Meegwetch, Speaker. I want to welcome to the Legislature the people from Rescue Lake Simcoe: Margaret Prophet, Claire Malcolmson, Susan Sheard, Jessica-Margaret Paige Merriman, William Alexander Agnew, Diana Wells and Carolyn V Boyer. Meegwetch for being here.

Meegwetch, Speaker. Remarks in Anishininiimowin.

Neskantaga First Nation is coming on its 30th year with a boil-water advisory. That is 10,641 days. Once again, tomorrow is World Water Day. In the riding of Kiiwetinoong, I have 14 First Nations that have boil-water advisories.

Speaker, it is racism to do nothing. Next week’s budget is an opportunity for change. I ask, will there be any allocations for money to lifting boil-water advisories on reserves?

Interjections.

Meegwetch, Speaker. Just saying that I liked the member from Timiskaming–Cochrane’s—what’s it called again?—petition better than the long one there. Otherwise, we should bring popcorn out.

Speaker, it’s always an honour to speak on behalf of the people of Kiiwetinoong. Kiiwetinoong, as you know, is a very, very unique riding, which represents 31 First Nations—24 of them are fly-in First Nations—and then four small townships.

I know this topic, when we talk about Bill 171, An Act to enact the Veterinarian Professionals Act, 2024 and amend or repeal various acts, is important because, as we know—right off the hop, I will say that, for me, I will be supporting this bill, alongside with my colleagues, because it is very reasonable. It is a reasonable framework to improve the standards of veterinary care in Ontario. And not only that; it will lead to greater accountability to the public. But also, we have seen a positive start in a consultation process, with years of open and transparent public consultations that included veterinary professionals themselves.

Engagement and consultation is important. That’s the same work that should happen exactly when you deal with First Nations when you’re trying to do work on their traditional territories. That’s the same engagement process that we should follow when you try to extract minerals from our territories.

There was one time an elder spoke about consultation to me. He did it by a story, by a legend. He started talking about moose to me. He was telling me about what consultation meant. There was one summer; moose were gathering. Bull moose were gathering in the summertime. They were trying to decide, these bull moose, on how they can gather on an annual basis. So they decided on the summer; bull moose will come together in the summertime.

Then, the cow moose showed up and said, “What are you guys doing?” They said, “We’re trying to determine when we’re going to meet as moose.” The cow moose says to the bull moose, “No, we cannot meet in the summertime. There are too many flies, too many bugs in the summertime. Because there are so many horseflies in the summertime, there are so many mosquitoes and it’s too warm, we should meet in the fall when there’s less bugs.” That’s why the moose rut happens every fall. That elder told me, “Now that’s consultation.” This is what you should do for First Nations people.

But going back to the bill, though I cannot say the same about many of this government’s bills, this process has been followed for the bill. That should be an example for future drafting of legislation. Rather than doing it by yourselves secretively, rather than doing lobbyist-driven politics with backroom deal-making, there should be an open concept of proper consultation, proper engagement.

But even with my support, I also want to acknowledge the history that we live in here in Canada. It may be not your history, but it’s our history as well. But it’s a colonial history of how our animals have been treated and the continued lack of access to veterinary care in the north.

I say this because veterinary care holds a very different significance for communities living in far northern Ontario, for communities living in the rural places. What I mean by that is not enough people know about the history of how animals, First Nations, sled dogs have been treated in this country. What we see today is very far different from what we know of how governments treated animals.

I say that because in First Nations, even in the Inuit communities, sled dogs were not pets. Sled dogs are not pets but working animals necessary to assume our ways of life, helping to transport hunting supplies, helping to move camp. But I talk about this because I think it’s just another example of the difference of how far we’ve come along in how we treat animals—when we talk about how colonization uses violence to aim, of taking First Nations, aim at the Inuit ways of life.

For decades, in the 20th century, as early as the 1920s and 1950s, there were government officials who came to our lands; there were the RCMP officers who came to our lands; there were the—I don’t know what the term was, but there were the MNRF officials who came to our lands. And what did they do? They killed our dogs. Do you know why they killed our dogs? So we had no means of travel, no way to continue our ways of life.

That’s the reality that I know. That’s the real history that I’m aware of. That’s why I say this is a very—fast-forward to 2024, this government, all levels of government, have come a long way of being colonial.

It was very clear, where my elders, my parents, tell these stories—where these government officials, RCMP, shot and killed our people’s dogs. The intent, again, was to disempower and take away our ways, take away our independence, take away our ability to hunt for food.

I’m just sharing this story because, again, it is part of our shared history; it’s part of that untold history that you never learned about in your history class, but it is our known history here, as First Nations people.

It is also very clear, this is one of the many, many violent tactics used by government to try to force us to assimilate, and we continue to see this in Kiiwetinoong, with the people I represent.

I think it’s also important—I started off with the number of First Nations that I represent in the riding of Kiiwetinoong. The riding of Kiiwetinoong is very unique, where there are a number of First Nations that are represented—I’ll say “First Nations,” but they’re also reserves. Because we are on-reserve, we are treated differently. We do not have access to veterinary services in Kiiwetinoong. There are animals that we have to send out by plane to send to a vet.

I spoke about the history, how we came about, and on how government treated our sled dogs, even though it really interfered on our ways of life relating to animals, relating to the land. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, back then, the officials—I can’t remember the name of the department back then—went further, where the government officials, bureaucrats and RCMP came and ripped out our traps. They came and ripped out the gillnets that we need to get our food, to be able to sustain ourselves and to have fish.

I speak about that because recently, one of the things—I put a motion forward recently for our government to recognize colonialism and Indigeneity as Indigenous determinants of health, which would help acknowledge that colonialism still impacts the lives and the health of First Nations people every day and to address the structural violence. Of course, this did not pass.

I want to do a shout-out to this dog; he’s got his own Instagram account, @mr_black.213. The .213 is the reserve number in Muskrat Dam. We are all numbered people, First Nations, but this dog has his number as well. So a shout-out to Mr. Black. They call him Blackie.

I think when we talk about northern Ontario, northwestern Ontario, Kiiwetinoong, there is so much more that needs to be done for veterinary services in Ontario. You know, when we talk about access to veterinary care, it is a major problem for livestock producers, and it is even worse in northern Ontario.

I just want to talk about—her name is Sara Epp. She’s a researcher who did surveys and interviews with many stakeholders and learned about their challenges and talks about how some of the producers have been asked by veterinarians to sign a waiver because in an emergency, they would not have veterinary care.

I think it marks that there’s a shortage. It’s very bad, and even today, I think some of the farmers are considering leaving livestock farming. And one of the things, too, is she heard that long-distance travel, distances between farms, was a major challenge for vets, and it’s even harder in the north, especially in the winter season.

One of the things that she found as well was that veterinarians told her that a one-size-fits-all approach does not work in the north and that northern Ontario needs solutions that are specific to its challenges. I am hopeful that the upcoming budget next week will announce more such initiatives to help communities in the north access veterinary care for our animals in the north.

I guess one question I would ask is, how are we supporting students from the north who want to become veterinarians? How can we make existing streams of funding for veterinarians in the north more effective? I ask those questions because life is already expensive for people living in northern Ontario and especially within the fly-in First Nations, and we need to remove any barrier any way we can.

When we talk about fly-in First Nations in Kiiwetinoong, even with the north, access to veterinary care is not equal. The first time that Sandy Lake First Nation, which is also a fly-in reserve, a fly-in community in Kiiwetinoong, ever had veterinary services was 2015. It actually made the news. It was news to get a veterinarian on-reserve in Sandy Lake. Community members lined up for five days so that their pets could be spayed, vaccinated or neutered. At that time, they had 238 dogs receive veterinary care at the clinic, which was open 14 hours a day.

They were even able to spay and neuter the stray dogs. Those are the ones that we call “rez dogs.” There’s a show called Reservation Dogs; everybody should watch it. I can’t remember which service it’s on, or which stream. But yes, that’s what we call stray dogs: rez dogs.

But going back to those 238 dogs that got vet services: That clinic took a year of work just to organize. I think it recognizes the difficulty for fly-in First Nations to keep their dog populations under control without adequate access to veterinary services.

The role and the relationship with the dogs has changed over the years. Where they used to be means of transportation and companionship, some dogs roam freely as strays and some are pets. I think when we talk about vet services on-reserve in far northern Ontario, it is a source of stress for communities that if their pet got injured or sick, they could not get immediate care for their pets, the way you can have this access in cities or in places like this.

My time is up. Meegwetch.

Thank you for the question. To have 20 seats in the north, such as Thunder Bay, would be very helpful. What would be more helpful, as well: There are so many First Nations, so many of us, in the north. I think if you had specific seats for Indigenous people to become vets, it would be so awesome. I think that’s the best way, because we want to be the ones servicing our dogs. Our people, the First Nations people, want to be the ones to help their pets.

There’s always room for improvement in anything, I think—such as this bill; such as your question. The biggest room in the world is the room for improvement. Let’s do it for the pets. Meegwetch.

Rez dogs are very important in the north because they provide whatever—we’re in a reserve, right? We’re in a reserve. We’re in the north. If there are bears coming, if there’s polar bears further up north in Kiiwetinoong, like in Fort Severn, if there’s other animals that come to the communities, such as wolves, they’re the warning. They warn the community members if there’s other animals that are coming within the reserve.

But also, rez dogs can be scary as well. I think that’s where the importance of—we need to have a control system where we need to manage the dogs because dogs will attack children, will attack people as well. They will bark at people, so it’s two-sided.

Again, when I listen to the debate, when I look at the bill itself, I recognize that. I think, again, it’s an opportunity—not just veterinarians, but also the veterinary technicians—to be able to travel up north to do the work with the recognized scope. I think that’s a plus, it’s a bonus, and I think the way this government engaged with the veterinarians is the same way you should engage with First Nations when you want to make good legislation, so meegwetch for that question.

In all seriousness, there are so many issues in the north: housing; clean water; overrepresentation of our people, people who look like me, in the jail system. But I think long-term care is a big issue. We have to travel hundreds of kilometres away to access long-term care. I know, back in 2018, we were promised that we would be getting a long-term-care facility in the north. We are still waiting today for the 76-bed facility that was promised.

I think it’s important to acknowledge that even at Fort Severn, which is right on Hudson Bay—just imagine if they came to Thunder Bay from Fort Severn. That’s 700 kilometres. I think, further apart, that’s just continued oppression, continued colonialism, when you take away our elders from their homelands and to an urban place like Thunder Bay. Thank you for the question.

I think this is a good bill, a good process but, in other areas, not so good because that that will certainly give you—meegwetch.