Nuanced. - 172. Gary Anandasangaree: National Truth & Reconciliation Day with the Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations

Episode Date: September 30, 2024

Aaron Pete is joined by Gary Anandasangaree, the Federal Minister for Crown-Indigenous Relations, on National Truth and Reconciliation Day to discuss his journey from youth advocate to shaping policy at the UN, his work on racial disparities in Ontario’s Education Act, his commitment to UNDRIP, and efforts to improve housing and Indigenous rights through federal initiatives and treaty negotiations.Send us a textThe "What's Going On?" PodcastThink casual, relatable discussions like you'd overhear in a barbershop....Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the shownuancedmedia.ca

Welcome back to another episode of the Bigger Than Me podcast. Here is your host, Aaron P. Reconciliation is a hot topic, particularly for National Truth and Reconciliation Day. Are we on the right track? Or are we lagging behind? Today I'm speaking with the Federal Minister for Crown and Indigenous Relations. My guest today is Gary Anansan Garay. Minister, it is an honor to speak with you today.

Would you mind first introducing yourself? I'm glad to be here, Aaron. My name is Gary Anna Desangery. I represent the writing of Scarborough-Rouche Park in Parliament, and I also serve as the Minister of Crown and Business Relations. Fascinating. You are an internationally recognized human rights lawyer and community activist. Would you mind just sharing a little bit about your background? Sure. I have a myriad of experience prior to getting into politics. I would say my first advice, I would say my first advent of advocacy role was to advocate for youth, particularly those who were getting kicked out of schools and were involved the criminal justice system. So prior to even going to law school, that's the work I did running a youth organization. And really grounded me, really grounded me as a person, as someone who advocates on issues of importance. One of the things that, you know,

I realize is that when you work with individuals, you're really advancing the rights of that individual. And I think that's critically important. And I have the utmost respect for people who do that important work at a grassroots level. But over time, there's a sense of frustration that, you know, takes place because you're basically doing the same thing over and over again, getting, you know, maybe same results, like good results. But it doesn't offer transformational change. And that's one of the reasons I chose to go to law school. And even in law school, I was doing a lot of the advocacy around what was called the Education Act in Ontario, and we were able to get some changes to the act that essentially changed how discipline was handed out in Ontario schools.

One of the critical pieces in this is that you'll find that more racialized, indigenous, black people will likely be kicked out of school more often than their non-counterparts. And for us, we were able to demonstrate that as we advocated for the changes to the act. And eventually, the act was changed, and we do see differences in the way students are supported, and if they do make a mistake, or addressed, you know, as part of both the school system, as well as a criminal justice system. So for me, that's where I started. From there, I did some work at the UN Human Rights Council

and advocating for accountability. One of my most important interactions was with what it's called the mothers that disappeared. So many mothers, and oftentimes it's also the spouses who lost their husbands during the conflict in Sri Lanka. And that's really been a source of enormous pain and suffering for people. So I was able to work directly with survivors, you know, with a sense of determination that, you know, their loved ones will either come back

or they need answers, you know, for their loved ones. And it is something that I'm able to translate in the kind of work that I do right now because the loss of a child or a spouse or anyone in your life without answers, without closure, leaves a lot of unanswered questions and leaves an enormous amount of pain that oftentimes haunts you and you can't let go, you can't really move on with your lives. and I find that, you know, the law sometimes the offers hope, but sometimes doesn't give you the type of resolution that you need, which is to really have the right answers for what happened to your loved one.

So, you know, this all kind of, I think, helped me build as an advocate. I still look at the role that I have as a minister, as an advocate, as someone who's advocating for the rights of people in this case, particularly indigenous people. I'm very grounded on the UN Declaration on the rights of indigenous people. I would say that's one of my guiding lights in the North Star. I was involved with the private members bill when, you know, Roguel Sagamash, the former MP brought it forward. and, you know, it's inspired really by the depth of support he was able to mobilize from across Canada

and we traveled the country together as part of the community travels. And, you know, I remember being in Delta, British Columbia, and we had people that came from all over British Columbia and just talked about undrip as such a central part of, you know, the next phase of the relationship between Canada and indigenous people. And that really woke me up, really, I think, enabled me to see the potential and be able to work with our government and ministers at that time to be able to bring that into both law as well as now the implementation of it. And again, I think this is the type of transformational pains that we're able to do in government. And at the end of the day, I think,

think that one of the major achievements for us in terms of reconciliation is the resetting of this course, the resetting of this relationship and having a path that is now grounded on an internationally recognized and understood human rights frame. But we, with the full view that we have so much work to do ahead. Would you mind sharing one of the interesting pieces I find really important is is that as a minister, you're given a mandate letter. And I find that so fascinating, just as a council member, because we get given portfolios,

but we don't get given mandate letters, which can often give life to the approach that you're going to take, guidance when you're having a tough time, maybe choosing between one path or another. It's kind of a guiding force for you. Would you mind talking a little bit about your mandate letter? Sure. You know, the mandate letter was prepared for my previous minister, Mr. Miller,

and, you know, my task and the task of the team that I have at the minister's office is to be able to implement the specific recommendations that we have, the specific mandate we have to execute within government. So within our mandate of the government, which, you know, could be over the next year, we have a number of things that we need to complete, including. you know, the ungrib action plan, as well as work around missing and murdered and women and boroughs, ensuring that we work towards modern treaties, closing off treaty discussions and initiating them. So there's a range of issues that continue to be priorities for us. What I find is a mandate letter gives us, crystallizes the direction that we need to take and the priorities that we need to place on a range of range of issues. And it's something that we are guided by, you know, we're going to have a retreat in a couple of

weeks and we will review the progress and also, again, prioritize where we need to go. If I may suggest, like one of the things that David Lemedy, who's, you know, I was his parliamentary secretary before, so they never gave a letter to parliamentary secretaries to the ministers it's given. So David and I sat down and we basically tasked the specific things that I would do and lead as part of the work that he was asked to do as Minister of Justice and Attorney General. And I think for any counts or anyone in government, it's probably a very good transparent way of offering or what we are going to achieve and maybe hold us to account in that regard. There's many ways of looking at it, but I look at it as a guide, guide post and something that is really important for us to work through.

I couldn't agree more. In July, it sounds like there was a bit of a debacle. Regina Crowchild, she was a proxy for Chief Roy Whitney, and she made some comments accusing you of being on your phone during this meeting. And it sounds like there was feedback given from your team saying that was not the case. Would you mind clarifying somewhat what took place there? Actually, you know, I did not have my phone and I wasn't looking at the phone. I mean, she may not be, in fairness to her, I don't think she may have seen me up close because, you know, there was a bit of a barrier as well in a distance.

And I was sitting right beside the National Chief at that time. I think it was to get the attention of the audience as well as, you know, I guess ensuring that, you know, I focus on her questions. I was taking notes. I usually take notes when there are meetings and, you know, sometimes we have like seven, eight, nine different interventions to which we need to respond. So I oftentimes take notes. The lawyer in me, I think, kind of naturally gravitates to that. And for me, it was a very important message to be open and transparent. I'm not about to correct someone of an elder in that kind of a setting.

I don't think that was appropriate. But our office did send clarification to the media that reported it as such. But, you know, we're also in a world of TikTok and other social medians where, you know, it's moved by the time that clarification goes out. But for me, that wasn't the central part of my attendance at some of the First Nations. You know, I had some incredibly important meetings, meetings that, you know, led to several announcements, including, you know, establishment of tables as well as continuous work on creating negotiations.

You know, the relationship is fragile, right? And the best of times it's fragile. I believe that over the last nine years, our government has done a lot of work to build that trust. But we're also working in a backdrop of over 157 years of colonization distrust. So you can't undo it overnight. So for me, was I irritated by it? Yes. But was I, you know, did it change the way I do things?

No, because ultimately it is about delivering results. And to me, you know, I am confronted oftentimes with people who look at me not as who I am. They look at me as a representative of the crown. And ultimately, you know, I respect that. and I respect that I have to work harder each and every day. The only way I can overcome misconceptions or people's anxieties or anger sometimes is just to prove them wrong by working harder to do the right thing. That's not always easy and that's not always possible, but we do our best each and every day.

And that's, you know, since I was appointed on July the 26th of 2023, I would say every single morning I wake up with, you know, with this hunger, to say, okay, let's, what more can we deliver? What more can we do? And, you know, I've had a remarkable summer going around the country, but particularly on, you know, initiating three modern treaties in British Columbia, renewal of the agreement in northern BC, you know, ensuring that we advance Haida recognition, government recognition. So it's been a, you know, a very busy summer delivering results. But I would say there's a lot more to do and that we intend to work every single day until

the end of Ramnandy to deliver. May I ask, just on a personal note, your file is incredibly challenging, as you describe. There's an incredibly long, complicated, dark history at times in regards to the work you do. And the work you're doing is incredibly important. I just wonder personally, is this file more challenging because you are likely always confronted with there's more to do, whatever you're doing, even the biggest, you could have the biggest win of your time in office and the next sentence probably needs to be something along the lines of, but there's more to do, we're not saying we're done, does that, has that been a unique

challenge just to try and address really important issues? I'm sure the work is incredibly rewarding, but to know that kind of the cycle of the work is that you're never done. You got to keep going. It's a unique file from my perspective in that regard because there is so much to do, but that might be more challenging. I know on council, when we have a win, I notice my team has a tough time absorbing that, soaking that in for themselves. And so I always try and say, like, let's just take a couple of minutes and like process what we've done here. We just got approved for BC housing. We're going to have new housing we haven't had in like 20 years.

This is a big accomplishment, but everybody wants to kind of move on to what do we need to do next for A, B, C, or D. And so I noticed that it was taking something a little bit too much from me personally in that role. And so I just needed to start to develop processes so we could celebrate those things. I'm happy to get back to work. I'm happy to do the job. But I just noticed that if I didn't do that for myself, I was going to burn out because you need to be able to say, I'm doing my very best. And so I'm just curious as to that personal experience with this file.

Yeah, look, it's one of those things where I've always, you know, anything I've done, you know, you see, they're 110% or nothing, right? And that's always been my approach. But in this particular role, I realize that every day matters, right? Every day, you know, when we, you know, we spent three modern, initial three modern treaties this summer last week. June. And last week, June, 1 in July. And one thing I realize is that every single one of them, communities and leaders and lawyers and negotiators and councils and elders have been working on it for 30, 35, 40 years. Like, it's a lifetime, right? I mean, you know, at the end of this

enormous journey, you're some, sometimes I think we were celebrating someone who was, you know, couldn't even come to the initial just because it took so long and it was not well. We've had issues where a gentleman passed away just before negotiators agreement on it. So the

weight of history is there every time we do this, right? And every day, even if we're signing off an agricultural benefit or an addition to reserve, the time it took to get us there It's so frustrating sometimes, but we're there. And it's a moment where, you know, yes, I want to relish it and I want to say this is great.

But I don't think we have time to just focus on that because we're right away off to the next one and the next one and the next one. Because we do, we have made progress on a range of issues. And I will be remiss if I don't execute on them and be able to, you know, I'm trying to, figure out my fall schedule and we were a number of major, major advances in Ontario and in other parts, I just need to make sure I get to each one of them to be able to initial them because imagine if we're not able to do it in the mandate we have, because then they'll have to wait, you know, maybe several months, maybe several years, maybe until, you know, maybe in decade. And we don't want to do that. And so I think I'm inspired by it and I feel like I do take rest.

I'm not a robot, I take rest, I take my time off, I spend time with family, and I do take vacations and so on. But ultimately, the focus of the work is so important. It's like nothing else in government. There's no other parallel role in government that I think will have transformational impact in the long haul than this particular portfolio and the work that we're doing around location across the board. Would you mind sharing, I know this was a little bit of a time ago, but it's still very relevant, the agreement you signed with the MECMA. As you know, the MECMA have, it was an education sectoral agreement with the MECMA in Nova Scotia. It was basically a renewal of the previous agreement. The MECMA in Nova Scotia have amongst the best results of any community, any nation within Canada, in fact, their provincial averages are higher than the

averages for Nova Scotia in terms of graduation rates in terms of educational attainment and so on. So it's a, in many ways, it is a very inspiring, you know, 30-year journey where they've built an education system with outcomes that I think is desired by most of not all that I have men. So signing that, I think, with the prime minister there, I think, was very special. And at the core, I think, of the relationship is the failure of Canada and its education policies. It's the failure of colonial structures and policies to say, you know, we're going to take the India of the child. We're going to remove the child into residential schools. And then we're going to make sure that they don't speak the language. They have no connection to

their community and culture, and we're going to take, you know, cut their hair, a range of things that happened where the child was actually, you know, devastated and ultimately we turn to a community where the community doesn't recognize the child and the child doesn't recognize the community. And at the core of self-determination, at the core of an unrip, it's about ensuring that indigenous people have right and control over every aspect of your life, with education being a core aspect of one's growth, one's well-being, one's progress. And that's why it was so important for me when we signed that agreement. As someone who, you know, I think more than any other area of law, you know, education is

Rights of education is something I've fought for all my life. And I think to be able to sign that agreement and renew that relationship of a 35-year renewal and to ensure that self-determination stays with the migma was extremely powerful. More powerful was to see the, you know, we were at a graduation right afterwards, the local high school, I think, 11 out of the 12, like their high school graduation rates were, you know, phenomenal. And to be able to spend time with the young people there.

Just, you know, for much of the negativity we hear, those are the days why we do this work, right? Because we want to set and ensure that the trajectory is turned and we have a path that ensures every single child that's born here, indigenous or non-indigenous is able to fully actualize their pretension. Beautiful. I've had the honor of interviewing Roy Henry Vickers, who is an artist, and you've recently signed draft treaties with one of his communities. Would you mind talking about the draft treaties with Kitsam-Kalem and Kitsilis? Yes, we were able to initial this in June right after National Indigenous People's Day. It was a remarkable week. in Terrace, and it's very special.

And it's one of those things where, again, we're talking about people that have been working for, you know, 30, 40 years towards establishing a treaty, and we were able to initiate and go to the next step of ratification and consultation. It was special for the communities. I mean, you know, I couldn't underscore. the incredible partnership that we were able to nurture Mr. Rankin and the province of BC

where, you know, are incredible partners for us in this journey. In British Columbia, we haven't had a modern treaty completed in a generation. So as far of the BC treaty process, it was also critically important to ensure that worked. Is it perfect, no? Is it, is it going to solve every issue or any of all the major issues? No, this is an important framework.

I think that will, over time, ensure that both communities have sub-termination over their affairs. We need to look at to us and or, you know, some of the communities in the lower mainland who have entered into modern treaties. And we see the progress that they've made. You know, within a relatively short period of time. It wasn't only 15 years. The Nishka, you know, they're much more advanced and a longer term treaty. But even then, you know, we are just scratching the surface and the potential is enormous in the future.

And I think that's what I'm excited about. The fact that the nations will have self-determination over their affairs is at the core of what I think our government wants to work on. And I think it's a core of UNRIP. It's a core of the aspirations of many nations that I've been able to speak to and engage with. Is there a piece of the treaty process that stands out to you? Right now we have a provincial election underway,

and John Rustad seems very focused on economic reconciliation. I'm just wondering within these treaties, is there a piece that stands out to you that's important, that differentiates it from historic treaties. How do you process the document itself? Look, the number treaties, you know, are from a very different era with a different set of objectives. The modern treaties are fully hash out over, you know,

several decades of work, and it ensures self-determination. It ensures land that goes back to the nation. It ensures establishment of a government and different structures within government. Oftentimes it's incremental. There's also fish components to it. And ultimately, in order to have economic reconciliation, I believe these are a very important tool to achieve that. I think it's relatively easy to talk about economic reconciliation without talking with the underlying issues.

And if we do not have self-determination over, you know, aspects of people's lives, many aspects of people's lives in taxation, then the latter is almost an artificial assertion that life will be better with the economic condition. I think in order to understand what that really means, the tools need to be available ahead of time. and the modern treaties actually enable us to set up those tools.

And I go back to the Tuasana as one of the examples of how they've been able to build and to be an economic, economically self-sufficient with enormous aspirations that they have towards economic development. But all of that's happened because of the modern treaty they were able to enter into. This is more of a personal philosophy question that I ask myself fairly regularly. I see many nations and many indigenous people demanding self-determination. And the only piece that I just, I want to hear a little bit more of from my counterparts, my colleagues, is the responsibility. that comes with that self-determination.

That's just something I personally worry about as my own nation, we look at wanting self-determination. I constantly stress that with self-determination, we can no longer ask to shift the blame to municipalities, the provincial government, the federal government. With that idea of being able to have that self-determination, we need to own our own mistakes

and not point at you, at your colleagues, for the problems that we're facing now. certainly caveat being many indigenous communities are in different places and some of them aren't asking to be free and make their own calls. But I do see that their balance needs to be struck where if an indigenous community is reaching that point where they're able to have the money they need to invest in their community, that they have to own the outcomes for their community, that they can't point it at you or the local provincial minister, they have to take that on themselves. And it's a shift that I think needs to come with that. Do you have any

reflections on that? I would say that, you know, the vast majority of the interactions I've had, there's never been that, you know, shift of blame. I think the modern treaties, there's 27 of them right now across Canada. Each one of them are on a separate journey. You know, we are in the cusp of signing the first full justice agreement. in the Yukon. This will be the first one in Canada with true drawdown rights for justice. And it's been done incrementally. So if you look at the journey we've had and we can go back to 50 years of modern treaties,

they have been incremental. They have oftentimes been very frustrating because of the length of time it's taken. But I think we get to a point where this is naturally the willingness, the ability, the strength, and the capacity is there for communities to be self-governing nations. And I think there are sometimes misconceptions that, you know, we can do this overnight. We can't. And I think there's realization that, you know, when we take the longer term view and frankly,

and a lot of the blame, I think, still falls into the federal government because some of the treaty commitments are delayed or have not been fulfilled in a timely manner. So I think there is enough blame to go around with both the provincial and federal governments. But I do think ultimately, my perspective is that we have advanced treaties to a point where communities and nations are ready, willing, able, and have the capacity to take it on and to flourish and it's not perfect, but I think they will have their own journey. Each one of them will make mistakes, but also they will correct their mistakes and they will be held accountable to their own people. Fascinating. The way that we got connected was through your work with Comox First Nation and the treaty they're working on. Would you mind sharing some of the background on that agreement?

Sure, it's very similar to the other two. Again, Comox, I think it's about 35 years in the making, the initialing. I think we did in July the 22nd of last couple months ago. You know, fish was a major component of it to ensure that there's, you know, traditional fishing rights are protected. Again, it was a very difficult journey. And I think we got to a point where, you know, I think we all went to the former chief's house to initial the final treaty because he was not well. And we wanted to make sure that his life work was respected and recognized.

But it was also great to see young people there who had so much hope and aspirations In fact, there's a family from visiting from the Netherlands on the island, and they were actually, they just happened to be there. They said, this is happening, and we wanted to see what this was like, and I was talking to them, and they were quite overwhelmed by what the significance of the moment. I think for the community, I can't speak for the community, but I can tell you as someone who witnessed the third initially, and the first one I signed was,

the first one we've signed in Saskatchewan was the White Cap Dakota last year, and I did it a few days after my appointment. Every single one of them is exceptionally meaningful and real and heartwarming because it is about getting out of the Indian Act. It is about saying that Canada no longer relies on a racist, government legislation to define a relationship. It is about saying that every person has agency

and sovereignty and self-determination. As a people, Canada and the Comox, for example, are able to coexist as partners with our own set of responsibilities, but ultimately the Comox people will be able to be the driver's with your destiny. And, you know, I visited the Comox maybe six, seven months ago, and I saw the potential they have, you know, look, it's enormous, and oftentimes it's tied down because of the challenges of the Indian Act and the journey to get there has not been easy, and I'll be probably the first, probably the most frustrating part of the treaties is the length of time. but I think we're in a better place

and we want to continue to be able to do this for nations that are ready to move forward. You also introduced legislation to recognize the Haida nation's inherent rights of governance and self-determination. I had a few journalists actually reach out and say they didn't feel like this story

got a lot of coverage. Would you mind giving us some insight into this? Sure. There's also another story with the Haida that I would love to talk about. I was able to, I visited them, I was in Haida Goy this year in the summer, but last year S-16 was introduced, essentially recognizing the Council of the Haida nation as the government of the Haida people and ensuring that they represent their people and the establishment of the government.

The Haida have asked that we have an incremental approach towards, where they want to go, but the first issue being recognition of the government. The second major thing they want to do is recognition of title. As you know, the province of British Columbia was able to bring forward the legislation, recognizing title. I was invited to the legislature. First time I've sat through a legislation, I've never been elected to the provincial legislature, so the first time I was able to sit there.

But for me, it was important that I send a message that D.C. is not alone in this. we, you know, federal government, we want to move forward. And I know when Mr. Gibbo went, we spent several days in Hidegway, we're talking about lands that are federal control, including, you know, Parks, Canada, Guajanis, as well as some land that relating to defense and transport, which could potentially, as part of the second phases, phase of this could be transferred to to the height of people. At the backdrop of it,

there is an ongoing litigation that will, you know, continue to, I think, haunt both of us until we have resolution. So while,

you know, we're moving forward, we also know that there is litigation that's been ongoing for decades about title and the nature of title. And it was first,

you know, resolved with the Nishka, but we are here, in Heidegway trying to resolve it before, you know, we go to trial because I think, you know, it is such an incredible area, such a serene, spectacular history, and I was so moved, I think, by the connection people had to their land and what it represents, I think, for Canada, for North America for the world. And we're in a moment where, you know, giving land back is very much part of what we need to do.

Albeit, I think, we're not as advanced there yet. And I'm hoping over the next, you know, of course, we're demanded will be able to advance some work towards returning of land. This is just a question about relationships. You've spoken fairly highly of the work the BC government's doing currently. That's under BCNDP leadership and David Eby. Currently there's a provincial election. I know that's not federal.

But as I mentioned, John Rustad, the leader of the BC Conservatives, have talked about repealing UNDRIP. And you've spoken highly of this legislation. Do you have any recommendations, thoughts or reflection? that you'd want to share with Mr. Rustat as he looks at that decision? Look, I don't want to necessarily get involved in the BC election, but I can be very clear with respect to the federal objectives. Any government of Canada, any provincial government that goes back on reconciliation,

every aspect of it, right, whether it is on modern treaties, whether it's on, you know, on Drip and B.C. Drip is, you know, there are a couple of years ahead of us, or on a range of other advances that we have made. Any government that repeals or goes backward is taking Canada back. It is taking us back to a time where we're reinforcing systemic racism. I don't think that, you know, any of us want to live in a country. where we are, we have two classes of citizenship. I don't think we want to live in a country where we're not making every single effort to make all the mistakes that we have made

and to owning up to the failures of successive governments. We can couch all of this and say economic reconciliation is going to be the panacea to this. And I would be the first to say economic the station is important, but it is, it cannot be at the expense of everything else and it cannot be an excuse to roll back, you know, fundamental gains that we made over the last decade. In the federal side, you know, we've had a decade of what we call the last decade where there's no investments in housing. Every relationship we had with indigenous people were based on the Financial Accountability Act and looking at, you know, every band council, as someone who is fundamentally fraud and not fundamentally flawed and not, you know, not

transparent and accountable. And I think we need to have a starting point where we are nation to nation. We are in an advanced state of relationship where we trust each other. And we have been able to build that trust. And that 10 years has accumulated into many, many years of neglect on housing, on infrastructure, on schools. And frankly, I think we have made enormous advances in the last nine years. The BC government is the only government to, in fact, invest in housing for indigenous people, which is, you know, over a billion dollars of housing. And Mr. Rankin always reminds me of this. And I think it's a remarkable record. Now, is that enough? No, we need to sustain the work. We need to continue it. We need every government here on fourth to have

the vision of closing the gap until the gap is closed and then doubling down and ensuring that we have self-determination on every aspect of life. And I think for anyone seeking a leadership position in Canada who wants to lead a government, they need to think twice if they are for a second thinking about ruling back any of these rights and any of these advances. And I believe that Canadians, both indigenous and non-indigenous, are very committed towards making sure that we advance this work. And it's a bit long answer, but my ultimate test is grade five students I speak to in schools in Starvo.

When I first started going to these classes in 2016, when I started talking about business issues, they would have very little knowledge of what I'm talking about. Today I go into grade five class anywhere in my area, but over 20 schools. The first question I would be often asked about water, then it's about missing and murdered, then it'll be about, you know, every child matters.

And I would spend an hour trying to answer and oftentimes defend what the government's done. I think we're in a different place today than we were a decade ago. And I think Canadians expect a lot more of the environment and will not tolerate anyone going back. Agreed. Just on the Financial Transparency Act, I'll give a little bit of a pushback because the only concern that I see, I'm a fierce proponent of that act and the need for it to be implemented. I joined my council. We were three years behind on our audits. Our community had no trust in the council because there wasn't financial transparency. We were behind on some of our reporting to organizations like Indigenous Services Canada. And my big concern, and you might see this occasionally,

but is that often indigenous people and First Nation communities are often voted in based on their last name or their family relations. That's a problem. I believe in democracy. and democracy would have those people run based on a platform of how they're going to improve their nation, not based purely on their family dynamics. And so those people get put in, and if they have a big enough family, they can run the community. And then they may have good relations with you, but bad relations on their financial responsibilities. And then they might be a good partner between, say, me and you, but then they're not accountable to their community. And ultimately, I think that the Financial

Transparency Act protect the community members from mishandlings of things. And I think that's really important because if we as a First Nation community are going to be a good partner, you need to know that we're coming to the table with the full support of our nation. But if we don't have up-to-date financials, people may have voted us in based on a misunderstanding of where the finances actually are. Look, I don't, you know, for a second say that financial transparency or accountability is not important. I do think it's important. But my sense is that a previous act or the act that still is on paper focuses exponentially on that piece at the expense of the other work that needs to be done.

I think when you're creating a relationship, when we're trying to build trust, we need to, come with the understanding that your community is capable of governing itself, you know, is able to elect his leaders, is able to hold you accountable. And trust me, I have seen many an election, you know, I would meet a chief in the next week. I got a text saying, sorry, we'll vote it out. And I've seen, I see it all the time. And I think that's the concern, right? And absolutely, I think it's important that, um, that, that, that I, believe that, you know, notwithstanding our in our preoccupation with the Financial Transparency Act, we have a great deal of adherence to best practices. We have a, you know, a vast majority of the

communities that were on a difficult financial journey have turned themselves around. And that's because, you know, we've been able to work as partners to get them through difficult. times. And that's my point here. It's to make sure that when we build a relationship is not based on distrust. It's based on trust. Fair enough. The other conversation is around the caps on Indian residential school searches and the funding for that. Now, I just want to be transparent. I've had multiple conversations with people, various on the political spectrum. I've spoken to Chief Willie Sellers from Williams Lake First Nation. We talked about his community and the actual searches that may go on in his community, Michael Moses, who's running for the BCNDP. But I've also

spoken to individuals like Candace Malcolm from True North Media about her perspective and the book that her organization True North released, saying that perhaps there aren't these unmarked graves, that the CBC story that was initially reported has some problems with it, one of which is they find abnormalities. There's not bones that have been discovered. There's these abnormalities that may be, bodies. And I'm wondering how you process this story and then how do you decide you've removed the caps on that search. How did you come to that decision? So I think we need to go back to, you know, the first findings in Camberts. And when we had, you know, the prime minister and my previous portfolio holder, Mark Miller, from day one, our commitment was to support the journey.

that every community wants to undertake and that journey could be it's at their own pace it's at their own methodology it is to you know it's this incremental process sometimes and I think from the from the outset we've made funding available for for communities to undertake communities and sometimes it's a group of communities sometimes it's organizations to undertake that work and that work is critical and the absolute commitment that we have as a government is to be with the community each and every step in the way. This budget cycle, we had to make a very difficult decision because there was exceptionally high demand for resources. So we were, you know, we I think mistakenly put a cap of $500,000 per community,

which we eventually changed and there's no longer a cap. And I think that's caused some anxiety amongst many survivors. I've been able to meet with many of them along the way and I fully recognize that there was a mistake. And we're trying to, while we're trying to ensure broader work is done by more communities, we also did not appreciate the depth of work that was already being done. So here we are today, I think, as we lead up to September 30th, where our commitment is renewed, our commitment is absolutely clear.

We need more resources, and I will be seeking more resources towards long-term support for communities. And I do believe that many communities that have done advanced, work. So some have done, you know, work, they're ready to exhume, they're ready to find, you know, find their loved ones and maybe even go to the next step of DNA testing, are in a very different phase in someone who's just, you know, starting to look for anomalies or starting to scope out the area that they're going to do the search. They're in two different parts and areas of the journey. But it's the backdrop of this, this is denialism that is very

problem because, you know, I was at Williams Lake. I was at, you know, we did a, I was at Williams Lake last year around this time. I met with Charlene Galru, who is very involved with the work of St. Joseph's, former St. Joseph's residential schools. I walked the ground. And, you know, this was about three, four in the afternoon. By the time I finished, and I had so many other things to do that day, I just went to the hotel and I had to shut down. And I have not felt like that in any other day in this role. And I had to shut down because the emotion was so overwhelming

and the impact that just even walking and understanding and understanding the stories just crushed me, right? And for anyone to suggest that, you know, we can't accept residential school, that that's took place, that young people didn't go home, families didn't have their kids back, I think it's absolute nonsense. And it is a type of hatred, in my opinion, that warrants, you know, criminal review. And almost, you know, when we talk about Holocaust denial or denial, of any major event, or genocide, I think, is at that point where it should be part of

community and criminal law to be able to talk about those who deny that this happened. The work, I think, that's been undertaken by the community is a verification process to see, you know, if there are bodies that can be found or that can be exhumed and it can be, you know, tested. And every single one of those steps takes, buy-in from the community, it takes commitment, it takes, frankly, the understanding of, you know, what they're going to be able to live with when they do that search. And everyone will have different decision points, and everyone will not have the same outcome. But ultimately, everyone deserves to undertake this process of if and when they're ready.

Minister, I guess I will just push back a bit on the idea of legislating this into law. I spoke to Candace Malcolm. Her and I disagree on a great many things, but we work that through, through conversations and dialogue. And she's very skeptical on whether or not this money is going to be well spent. She's very confident that this is a gigantic waste of money from her perspective. I disagree with her. I lean much more towards, let's do the research, let's give communities the opportunity to understand their history and make sure they verify these things. But I spoke with Michael Moses, who is very sympathetic to this cause as well.

And he agrees this may have been a moral panic, that we may do all of this research and come back with a few people, that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission did cover a lot of this work. And so there is this genuine pushback that I think is coming from a very recent. place of, they were told that there was these 215 children lost. Then the number just kept going up. And none of, not a lot of that is verified. And so people panicked. I remember people reaching out to me, how do I think about this? What do I do? How do I reconcile? How do I carry this weight on my shoulders? We were a part of a genocide. We killed thousands and thousands of babies. And we don't know whether or not that's even true. And so when you see this

pushback, when you see people going, whoa, whoa, whoa, we might have been sold a bill of goods. when you see grave error and the book, like I read that book. I said, okay, we have to hear these people out because they may be on the other side of the political spectrum than me, but the only way to reduce these tensions is to have open dialogue. My grandmother attended St. Mary's Indian residential school. As a consequence of the trauma she experienced there, she drank most of her life. She gave my mother fetal alcohol syndrome as a consequence of that. And then I am lucky being raised by a single mother that I got given certain opportunities in life to rise out of that life. But I want the opportunity to sit those people down, look them in the face, and break

these conversations down. And if I threaten the legal system against these people, it just emboldens them that one side has the political power and one side doesn't. And I think there does need to be genuine conversations about that. So I just wanted to kind of share my feedback on that. The last piece is just around the infrastructure gap and how we think about that issue. I've been very impressed personally working with representatives from Indigenous Canada. We're upgrading our water systems. We are looking at new subdivision feasibility studies. We are investing in making sure we have a clean sewage system that's going to allow us to continue to build new housing.

And so I'm just wondering if you can reflect on the work taking place. I think the common one your government often hears is what are you doing about clean water for indigenous communities? Yeah, and look, clean water is probably, of the major infrastructure issues, we made significant advances on clean water. And, you know, as you're aware, we have actual, you know, with a website that gives you, I think, just 130 boil water advisories where we're very close to completion. So I feel like that's a gap that we're going to close over the next several months, if not year or two. I think the broader concern is on issues of housing and infrastructure schools, what have you, and we have invested unprecedented amounts of money into these, you know,

different gaps. But the challenge is, for example, housing. Northern housing is a major challenge. So when we look at places like northern northwest territories, we know that you want to get goods into, you know, into the areas to build the houses, the barges are not able to go through because of climate change, because there's very dry conditions. Similarly, we have, you know, other areas where we've had a labor shortage and we've had, you know, supply chain issues. I do believe that our investment through, for example, the urban rural and northern housing with $4 billion that will be going out, you know, relatively soon, that will have a impact in communities and I do think we need to have a sustained effort towards closing the gap.

We're not going to be able to do it in a year or two. It's going to take time, but it's also going to take consistent investment. So it cannot be, as I said earlier, it cannot be that we invest for 10 years and the next 10 years we don't invest. This needs to be a continuous commitment by successive governments to be able to close this gap. Ultimately, We know the housing conditions are horrible in some communities. That results in difficulties for learning. Sometimes situations where if you want more people living in the house, your ability to learn, the ability to have privacy,

a range of issues that they kick in. And that oftentimes leads to other social issues. So we do know that investing in housing is a critical component of the work that we need to do. And I believe we made sustained efforts. Is it at where we want to be? No, I think we need to do no. And we need to continuously work towards closing the gap.

And, you know, today, just today, we announced $24 million towards, you know, 100 beds in southern Ontario, towards transitional housing for women who are going through difficult situations. for example, women and men, by the way. So, for example, you know, Thunder Woman, Healing Lodge is a place in Toronto where, you know, we're creating beds through the National Indigenous Housing Program with the requisite wraparound supports for them, for people getting out of correctional facilities. So those are important steps. And I think, you know, there's 72 or 73

different projects that are supported through, through Nietzsche. And what we're expecting is that more and more projects will flow through, not just through budget 2020, but 23 and 24 as well, because there are additional infrastructure dollars that are going to go towards communities. So it's a work that we need to continue and sustain as we move forward on this relationship and nurturing and building the relationship. Yes, I am very impressed when I came on. Of course, I've heard how difficult it can be to improve housing. I was given that portfolio in 2022. We had 89 homes.

A lot of them needed significant repairs. A lot of them, I wouldn't feel comfortable sleeping in for a night. And since I've joined, we've repaired 35 of those 89 homes. and those are significant investments that are allowing people to have lower cost of living because their BC hydro charges or their electrical charges are lower, they have better air quality because they're able to seal their house when there's larger amount of smoke. The only comment, and it sounds like you've already heard this from our provincial counterparts, is that investment in federal housing is something we start to see lack.

We're lucky here in BC because we have BC housing, but if we have a conservative government, we will no longer have that support. They will no longer prioritize that. And we will be completely reliant on your ministry. And of course, Paddy Haidu's ministry in order to get that support. Do you foresee that being an investment that we're going to see in the near future? Because we have started to see that start to dip in recent years. Well, look, housing from a federal perspective is critical,

and we are investing almost $60 billion towards a national housing program. A lot of it is earmarked. earmarked specifically for indigenous people. We also have $4 billion carve-out for urban rural northern, and those are focused on indigenous communities. We have an additional billion dollars towards infrastructure that's flowing out of by the 2024. So I think there's enough out there that I think people will start seeing the change

and ultimately, so building momentum and sustaining the funding the funding as we go forward. I do believe, especially in urban areas, there is a lack of supports that are available, lack of housing, and there are a number of incredible organizations that are closing the gap, but they're doing it because the fellow government is there as a partner for them, and that's exactly what we did this afternoon. Can you tell people how they can keep up with your work and the important impact you're having in the agreements you're signing? Well, our social media is probably our best form. So Gary underscore SRP on Twitter and Instagram and Facebook. And we're always, you know, I am visiting many communities. One of the things I've started to do, Aaron,

is to meet young people. So last time in New York at the UN Perman Forum on Indigenous Affairs, we had a meeting with about 70 youth from across Canada who were attending as delegates. and it was truly inspirational. So I would love to continue engagements with young people across, indigenous people across Canada. I do think there's a voice that's oftentimes missing or not to hurt enough.

But, you know, like the work doesn't end. And I think that we're in a critical moment, juncture in our history, in our shared history, where I think we can move the dial and we're moving in the right direction and I think they're all saying, you know, if we are paddling the canoe in the same direction, you know, we will get to the destination faster. And that's how I feel that we are today. We still have a long way to go, but I think we're on that path and we're on that together.

Minister, it's been an honor to share the time with you. I really appreciate you sharing your insights on this work and for taking the time. Thank you, Aaron. Thank you. Thank you.