Minister on Indigenous file pushes for better lives in 2 years

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This article was published 21/09/2017 (2986 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Jane Philpott believes Indigenous Manitobans will have better lives in two years because all Canadians support her new job of “righting wrongs,” despite Ottawa’s occasionally frosty relations with the province.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed Philpott as the first Minister of Indigenous Services on Aug. 28, assigning treaty disputes to another minister and pledging to split the “creaky, old” Indigenous Affairs department in two.

“Clearly there’s a tremendous amount of work to do,” Philpott said in an interview Wednesday. “But I believe that all Canadians are behind the goals that we have.”

Her new role spans on-reserve health care (which is generally paid for by Ottawa, not the provinces) and implementing Trudeau’s pledge to solve all First Nations drinking-water advisories by fall 2020.

Philpott doesn’t have clear goals yet — she’s still waiting for her mandate letter from Trudeau, which outlines his expectations for the last two years of his government. She says there will be “tangible measures of what success looks like” by the numbers of new schools, houses and drinking-water facilities.

Yet, she’s more focused on “qualitative outcomes,” such as transferring health care, education, housing and food production to Indigenous communities. “Indigenous peoples want what all people want, and that’s control over their lives,” she said, noting it was a key recommendation of the 1996 Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples.

Manitobans saw a glimpse of that Tuesday, when Health Canada announced $19 million to combat Manitoba’s diabetes epidemic on First Nations. The funding supports a regional program designed for and delivered by Indigenous people in their own communities, to stem rising rates of foot amputations.

Philpott says another example is the June 2016 mental-health funding given to Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak Inc., which represents the northern First Nations. MKO created a nimble mental-wellness team that has provided rapid response to suicide crises.

Philpott called MKO’s work “some of the best I’ve seen in the country.”

MKO Grand Chief Sheila North Wilson wants more local control over health programming, saying it would be a form of reconciliation that restores pride among First Nations people.

But putting that into practice is not easy.

In July, a northern Ontario group similar to MKO signed an agreement with Ottawa and that province, pledging to clear bureaucratic hurdles and transfer more local control over health care.

North Wilson wants a similar agreement for MKO, but said the province would need to be at the table. It’s an ironic twist, given MKO already controls more health care than the Ontario group.

“Ontario has more of a luxury of having a willing provincial government that’s working with them on it,” North Wilson claimed at the time, saying the province hasn’t made health devolution a priority. (The province has since reached out to MKO.)

It’s unclear how much trust the province has in Philpott. She led one of Ottawa’s most antagonistic negotiations with the provinces, pushing through a drop in the annual increases to health spending, which is Manitoba’s largest expenditure.

Months of negotiations left Manitoba as the last holdout, only signing on Aug. 21 for extra mental-health and home-care funding. Premier Brian Pallister had called it a “dangerous” deal, refused to use Ottawa’s term, “health accord.”

He still insists Manitoba never consented to the slowdown in funds, something Philpott says is a done deal.

Philpott said her time as federal health minister included cordial chats with her provincial counterpart, Kelvin Goertzen. “We have seen eye-to-eye on many issues,” Philpott said. She credits Manitoba for raising Indigenous health care repeatedly in the talks.

Philpott wouldn’t say whether she feels the province uses Ottawa as a political scapegoat, and how much of Pallister’s frequent criticism of Trudeau is merited.

“I’m optimistic that I’ll be able to build good working relationships with other ministers as necessary,” she said, adding she’s never met Pallister.

She similarly dismisses media reports bureaucrats are impeding progress on solving boil-water advisories.

“I think the public-service employees want as much as everyone else to see these wrongs made right and to see the socioeconomic gaps closed,” she said. “I really believe in encouraging people to throw their hearts and souls into their work.”

Philpott says a new water-treatment system for Shoal Lake 40 First Nation is under design — an update from earlier this month, when the local chief told the Free Press he had no idea when he’d have clean water.

“There’s very active work,” she said. “Hopefully, construction itself will begin very soon.”

The reserve, which straddles the Ontario border along Indian Bay, has lacked drinking water since February 1997, despite serving as the source of Winnipeg’s drinking water since 1919.

“When I really started to dig into that, I was stunned to learn how long this has been going on,” Philpott said.

There have been other surprises. She cautiously said “several” reserves she’s visited have reminded her of her work as a doctor in rural Niger and Ethiopia.

“I see people who are incredibly generous, sophisticated, creative, passionate for their people. But I see them living in situations that few Canadians would accept, in terms of the quality of housing, the health clinics that are there,” she said, clasping her hands in front of her neck.

“It does remind me of other places I’ve seen in the world and it disturbs me as a Canadian that we have not done better,” she said, pausing. “And that we have accepted these conditions in which people cannot thrive and enjoy a decent quality of life. So we have a lot of work to do.”

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca