SCYR Committee Meeting
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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
Wednesday, November 27, 2002
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The Clerk of the Committee |
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Ms. Diane St-Jacques (Shefford, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair (Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.)) |
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Mr. Larry Spencer (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, Canadian Alliance) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Libby Davies |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Anita Neville (Winnipeg South Centre, Lib.) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Anita Neville |
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The Chair |
| ¹ | 1530 |
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Ms. Anita Neville |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Anita Neville |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Anita Neville |
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The Chair |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay (Laurentides, BQ) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Anita Neville |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Monique Guay |
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The Chair |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair |
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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EVIDENCE
Wednesday, November 27, 2002
[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
¹ 
(1520)
[English]
The Clerk of the Committee: Honourable members, I see a quorum.
[Translation]
The first item of business is the election of the chair.
Are there any motions to that effect?
[English]
Do I have any nominations for chair?
[Translation]
Ms. Diane St-Jacques (Shefford, Lib.): I move that Mr. Godfrey be elected Chair.
The Clerk: Ms. Diane St-Jacques has nominated Mr. Godfrey.
Are there any further nominations?
(Motion agreed to)
The Clerk: You may take the chair, Mr. Godfrey.
[English]
The Chair (Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.)): I propose that this be a very short meeting. Because of the delay in forming committees, we were not able to get down to it until now, but I think it will be better to get organized so we can get ourselves set up for next time.
Today I have a couple of proposals to make on how to handle the remaining two meetings of this calendar year, which will then set us up for next February when we come back.
You'll recall that we put forward a report in June called “Building On Success”, and the government has responded to that. I hope members have received both the official government response and the work that's been done by our researcher,Tonina, to compare what we asked for and how they responded. You have not had time to digest this, and I don't expect that to be the case.
I propose, therefore, that next week we give you a chance to read this to look at the government's response, which has now been published and sent to everybody, I hope, so we can reflect on the progress we've made to date.
I propose, if possible, that we invite the Secretary of State for Children and Youth, Ethel Blondin-Andrew, because she seems to have been given charge of responding to us. If we can have her in next week, I think that will be desirable, so we can quiz her a bit. But I won't expect anyone to have time to really review, in a sensible way, what we've just been given. So that will be next Wednesday's work.
For the following Wednesday, let me review what we agreed on previously. We said we were going to be doing about four reports on aboriginal kids. The first was for on-reserve children ages 0 to 6. It was the desire of members previously that the next one be for off-reserve children ages 0 to 6, sort of a companion piece. Then the third will be for on-reserve children ages 6 to 12, and the fourth for off-reserve children ages 6 to 12. At the rate we're going, it'll be our work for the next year and a bit, but at least we'll know where we're going.
If it's still the desire of members to proceed with that plan, I will ask the researcher--not for next week but for the following week--to present us with a first sketch of witnesses and how we might begin our second study on Indian kids off-reserve, ages 0 to 6, and then have input from members. That will allow the clerk and the researcher to work during the break to start setting up meetings for us, so when we get back, we'll be right into it.
Is that okay as a plan?
¹ (1525)
Mr. Larry Spencer (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, Canadian Alliance): Do I understand you right that we'll wait until then to make any witness suggestions?
The Chair: You can start the moment we sit down, two weeks hence, and talk about it. If you have any ideas right off the bat, people should be thinking about that.
Libby.
Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): I very much agree with the suggestions you've made. I actually want to apologize in person for my very long absence, but there's been an ongoing conflict with the drug committee on Wednesdays, which now, thank goodness, is over, so I'm back. I'm very interested in the off-reserve, as you know.
For the benefit of the researcher, one thing I would be interested in as our work proceeds is the issues that we look at. Could we have sort of parallel information that shows us what programs there are and how many kids they actually reach? One of the concerns I've had for a long time is that there are a whole bunch of different programs in different departments, but the number of kids they actually reach, I believe, is minuscule when compared with the populations that actually need to be assisted or are at risk.
I'm very interested to know whether or not we could actually figure that out. It's just bits of things that you read here and there. I have that in my mind, but I don't have a lot of input about that, so I think it would be interesting for us to match up whatever issues we're looking at specifically--whether it's health programs or FAS or early childhood development, whatever it might be--and find, in a parallel way, what actually exists out there.
The Chair: And what the take-up rate is of those.
Ms. Libby Davies: Yes.
The Chair: I guess we did that to some degree with the last study. We tried to get some sense of how many people were covered off. What we could do for next week is to alert the minister that this is a question we would like to ask and, further, ask if he has any additional information to the report that we've just done. It's an excellent idea and I think it's really the way we've been operating, that as we do our research for off-reserve kids, 0 to 6, we would want to ask those questions all the way through about how effective they are, what's their reach, and so on.
Anita.
Ms. Anita Neville (Winnipeg South Centre, Lib.): I think what Libby is suggesting is very important and I guess I'm extending it a little bit, with difficulty probably, because when you're dealing with off-reserve children there are many other responses to off-reserve children that are not funded by the federal government. They're funded by school divisions, by--
The Chair: By provinces, generally.
Ms. Anita Neville: —provinces, by whomever. My own view is that a significant part of the problem with off-reserve children as well as adults is that there is a tremendous amount of duplication, overlap, falling between the cracks, lack of talking to one another, and no continuum or seamlessness in programming. I realize it entails significantly more work, but it would be interesting to begin at least a scan of what's being done in certain provinces, in particular where numbers are greater in urban settings.
The Chair: What I was going to suggest first is that if people--following on a previous thought--have any potential witnesses in mind for our second study, don't hesitate to bring them forward, even to next week's meeting, because that'll just give Tonina a better chance to incorporate it in her following week's work. If anything comes to mind, don't hold back.
On that second point, on Anita's point, in a sense given the mismatch of resources to problems that you've described, maybe what would be effective would be to.... We will understand in general terms.... We would have to say in our report that there is this huge variety of players and every one is in a sense site specific; that is to say that every province and, indeed, every part of a province may have a different configuration. What we could do is take a couple of really good examples, Winnipeg or Vancouver or wherever--three or four. We couldn't possibly attempt to be complete in the total inventory of resources from all sources across the country; we'd drive ourselves crazy. But if we did a few places, we could really get a feeling for how that works or doesn't work.
Anita.
¹ (1530)
Ms. Anita Neville: I was about to suggest the same thing and I would suggest, with all due respect to other parts of the country, that we take a look at Winnipeg, some site in Saskatchewan and, probably, Vancouver. This is a huge issue. I don't believe it's getting national attention, in large part because it's more of a western issue than a national issue. I think it's important to start focusing on it everywhere, because the gaps are huge.
The Chair: We may want to add one or two others. For example, downtown Toronto has a huge aboriginal population. Bill Graham probably has as many aboriginals in Toronto Centre—Rosedale as Bob Nault does.
Ms. Anita Neville: But relative to the rest of the population, the numbers are perhaps much smaller.
The Chair: I think that's what we're going to thrash around two weeks hence. That's the kind of thinking we want to get going on. Maybe we can think about site visits.
That brings me to--
Ms. Anita Neville: So moved. Are you talking about the budget?
The Chair: Yes. Let me ask Danielle to explain. I think this is very modest, but this is just to get our feet wet. We haven't guessed what the travel plans will be, but we just want to get going with this.
The Clerk: For travelling, it's always a separate budget anyway. You cannot include it in your normal budget because travelling means you need the authorization of the House, and so on.
This budget is based on the cost of our last study. That's pretty much what it cost. The witnesses averaged out to $1,200. Obviously some cost $3,000, but then some cost $500. So that's the average we normally take. Apart from that, we've given you a few working meals and miscellaneous for $500.
Last year there were plenty with that amount, but nothing prevents us from going back for more.
The Chair: Okay, Anita moved that. Is there any discussion?
(Motion agreed to)
[Translation]
Ms. Monique Guay (Laurentides, BQ): Mr. Chairman, if we hear from Ms. Blondin next week, we would need to ask her to bring along a report. Surely her department has already published reports describing what the government does and the activities it funds with respect to natives off reserves and to youths from birth to six years of age.
The Chair: Off reserves?
Ms. Monique Guay: Yes, since that's the subject of the study we are preparing to undertake.
The Chair: I don't see any problem with that, although my initial reaction was to have the committee comment on the last report. However, if we give her advance notice, I don't see any problem with that request.
Ms. Monique Guay: I think we're heading in that direction. Ms. Blondin could provide us with some information before we undertake our study. If we already have some tools in hand and know what the government is already doing in this area, we'll have a leg up on our next study. We could also comment on both. There's not much risk involved in doing that.
The Chair: I understand.
Ms. Monique Guay: Next, Mr. Chairman, I'd like to discuss a subject that I consider to be very important. I've already mentioned it to the clerk. I hope that this committee won't have a problem achieving quorum. No doubt you recall the problems the sub-committee had last year. The situation wasn't very pleasant. At times, we heard from witnesses even though we didn't have a quorum. Therefore, I would ask that you be very vigilant this year and ensure that we have a quorum. Otherwise, the climate becomes quite unpleasant.
The Chair: I can appreciate what you're saying.
Ms. Monique Guay: ...when we're the only ones working, and the others don't even bother to show up. I really want to emphasize this point. I even received a call at my office asking me to come down because there weren't enough members present. That type of situation is quite unpleasant and out of respect for the witnesses, for the committee and for the work it's doing, it's important to ensure that we have a quorum.
¹ (1535)
The Chair: I totally agree with you.
[English]
Ms. Anita Neville: I sympathize with Madame Guay's comments. What is quorum to hear witnesses? Is it three?
The Chair: It's three, with one opposition.
[Translation]
Ms. Monique Guay: At times, we didn't even have a quorum.
[English]
The Chair: I like 3:15 simply because it means you don't have time to get back to your office. Once you're in your office, it's dead. So if we can all try to do that, I think
[Translation]
we'll do our best. I agree with you completely.
[English]
I guess we have agreed to the budget. Does it have to go through the main committee?
The Clerk: No, we've accepted it in the main committee.
The Chair: The budget has been pre-accepted. What friends we have.
The Clerk: It hasn't been presented in the liaison committee because it had a lot of budgets, and Mrs. Longfield was on very shaky ground to try to present a budget for a subcommittee that wasn't on the roll.
The Chair: We love Ms. Longfield; we think she's a splendid person.
Are there any other things we have to deal with today?
The meeting is adjourned.