Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I was very happy to hear that our government took the initiative to comment on the events that occurred last week with the apology to residential school victims and survivors that was given by the Prime Minister of Canada. It was very timely, and the feedback over the last ten days of so has led me to believe that…. It was something that was long overdue. It was something that was needed to be heard by all the people who went to residential schools.
I, too, spent many, many years in the residential school system. When I gave my Member’s statement last week, I have to admit I was overtaken by emotion. When something like that happens to you, you think back, and all the emotions kind of flow back to you. That’s what happened, and I’m sure that happened to many, many people across Canada and throughout our Northwest Territories.
I do believe that the words were sincere. The words had to be heard in order for healing to begin. In order to forgive, there’s got to be an apology. I think that’s what happened. Once you begin the forgiveness process…. In my healing journey, forgiveness doesn’t happen overnight. I believe you’ve got to keep forgiving and forgiving, and then it becomes easier. The impact of traumatic events that happened to individuals or people or families is never really forgotten. Once you begin the healing process and you hear the words “I’m sorry” and you do want to forgive, you can move on. You can get past that and then start concentrating on yourself — take that event that happened last week and make it a positive for yourself and for your family. I believe that’s the direction we want to go.
It’s a huge impact. It’s like a hundred years old. That’s how long this — I want to say — oppression happened, and that’s pretty well what it was. Once you get involved in that kind of system, those kind of oppressive states…. Someone I met somewhere along the way — I think it might have been somebody from this House — likened it to the prison camps during the war. The word I heard when I was growing up was “subjugation.” Subjugation is kind of like when you have a bug and you put it under your thumb. That’s where you keep that bug, and the bug’s squirming and doing pretty well what you want. To me, that’s what the residential school meant. I went there very, very young, and people all around me — all those people in authority — they were telling me what to do. It affected me throughout my whole life.
It’s not only me. This story was repeated 80,000 times throughout Canada, because that’s how many survivors are left to this day, and the countless others who have passed on. But it’s not only the survivors that it impacts. I was talking with a school principal about four or five years ago, and the principal said our children in our schools today are behaving like they actually went to a residential school, but we know they didn’t. That’s because behaviours from parents or from the community…. It’s instilled and it’s pervasive; it’s there. Those are the skills that.… That’s how we learn. We learn from things around us. So that impact is still there. It changed our lives wholly.
The Prime Minister spoke of an intergenerational gap. That’s there. My story is that too. I went there. My grandparents passed away, so I lost a big connection. There was a whole generational gap there. That’s huge, because that affects your language and your culture.
Just in summarizing, Mr. Chair, I just wanted to say it was appropriate that we spoke on it. Many, many Members on this side of the House — our government, where we are the government …. We spoke, and we understand our people. I’m happy to hear that we’ll provide as much support as we can in order to begin this healing process, and I wish everybody well.
As well, that day was very, very emotional. It’s a signal that people are ready to let go and move on. We, as a government, I believe, have always been ready and willing to help. I urge the government to continue to provide the resources to do so, because there’s still a long way to go in terms of providing a healing ring for our communities and our families out there today. So with that, thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Krutko.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I too would like to thank this government for the apology and, more importantly, hearing it from the Prime Minister of Canada. Again, you cannot replace the lives of the young individuals who have lost their lives, either at these residential schools or by way of problems that originate from a lot of these experiences. We’re still seeing it in today’s society. I think people can’t state, Oh well; we can compensate somebody. You can never replace a language, a culture, a way of life.
Again, we talk about a society in the Northwest Territories, and you look at other nations around the world — Africa or other countries of the world — where indigenous people have basically been able to sustain a traditional lifestyle that’s still unique to those different regions of the world, because they weren’t assimilated. I think you have to look at exactly how unique our aboriginal people are and what has happened to them. There are a lot of strong cultural communities that still retain their culture, their language, their different lifestyles, their ability to sustain themselves on the land and carry out their traditional pursuits. Yet we have other cultures that have lost a lot of those unique values that every society has. By being able to say that you’re a Gwich’in or you’re an Inuvialuitan, you basically have a cultural background.
I’ll use my own example. The Gwich’in culture in Alaska is very traditional. They still retain their language, they still retain their traditional lifestyle, and a lot of them still depend on retaining their connection to the land and their survival on those lands to sustain themselves. Yet in the Northwest Territories we have almost lost our language, and we have a very poor connection to the values of the Gwich’in people. In Alaska they weren’t touched by residential schools like the people in Canada.
I think it’s important to realize that we, as government, as Northerners, can never lose sight of the effect this has had on aboriginal people. It has affected the mosaic of what the Northwest Territories could have been by way of having seven strong cultural groups, seven strong languages, seven strong unique aspects of how people were able to survive, maintain their lifestyle in the Northwest Territories and be able to celebrate those groups of people. I think, as a government, we still have an obligation and a responsibility to find ways of working with those people who have survived residential schools.
Mr. Menicoche asked why students today are still acting like they’re in residential school. One thing that was paramount in regard to people who are having problems today with alcoholism, drug abuse, violence, physical and emotional anger…. You can trace a lot of these things back to their great-grandparents. A lot of their great-grandparents were the ones who felt the bulk of residential schools by being removed from their home at the age of five. You never got to go back to your home communities to see your parents, see your siblings and see your relatives until you were 12. I think you have to put yourself in the shoes of those young children — to be removed at that age and not have an opportunity to see your parents, your brothers, your sisters, for seven years. That’s the reality of what the residential school has done to our people.
Like I stated, it’s going to take a while for us to really pinpoint the problems that residential schools have caused — but again, the element of being able to put your thumb on the problem is to do a mosaic of your family tree. You can ask: Why is it that there’s violence in my family? Why is it that there’s anger in my family? Why is it that we do not trust people, from the police to the justice system to teachers? I think a lot of this has to do with that experience, which has been with us for some time. It is going to take work to get around that.
As a government, we do have an obligation to do everything we can to deal with these issues that are still practiced today: socially, economically. Look at the health statistics; look at the social statistics; look at our judicial statistics. Why is it that 85 per cent of people in jails in the Northwest Territories are aboriginal people, yet they make up 50 per cent of the population? Why is it that the health standards for aboriginal people are lower than for other Canadian citizens?
We cannot assume that by simply making an apology everything is made right. We do have a lot of work to do to improve that. More importantly, we have a lot of healing to do by way of governments, the churches, the communities and our families and the next generation of aboriginal children.
If we do not deal with this issue today, it will carry on to the next generation and seven generations forward. It’s something we can’t take lightly. As a government, we have had an apology. The question is: how real is that apology? Is there going to be a difference in attitude? Is there going to be a difference in how we deal with the social issues that still affect aboriginal communities and aboriginal people in the Northwest Territories and also in the rest of Canada?
I, for one, know that a lot of these issues stem from that experience. But again, people are trying to retain their language; people are trying to retain their cultures; people are making an attempt to deal with the social fabric of residential schools on our communities. As government, we have to realize that we have to put more focus, more emphasis…. I know people don’t want to hear about programs, but that’s what it’s going to take. If that means counselling programs, rehabilitation programs…. In light of institutional process, just look at what happened to people in regard to the Second World War, in regard to what is happening in other countries in the world when oppression takes hold of a society. That is nothing different from what we’ve done here in Canada and nothing different from what has happened to the residential school survivors in the Northwest Territories.
Mr. Chairman, I just would like to request that the government not lose sight of this issue. It has to be dealt with, and we in government have to change the attitudes of our society and, more importantly, our bureaucracy and the system of government. We have to take down those barriers that have kept people entrenched in a system that has destroyed the lives and the culture of our First Nations people. With that, thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Krutko. Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I hadn’t really planned on saying too much, because I’d spoken to the apology during my Member’s statement. But listening to David and Kevin speak, I was thinking about…. Since the apology, I’ve been reading articles in the newspaper. One in particular that caught my attention was an article in the Edmonton Sun. It wasn’t the actual article that caught my attention; it was some of the letters to the editor. I couldn’t believe the ignorance of some people, yet, in this country, making comments toward the aboriginals and the apology and the compensation and what they went through. I could not believe how ignorant some people still are as to the plight of aboriginals.
Most aboriginals didn’t want to go to residential school. They didn’t ask to be taken from their homes. They didn’t ask to be beaten when they spoke their language. They didn’t ask for all of this. So that ignorance shouldn’t be directed toward the aboriginals. That ignorance should be directed to the people who did that to the aboriginals. But no, it’s not, and that’s what really upset me.
I’ve seen a few letters to the editor in a couple of the papers, and I honestly, to this day, could not believe how ignorant some people in this country still are. I hope there is none of that sentiment here in the Northwest Territories. I really hope that, because, like I said before, we didn’t wish this on ourselves. A lot of the old-timers were threatened. They had to send their kids to school; otherwise, they’d go to jail. They did whatever they could.
I think this whole experience, if I can call it that…. I was one of the fortunate few, as I said in my Member’s statement; I only spent a few months. But I’ve been hearing stories from a lot of the Members. I know a lot of people who have been in hostel for, basically, their whole lives. I think this is a real testament to the fact that, as hard as they tried…. They bent and they bent and they bent the aboriginal people, but they didn’t break them. It’s not going to happen again, Mr. Chair.
Thank you very much, Mr. Robert McLeod. Any other speakers? Seeing none…. Premier Roland, would you have any response to the comments we’ve had in response to yours?
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the Members for their comments on this. It was indeed a day in the history of Canada to be remembered. The fact that the Prime Minister of Canada — a present-day Prime Minister — apologized on behalf of the people of Canada for the actions of a government in a direction and a policy of assimilation…. I believe that apology to be a sincere one for aboriginal people across the territory and the country of Canada. We as the Government of the Northwest Territories felt we needed to recognize that.
As we’ve heard Members say, there are still a lot of things that people are going through in the Northwest Territories around this matter. It comes up in many discussions yet, and I’m sure it will continue for some time. But it has now opened the door, as some Members have pointed out, to a healing process that can proceed. There are many people who would move ahead in life but hit a certain point and seem to almost collapse or fall into an old pattern. I see that in the lives of individuals — in many of us who did go to a residential school and saw a different side of life and longed to be home.
I was one of the fortunate who only spent a couple of years in a residential school. But as Mr. Krutko said, there are some who spent their whole educational life, from kindergarten to graduation, and some even longer, in facilities away from home. We, of a younger generation, didn’t experience the level of difficulty — putting it that kindly — that some of our elders had gone through in the first days of the residential school and the standards that were in place at that point.
It was something we felt we needed to recognize. Indeed, to see the importance — when we’re in a facility or an Assembly like this — to see what happened, and to see our national aboriginal leaders as part of the ceremony, as part of the parliamentary session and sitting there formally as a part of that…. It is a rare occurrence that non-parliamentarians would take part in a process that involves the House.
Mr. Chairman, it is for us a day to remember, a day to turn the page and look toward the healing that can occur, to recognize the terms that we use, as well, how we describe ourselves as people in the Northwest Territories.
One of the things we had pointed out and the tone we used was in the recognition of our aboriginal peoples, all aboriginal peoples. In the term of the day they were called Indians. We in the Northwest Territories now call them Dene, Gwich’in, Sahtu, Tlicho. There are also Inuvialuit, Inuit and Métis people. We are all affected by this; we are all a part of it.
It is something that we as the Government of the Northwest Territories felt we needed to recognize: the importance of that day in sending a message and accepting that and hoping that now the aboriginal people of the Northwest Territories can see the page turn and the door open to a journey of healing.
The memory will always be there, but we’ll also now have the memory that there was a sincere apology by the Government of Canada, by the Prime Minister, who spoke quite clearly to that. I’d like to recognize it again, and I’d like to thank Members who spoke to this in their Members’ statements in this forum.
As we know, there are times in life when we speak to issues that draw back a lot of memories, some of them not so good, and they can be emotional. To share that with the Assembly and share that with the people of the Territories is important even in that step, so I thank Members for speaking to this.
Many of us are looking forward to the journey of moving ahead. As well, we would like to recognize the fact that the next phase of the journey is also open to people across Canada, and that is the reconciliation journey that is starting to happen and will travel across the country.
One other thing, Mr. Chairman, is the fact that those of us who are here — and we’ve heard Mr. Krutko speak to it — were able to hear that for ourselves, to hear that apology made, but there are many who were not able to hear it. Those of us who were here to hear that message can share that in our prayers for those who have left us and are in a better place. That is one of the things we get to recognize and to bring some healing to our own families in that way.
I’d like to thank Members for speaking to it, and let’s not be afraid to share.
Thank you very much, Premier Roland. Any other speakers?
Does the committee agree that Minister’s Statement 62-16(2) is concluded?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. As Chair I’d like to recognize that National Aboriginal Day is the day after tomorrow. It’s an opportunity for all of us to get out and do some of the sharing that the Premier mentioned and the celebrating of our aboriginal people and their cultures. I hope to see you out there.
Does the committee agree that that concludes the business before the Committee of the Whole? Is there a motion? What is the wish of committee? Mr. Beaulieu.
I move we report progress.
Motion carried.
