent census, the 2001 census. We'll be taking a look at a number of socio-economic and health conditions of aboriginal children on-reserve aged six to 12, and we have some benchmark data from one of our other surveys for all children in Canada as well.

    Perhaps what I'll do is begin by walking you through the deck we brought, and I'll start with the first chart. As Minister Owen has pointed and is well known, the aboriginal population in Canada is a very young population. As well, the population on-reserve is very young, compared to the total population of Canada.

    According to Indian Affairs' own Indian population register and their count in 2001, there are approximately 69,000 children in that age group living on-reserve. That represents about one in five of all aboriginal kids on-reserve, so it's a fairly significant proportion in this age group, six to 12. The comparable figure is about one in ten of the total number of children in Canada.

    This is illustrated on page 2, the first graph. You can see that almost 20% of the aboriginal population is in the age group six to 12; the rest of the population is sitting at about 10% in that age group. As you can see, overall most of the aboriginal population is under age 25; in fact, better than 50% is in that age group of under 25. This is not quite the same situation for the total population of Canada, which is much older, as we well know.

    Turning to the next chart, I think it's important to keep in mind, although we're focusing on the on-reserve aboriginal children who are six to 12, they actually represent only a third of all aboriginal children in Canada in this age group. The other two-thirds of kids in this age group six to 12 are actually living outside of reserves. That being said, however, as is shown in chart 3, on-reserve aboriginal children in this age group, six to 12, make up about 2% of all children in that age group in Canada.

    Although these on-reserve children live in all parts of the country, they make up particularly high percentages of the children in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. We see, for example, that the children on-reserve in Manitoba and Saskatchewan represent about 10% of all children in those two provinces, so they make up a significant percentage of that population of kids.

    In the next chart we take a quick look at the family situation or living arrangements of aboriginal children. You may recall we presented you with the 1996 version of this chart a year and a half ago, when we were here before, but this is later data, and basically it's for all children under the age of 15.

    Here we see, for example, that about two-thirds are living with both parents, but about one-third are living in a lone-parent situation, and about 3% of aboriginal kids on-reserve are living with people who are other than their parents, namely relatives such as grandparents or possibly non-relatives. You can see there's quite a big difference with the non-aboriginal children of the country, where there are only about 17% living in lone-parent situations.

    The next few charts are going to look at some very current data we have from the Aboriginal Peoples Survey and the other data source we use, the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth, so we can see just where all kids in Canada are in relation to aboriginal children on-reserve.

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    This first graph looks at the percentage of children reporting either excellent or very good health. We can see that overall about three-quarters of aboriginal kids were reported as having that quality of health as compared to a little over 80% for all children in Canada.

    The Chair: Can I just ask whether that's self-reported?

    Mr. Andy Siggner: It's self-reported, but don't forget that these are children, so in many cases their parents are reporting on their behalf, especially for the young ones.

    We can see there's not that much difference across the country in terms of regions.

    The next chart looks at the number of chronic diseases or conditions that are reported for children in this age group on-reserve in comparison with the general population. The grey bars represent all children in Canada and the blue bars aboriginal children, and you'll notice that in some cases we don't have grey bars for some of the types of conditions that have been reported in the aboriginal survey. That's because the other survey either didn't collect data on this particular age group or didn't ask questions directly related to these conditions.

    However, we see, for example, that asthma, allergies, and ear-related problems are among the most highly reported conditions for kids six to 12 among aboriginal children on-reserve. Basically, around 10% of that population reported these kinds of conditions. It is interesting that it's actually higher for the general kids in the rest of Canada, sitting at around 16% to 17% for at least two out of three of those for which we have data. There are some other areas where there are some differences, particularly with bronchitis. Although it's a low percentage, it is a bit higher than it is for all kids in Canada. There are some interesting findings there.

    Turning to the next chart, we see that finding out how often they're eating their breakfast is an important measure of nutrition. Here we find that overall in Canada, about 77% of on-reserve children in this age group report they eat breakfast every day, and that's pretty good. About 18% reported they were eating breakfast three to six days a week, and about 5% reported they didn't eat breakfast at all or up to two days a week. About one kid in twenty reports they're not eating breakfast or at least don't eat it very often through the week.

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    The Chair: Is there a comparative figure for kids that age in the general population?

    Mr. Andy Siggner: This is one of those we didn't have. The NLSCY survey asked it for kids 12 and over, so we didn't have it from that source for this particular age group.

    On the next chart we look at those reporting having experienced worry or unhappiness. This is a question that's asked in both surveys. We can see that for aboriginal children, about 37% report they have experienced worry or unhappiness, compared to about a third of the population of other children in Canada. It seems to vary a bit across the country. The two coastal regions seem to be quite a bit higher than the middle of the country. Ontario is also up there with B.C. and the Atlantic region. We haven't had a chance to really explore what's underlying these particular results, but it is interesting we're getting these variations.

    For those who did say they experienced worry or unhappiness, we looked at what they said were the causes of that situation for them, as we see on the next chart. Clearly, the most important reason given among those on-reserve aboriginal kids experiencing worry or unhappiness is a death in the family. Nearly a third of those who said they had experienced some worry said they actually experienced it for a death in the family.

    You can see some other major causes are related to parents in one way or another, such as divorce or separation. That's 22% versus about 15% among other children in Canada. Conflict between parents accounts for 11% versus 3%, and other separation from parents is 9% versus 4%, so there are some interesting findings there.

    Now, I just want to caution you that this isn't for all aboriginal kids on-reserve, and this is just among those who experienced worry. Remember that almost 40% said they had some worries.

    The Chair: There's just one detail. I noticed that on the previous chart there didn't seem to be any reference to Quebec. Is that just because the population is small?

    Mr. Andy Siggner: That's a good observation.

    The Chair: It's actually my colleague's observation. I have to give credit where it's due here.

    Mr. Andy Siggner: The reason we haven't shown the data for Quebec is that for the Aboriginal Peoples Survey there was a refusal among the first nations bands in Quebec with the exception of the Cree communities. They said they didn't want to participate in this voluntary survey, the Aboriginal Peoples Survey. We would not have felt too comfortable showing those data since there were a very small number of reserves in Quebec that actually reported.

    With the next chart we're starting to get into, I hope, a little better news as we move along. It focuses on the number of kids who said they had attended a preschool or early childhood program. As you can see, we have almost 60% of the on-reserve kids in the elementary school age group saying they actually had attended--or at least their parents reported for them that they had attended--a preschool or early childhood program. It varies across the country. British Columbia seems to be on the high side here, as do the Atlantic provinces, compared to the provinces in between.

    There's some other good news--let's turn to the next chart--and that is that two-thirds of children on-reserve in this age group, six to 12, report they read every day or a few times a week, which is fairly comparable to the statistics for other children in Canada. As you can see, even among those reading less often the percentages are not that different from those of the other children. That's a piece of good news we found in our survey.

    On the other hand, we get into the number of children reporting how many hours a day they watch TV. Here we're finding we have 42% of aboriginal children reporting they watch TV three to four hours a day, compared to about 22% in the general kids' population. It's even running up to 10% for five or more hours a day, compared to about 6% among other kids in Canada. There seems to be quite heavy watching of television among aboriginal kids on-reserve.

    This is followed up by children playing video games or computer games. There again, we didn't have comparable data for other kids in Canada, but for the aboriginal kids, about 56% said they play video or computer games one to two hours a day.

    Now, I should point out that there was one question we didn't ask on the survey; we didn't ask the kids where they were watching this. Some of this could be occurring in school as part of their learning experience, but that's something we did not get into detail on in the survey.

    The next graph does point out how many children in this age group, six to 12, reported having repeated a grade. I think you can see some fairly big differences between all children in Canada and aboriginal kids on-reserve. Basically, one in five aboriginal kids on-reserve in this age group said they had repeated a grade, compared to about 4% among kids in the rest of the country. It varies across regions. Again, British Columbia seems to be quite a bit lower. I must admit, we haven't had a lot of time to really explore these interregional differences at this point in time, but we do see some differences there.

    Coming back to a comment Minister Owen made in relation to eventual outcomes and the conditions under which these children are living, such as overcrowded housing, we see that a very high percentage of houses in which children in this age group live are overcrowded. More than one house in four for on-reserve kids this age is overcrowded, and this compares to about one in twenty houses in the rest of the country for kids of that age.

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    That basically concludes our quick snapshot of conditions of aboriginal children on-reserve for these elementary school ages. I welcome any questions from the committee.

    Thank you very much.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    It's nice to have you back, and it's good to have the update and also to get some indication of the good news as well as the bad. I think it's really important that we not lose sight of progress where it occurs.

    I would be interesting to do a kind of comparison of trends through time as well. We could maybe get back to that, whether it's just the plain demographics or whatever else, and compare this with what we saw the previous time you were here.

    We have roughly 35 minutes together. I know the minister has to go.

    I also wanted to say to members who joined us late that at the end of the meeting, before we go, I'm hoping to have a very quick chat about where we go from here. It will just be a very minimal meeting, and we'll try to get you well away before five.

    Monsieur Gagnon, allez-y.

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[Translation]

    Mr. Sébastien Gagnon (Lac-Saint-Jean—Saguenay, BQ): Thank you for being here today; it's a pleasure to see you. I'm going to take advantage of this opportunity to get back to the statements made by the panellists the committee has heard.

    Your presence leads me to believe that there has been a certain awareness-raising and that is appreciated. It is often difficult within existing government structures to get in touch with certain realities. My question is related to that fact.

    Because of government policies, programs are very often applied in a uniform manner throughout the country. However, the various community groups we met mentioned that needs and concerns vary from one community group to another. A certain flexibility is required.

    Personally, I once managed a 240-million-dollar fund that was intended for Quebec's youth. We had set ourselves the challenge of decompartmentalizing that fund and we wanted to leave the beaten track to get a concrete grip on the problems young people were experiencing. What the panellists said could make us more aware of their concerns and reality.

    Often, the needs are many but the resources are few. But the message they conveyed to us is clear: there are problems and we must act. I'd like to get back to the issue of effectiveness. In this context, interaction would mean listening to these people and understanding that problems can vary from one reserve to another. In the face of that we have to show some flexibility so that investments are made wisely and money is well and effectively spent.

[English]

    The Chair: Mr. Minister.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you, Mr. Gagnon.

    I think you make an extremely important point.

    I'll just look briefly at the education situation first. We have to have both top-down and bottom-up. The agreement is with tribal groups, with provincial first nations groups, with the AFN nationally, and with provincial governments. There is a recognition that we have to deal with issues of jurisdiction, infrastructure, and capacity building at a fairly aggregated scale just to get sufficient resources to support what might otherwise be an isolated school in an aboriginal community operating all on its own. At the same time, the services will not be appropriate, relevant, or effectively delivered unless there's a bottom-up approach that looks not just at teacher training but at recruitment and retention as well and perhaps, even more importantly, ongoing professional development support for teachers in sometimes isolated situations.

    There's also curriculum development. One of the main things I've been impressed by is the strong links between educational outcomes and the cultural and linguistic content of the curriculum, and that is almost by definition local, community-based cultural development. We have to come at it from both ends, but certainly it has to be locally relevant and community-driven if we're going to have the involvement of parents and elders of the community itself in the education.

    On the child and family services side, I know we have had real difficulties with funding formulas. Those are being reviewed. The major difficulty, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, is around the ability to identify problems or potential problems early so support can be given to families or children, without the authorities simply waiting for neglect or abuse to occur and then having to remove a child. There are block-funding arrangements that are being discussed that might give more flexibility for local adaptation.

    The Chair: Monsieur Gagnon.

[Translation]

    Mr. Sébastien Gagnon: There is an interesting phenomenon that occurs when a department must go into the field to choose those who will promote projects. During the last round of hearings we observed certain conflicts or disagreements among band councils and friendship centres, for instance. In the previous report I suggested that we be sensitive to that phenomenon and that we take a good look at who would be in the best position to manage a given program in the field. I am sure that in certain cases it would be the band council, whereas in others it would be the friendship centre. With that in mind I think that we should not adopt a rigid policy.

    I would also like to direct your attention to education. Last week, a professor mentioned that the education programs had to take certain differences into account. These are full-fledged communities with their own cultural history.

    Since I am from Quebec I defend that distinct character. I thus agree with that person and share her opinion. These people have a culture and a history that must perpetuate itself over time. We always try to define the Canadian nation as being made up of Canadians as well as Aboriginal people, and Quebeckers.

º  (1605)  

[English]

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you.

    I couldn't respond in a way that stated the need better than you've stated it. I agree, we have to be flexible and sensitive to those community-driven and community-identified needs and approaches.

    The Chair: Ms. Lill, did you want to...?

    Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Thank you, and thank you very much for coming in.

    I'd like to ask a couple of questions to the minister and then one to Mr. Siggner.

    I'm very interested in statistics. They help us to figure out what kind of policies we can get in place, and they can fuel our arguments, obviously.

    I'm interested in knowing about what kind of increases in aboriginal teachers we are seeing at the reserve level. I know this is a priority, and I'd like to know if we can have a grid showing that over time we have had some success in getting aboriginal teachers onto the reserves. Some numbers on that would be great.

    I'm interested in the idea of literacy, and there was a big literacy event here last week. We continue to hear that over 40% of the general population has literacy and numeracy problems in this country. Obviously, that is an astounding figure. Literacy is a responsibility of the federal government, I guess; I'll ask you that question.

    But I want to know what literacy programs are being offered on reserves. What dollar figure is being put into these literacy programs, and what kinds of results are we seeing? Those are all really important areas for us to get a handle on so we can push for more results.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you.

    I'm very interested to know that as well, so I think I'll ask Joan Atkinson to enlighten us.

    Ms. Joan Atkinson (Assistant Deputy Minister, Socio-Economic Policy and Programs Sector, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development): Thank you very much.

    I think when we talk about literacy, that's really where we're getting into some of the issues Minister Owen talked about in terms of the various responsibilities of federal government departments and the division of mandates among them. In Indian and Northern Affairs we have a responsibility for K to 12 and for first nations children on-reserve. Then we have responsibility for post-secondary education, which is interpreted, according to the authorities we have, as primarily first nations students going to post-secondary institutions for that sort of formal post-secondary education.

    I absolutely agree that literacy issues and adult education, which Minister Owen talked about, have to be very much a part of that continuum of learning we talk about, continuous learning from the prenatal to adulthood. I would say that at this point it is primarily HRDC, in particular through the AHRDAs, the aboriginal human resources development agencies, that has primary responsibility for adult education, for literacy, and for pre-employment training in preparation for the labour market, which also touches on some of those literacy issues.

    That being said, in recognition of the fact that we need to work together as a federal government and take a holistic approach, we are working with HRDC to try to ensure that our range of programs is seamless and that we are not breaking ourselves into silos. One example of that is in our social services mandate. We recently received policy authority from cabinet to deliver what we call active measures for social service recipients on-reserve, where we could provide some of that pre-employment training, including adult education, basic life skills training, and some literacy components, in partnership with HRDC. So we are trying to move forward to ensure we have consistent programming available across the board for adult learners.

º  (1610)  

    Ms. Wendy Lill: That's great.

    Getting back to statistics, I'm wondering whether there is a possibility of getting some kind of chart as to the investment we've been making in literacy programs on-reserve. I understand what you're saying, that it's difficult, but I'd like to know if we're getting better. Are we doing more?

    I always hear about pilot programs that are incredibly successful and have wonderful results, and then they disappear because you only fund pilots. We just need to know, is there sustainable funding people can use for literacy?

    Mr. Siggner, I'm interested in your statistics, and again, I wish there were more. I wish there was a figure about physical fitness. I guess that question wasn't asked about kids and physical fitness, whether they thought they were fit and whether they are fit. Or maybe you just don't know that--

    Mr. Andy Siggner: Actually, in the kids' portion of the Aboriginal Peoples Survey, I believe there are questions about physical activity. I just didn't report on that today.

    Ms. Wendy Lill: That's great. I'd be interested in seeing that.

    There's another issue that has been broken down but where I just haven't seen it, and that is the issue of disability. You talked about chronic diseases. If there's been more work on disabilities that would parallel the work that's being done with the PAL study, the general population disability study--because again, we need those figures to try to move things ahead--I'd be interested in those results.

    Mr. Andy Siggner: There are some general questions on daily living activities in the survey. We didn't go into the same depth in the aboriginal survey the PAL survey did, but we can get some general assessment of those kinds of issues for aboriginal kids. I think that even in one of the graphs I did give you there were some references to children reporting learning disabilities as a chronic condition.

    Ms. Wendy Lill: On page 6 you do mention chronic diseases.

    Mr. Andy Siggner: So we have a couple of places where we could look at that.

    I'll just come back to your earlier comment about the number of aboriginal teachers. While I don't have data on that in front of me, it is possible to get data on the number of people in teaching professions who are aboriginal, and we can even determine how many of those would be living on-reserve. We can probably compare that over time to at least give you a sense of what the growth in those numbers has been since the 1996 census, for example.

    Overall, I can tell you that there has been for aboriginal people in general, as Minister Owen made reference, a large growth in the number of people coming through the post-secondary educational systems. Undoubtedly, that will have affected the number of people who are coming out as teachers or in the education field. I don't have the numbers in front of me, but I'm pretty sure that's the trend you'd see.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Jackson.

    Mr. Ovid Jackson (Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, Lib.): My question is probably along the same lines as Ms. Lill's. In the general population we have illiterate people, and I guess that's reflected throughout our society. For aboriginal people I think the issue is to get them moving quickly, and part of it is motivation. I'd like to know if there are any steps underway to get them motivated, to give them the right self-esteem to wrap them up quickly to get going.

    To me, that's a critical factor. We have these large populations of young people in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and places like that, and I think it's significant and it's important that they recognize they have a rich culture. All the great stories that are told and so on are part of what they should know about so they don't have to take second place to anybody else. Such knowledge will ramp them up and get them motivated to do things.

    Maybe I'm coming at it with a different analysis. I just think that we have a lot of people in our country who, for whatever reason, don't get going. In the aboriginal community in particular they have a lot of resources, both natural and human, and we're aware of a lot of their artwork and a lot of the parts of their culture they bring. To me, it's a matter of getting them up and letting them know they're second to none. They compare to anybody in just about any class, so get them motivated enough that their self-esteem is ramped up.

    Of course, they'll need mentoring and they'll need all the other things in some situations in order to make sure the family does the right thing, even prenatally, so they don't have fetal alcohol syndrome or any abuse or problem like that.

    In a lot of cases, a lot of people come from down south. What I've noticed in aboriginal communities, the little I've noticed, is that there's always a consultant who moves into a community, they write a great report, and then they leave. I think that has to stop. Nothing happens. They just suck the money out and nothing really happens.

    I'm interested in getting them ramped up as quickly as possible. I know they have a lot of capabilities, and they should have a better and richer life.

º  (1615)  

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you very much for that observation.

    I might just make a few comments in support of what you're saying. There are a few programs I've become aware of that are not pilot programs but continuing ones; they're pilots only in the sense that they haven't been widely enough emulated. In British Columbia the First Nations Education Steering Committee, which Deborah Jeffrey is the co-chair of and which I spoke to you about, has kids' clubs in on-reserve schools around the province. They're linked and they meet together periodically, have joint activities, and encourage each other. That's been a great motivating force in kids feeling that while they're isolated, they can still draw on a very special local curriculum and on cultural content in their education.

    In Alberta there's a pilot project. We've been funding it under Western Economic Diversification, and it's an aboriginal apprentice program administered with aboriginal mentors in concert with a number of resource industries in three locations. We go right into schools and talk, not just to kids in grade 12 but to kids in grades 7 and 8 as well, about the importance of graduating and about apprenticeship opportunities that are available to them with various resource companies that are part of the program.

    In Saskatchewan there's a program the FSIN runs called “Super Saturdays”, where aboriginal kids from around the province get together to share experiences, do exciting things, and so feel confident. In Ontario there's the Thunder Bay summer science program for aboriginal students. It runs for two weeks every summer, draws kids from around the province, and stresses the importance of math and science as a basis for continuing success in society.

    So what you say is absolutely right. It's being recognized, and we have to try to multiply the opportunities.

    The Chair: Mr. Finlay.

    Mr. John Finlay (Oxford, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I apologize for not getting here for what I'm sure was a very interesting presentation.

    Mr. Siggner, I have a little problem with pages 11, 12, and 13, and maybe you could help me. It looks to me, on page 11, as if aboriginal children are very much equivalent to all children with respect to frequency of reading. I think that's something that's very good. Then when I turn to page 12, I find that for children watching TV, it still looks pretty good. I don't know why there's the big swing between one to two hours and three to four hours. I would have thought that the aboriginal children would be spending a little less time in total in front of a TV than would other children, but that may not be true.

    Then on the next one, page 13, we only have aboriginal children; we have no comparison. It would sure be nice to have it, and maybe you can tell me why.

º  (1620)  

    Mr. Andy Siggner: I had mentioned that the comparable data we took for the other children in Canada came from the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth. For the age group they either didn't ask the question particularly related to them or they didn't have the right age groups to compare it to. That was probably the reason we didn't put that in.

    Mr. John Finlay: Thank you very much.

    The Chair: Mr. Minister.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: I was only going to comment that it wasn't at 4:30 I had to leave but that it was at 4:30 I had to be at the other place--and it's not the Senate.

    The Chair: Why don't we, if I may retain Mr. Siggner for further questioning--that sounds as if the police are still asking you questions--take advantage of this moment, then, to perhaps invite the minister to reflect on...?

    Let me put a question to you; maybe this will be your envoi. It seems to me that what gets lost, in a way, in the statistics--although it still sort of comes through rather poignantly, and I'm going to return to this with Mr. Siggner--is the question of what causes the unhappiness. For example, why do people watch more television? It suggests they have fewer other things to do, that there's a sort of boredom component in all of that just because of a lack of alternatives.

    You've talked about two very precise kinds of programs where there have been recent reports, one on education and one on child welfare. We look at the whole needs of the child in this particular age range, at which time we know that some of the chief tasks in human development are to build attachments to people other than your parents, other adult figures you can trust, and to develop self-confidence as you move into adolescence so you can cope with all of those challenges. For example, there are recreation programs.

    I'm just wondering if we could get beyond the building blocks into some kind of a vision you would have if you were dreaming in technicolour, one that would address the universal needs of human development for kids from six to 12 but would also have the cultural specificity and the community specifics of various first nations. Perhaps you could just cast aside your ministerial discretion and take us into some better world, just as we send you off.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you for leaving that brief question until my last two minutes with you.

    The Chair: It'll be self-regulating, you see. You know when you have to be at the next meeting.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Without any bounds of discretion but without being indiscreet, I would say that children between six and 12, but also far beyond that, need to be able to do two things at once in a very global situation. They have to know about the world and be able to contact it and interact with it in some meaningful and increasingly knowledgeable and effective way. They also need to be very rooted, not only within their family security, which brings in a whole range of socio-economic challenges, but also in a cultural way, and not just in the general history of our country but in our specific and very diverse cultures.

    For some of the statistics we see here, I think if they were overlaid on statistics for remote communities in Canada generally, they would be very similar and not particular to aboriginal communities. They are conditions of remote communities. There are wonderful advantages to living in very rural areas, but there are some real restrictions as well. One of the challenges we have in this country, and it's evident in the movement out of reserve communities, is also the deruralization generally of Canada.

    As we look at children and educational opportunities, distance learning is phenomenal. We have a program in Canada called SchoolNet that ensures there are computer programs and access in first nations schools across the country, and we're getting up to something like 80%-plus now, which is very good. We don't have high-speed broadband access in all of those situations, but it's working out.

    Some of the results we see from the interaction that's created amongst first nations schools around the country--and with indigenous situations around the world, even--are very encouraging. It's encouraging to be able to take pride in local culture, to learn effectively even in front of a video screen, and also to share your pride in your own culture and your knowledge of it.

    So it would be for high-speed broadband access as a binding force for every kid in every remote community in this country if I had to have just one wish.

º  (1625)  

    The Chair: Well, that's a great wish to end on.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Of course, if we had tele-surgery, tele-health, and e-business, then we'd have the whole spectrum.

    The Chair: Let me just draw a close to this particular portion of the meeting and thank the minister for his first appearance here. We hope it won't be his last.

    Thank you for all of your observations, including the ones at the end, which I provoked you into. We look forward to working with you. I think we view you as one of our in-house, in-government allies, and we want to help you in your efforts. We know you are concerned about the same sorts of issues we are, and I hope we'll continue to have a very pleasant working relationship. Thank you for coming.

    Hon. Stephen Owen: Thank you. I appreciate it.

    The Chair: As the Minister leaves, I might ask Mr. Siggner a question that goes back to these rather suggestive charts. I'm thinking of page 9, the worry and unhappiness chart.

    I'm just wondering this. Take death in the family and then, further down, death of a parent, for example. There is a temptation to read these as simply proxies for other problems. In other words, if you kind of assume that all kids, aboriginal and non-aboriginal, would react in the same way to the same kind of phenomenon, it might suggest higher mortality rates for aboriginal parents or other family members.

    But there's another way of reading it. I don't know how one would correlate all of this; presumably one could do it with some statistics on mortality rates. It might be, for example, that unhappiness over death in the family does not simply mean there's a higher mortality rate for relatives but that a death is more keenly felt. Communities are more closely knit, and therefore the death of a member of the extended family is more keenly felt than in a mobile Canada, where that relative may be in a distant location.

    One could go down the list. Similarly, does the second item mean there's a higher divorce or separation rate among aboriginals, which might be suggested by your other statistic on single parents, or again, is it more keenly felt?

    Do you see what I'm getting at? How am I to read the reactions there?

    Mr. Andy Siggner: It's a great question but I'm not sure I have a great answer. I would agree with your comment regarding the fact that reserve communities tend to be much smaller. Then, one would assume, they tend to be much more closely knit; people all know each other very well, and a death in the family could be quite a traumatic event, I would say. Certainly, that must be part of this, but there are higher mortality rates in the aboriginal population in general as well, so that's likely built into this.

    How do we tease them out? I'm not sure. I'm not sure we have enough data in the survey questionnaire to even be able to get at that, but it's certainly a good research question.

    I knew I'd get questions like this, Mr. Chairman.

    The Chair: I'm just here to make them.

    Mr. Andy Siggner: We're just opening the can on this new set of data, and clearly, many more research questions are going to be asked as a result of this than we have answers for today. But they are good questions, ones that may lead to future surveys that get at those kinds of things.

º  (1630)  

    The Chair: You almost need to do focus groups to follow up on some of these things. It is very intriguing information.

    I'm looking at colleagues to see whether they have any other questions for Ms. Atkinson or Mr. Siggner.

    Yes, go ahead, Mr. Jackson.

    Mr. Ovid Jackson: It's just along the same lines you were following. Kids start with suicide-type things, and one of the factors is high unemployment, for instance. These high rates are caused, I guess, by the closeness in the community, and as you say, those stats probably don't reflect...because of all the reasons you explained, in the rest of Canada. That would be interesting to see, how we could maybe cut back and what measures would stop that from happening.

    Ms. Joan Atkinson: If I could, I'll respond to that observation. As Mr. Siggner has said, this points us in the direction of further research so we can perhaps, if there's the possibility of further surveys and so on, try to drill down and understand.

    We do know, of course, that there's a higher rate of suicide in first nations communities. Again, as Minister Owen said, we need to look at that particular tragedy from a very holistic perspective because it's as a result of many different factors. You spoke about the lack of employment opportunities, the high rate of unemployment in first nations communities, and the sense of hopelessness and despair, which we see leads sometimes, tragically, to people taking their own lives in those communities.

    From the perspective of the various programs the various federal government departments operate, we need to look at all of the factors that assist a community in developing their own way forward, as it were, and building a healthy community. That not only speaks to economic development opportunities, it speaks to education opportunities and it speaks to social programs that make a difference, some of the other programs the chair spoke about in terms of recreation and so on. So it's really the whole bundle of programs and initiatives we as a federal government can offer to communities to help them and enable them to determine their priorities and, hopefully, find a way through to develop healthy communities where people have a sense of hope.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    Nothing terribly secret is about to be said, so you're all welcome to stay.

    I want to begin by thanking the two remaining witnesses before they take their leave. I think it was quite useful, actually, having the juxtaposition, if I may say so. I think it worked out very well.

    I'm going to be very brief about this. Because of the peculiar times in which we live--is that the way we express this delicately?--because of this period of transition and uncertainty, we had originally thought that next week we would perhaps take the time to consider some kind of interim document. My own inclination is to think that we haven't heard enough to come up with anything that resembles any kind of useful conclusion.

    An alternative would be simply to write to the government and say we have reviewed the recommendations in the two reports, the 27 recommendations on education and the 17 on child welfare, and we urge you to respond to them. There'd be no harm done, but that doesn't exactly strike me as stating anything other than what's rather obvious. There's nothing wrong with that, and if people wanted to do that, we could do that.

    Alternately, I would suggest that we not meet next week. We're trying to prepare plan B in case Parliament actually returns. Should we find ourselves back here, the first order of business after the week of November 11 would be to review the response of the government to our second report. That's the report on urban aboriginal kids from zero to 12. The government has a report that is not going to come down, unfortunately, in time for a meeting next week but will on November 6, just within the time limits they have to respond to us. I think that if we find ourselves back here, the first order of business will be to review what they've said to our previous report and to interview the people who are responsible for drafting the response. That would be my first proposal.

    Julie Cool, our researcher, has a number of witnesses who can be brought in so we can continue our work here. Because of the uncertainty, we don't want to line up witnesses and then cancel them, particularly if they're from far away. There are people in Ottawa, though, we could bring in to do that.

    I'm just going by consensus. I'm not trying to read your minds, but I'm looking at people nodding and stuff like that.

    I'm assuming that it's probably not worth putting together an interim report of any kind. That strikes me as premature, and I'm not even certain a letter...unless people really want me to write a letter to the minister saying, please follow up on these two other reports we've been reviewing. If anybody sees some utility in that, no harm done, but I don't see anything particularly useful about it.

    So we will, with your permission, continue to draw up work plans on the assumption we're coming back. We won't meet next week.

    I would draw to your attention the fact that on October 30, two days hence, we have an invitation to all of us, individually and collectively, to go to a meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples. It's a news conference on the launch of their report on urban aboriginal youth, the 12-up piece, and will be held in the Aboriginal Peoples Room of the Senate on Thursday at 3:45. You're welcome to go to that.

    Does anybody else have any other items of business to raise?

    Yes, go ahead.

º  (1635)  

    Ms. Wendy Lill: Just using the scenario that we don't meet next week and we await our fate, I'm not sure exactly where we're at. We're basically saying we're not going to be able to make any plans or have any kind of closure at this point in time.

    The Chair: We have contingency plans.

    Ms. Wendy Lill: What is our contingency plan? I'm not quite clear on what that is.

    The Chair: What are the various options? One option is that we're in some way or other adjourned or suspended, and there are various technical strategies leading to the point where we basically don't come back until the call. Or we could be prorogued, which seems to me highly unlikely; the government doesn't want to prorogue because they need to be able to call the House back, without having an intervening Speech from the Throne, in case there's a national emergency. You just have to deal with it. Whatever it is, we won't be prorogued. So option A is that we're suspended until there's a new prime minister, and no committee can really meet, I don't think, under that scenario.

    Option B is that we actually come back and the parliamentary session continues until Christmas, in which case we will try to keep going with our work plan here. That's why we want to make sure we're ready.

    If we prorogue and the House doesn't come back until there's a new Speech from the Throne, new committees, and new this and new that, I don't know where we are. It will just all depend, and it's hard to plan for.

    I realize it's not helpful, but I can't think my way out of it other than to have a reserve plan. Does that make sense? It's an imperfect world we live in, Ms. Lill.

    On that basis, thank you very much for coming.

    The meeting is adjourned.