Kim Pate, and I live here in the unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg.

Thank you for joining us, and thank you for all your work on this and related issues.

I was struck when I was reading the recent book that was published, which Senator Gignac referred to, where you talked about the different and current approaches to income support being like a house, and we continue to add extra rooms and improvements throughout the years. The analogy that you made was that a guaranteed livable basic income would be tantamount to needlessly knocking down a perfectly good house and building another one in its place.

In the 45 years of experience that have led to me tabling this bill, I’ve learned that it’s people living in poverty and trying to access income supports who say something very different. For them, it’s more like a house where the foundation is cracked, the beams are rotten and the roof is caving in — and they’re not receiving enough to live on and they have to contend with inflexible conditions that they can’t meet. Yet, they’re watching politicians continue to use the same approaches by building new additions onto upper levels — a nice new room, but the rest of the house is collapsing.

I know that you did some of this work during the pandemic. I understand the limitations that you indicated in that you weren’t able to continue all the consultations, particularly with Indigenous people. What kind of research has been done recently around the impacts of income supports with those other kinds of supports? As you probably recognize from this bill, we’re not proposing an income-only model. It is a model that would streamline the income component, and also keep in place the supports components.

Most of the literature shows that the downstream benefits of such programs in terms of health and well-being — and you talked about the overall increase of a more just approach — seem to play out. In fact, it’s behind some of what Newfoundland and Labrador, Yukon and now P.E.I. are suggesting.

I’m curious how you see that playing out, and why you wouldn’t see a blending of those two as being beneficial.

The B.C. panel doesn’t seem to address the fact that the income project in Manitoba is the only pilot where benefits and potential cost savings were identified for health and well-being. Certainly, that shores up part of why Newfoundland and Labrador, Yukon and P.E.I. are looking at these models. The PBO has acknowledged that there will likely be downstream or upstream savings.

We see these in income and cash transfer programs in Ontario and Finland, and I’m curious why your findings didn’t find that there would be savings in health care costs, ultimately.

My understanding is that, in response to that position that you put out, Dr. Forget actually published a subsequent peer-reviewed article that showed that, in fact, there was an 8% decrease in hospitalizations.

Thank you, Professor Green. I want to come back to something you raised with Senator Woo in terms of long-term costs.

Part of the challenge has been that — certainly I’d be interested in your response to this, in writing as well — we haven’t seen a basic income and we haven’t seen the long-term costs, in part, because, as you pointed out, there is the political nature and the fact that programs have been cut. You’re probably familiar with the Finland example where they have looked at some of the cost savings and downstream benefits of the types of approaches they’ve done and, in fact, have found savings, particularly in terms of medical costs, the criminal legal system and a more just society. Is it tautological in some respects — because of how our election cycles work — that we haven’t had a government that is willing to take it on? That’s the first part of the question.

The second part is the bill doesn’t actually say, “Implement only a basic income.” It talks about national standards. It talks about many of the issues, and replacing social assistance wouldn’t address the single mom that you talked about. In fact, the bill tries to look at a number of those issues. I’d be interested in your response to how a streamlined process might look at all of those issues, including the jurisdictional issues that we’ve raised.

Thank you again, Mr. Giroux and Ms. Giswold and Ms. Vanderwees, for joining us.

In your Supplementary Estimates (B) report of last week, you indicate that about 40% of the amount requested — $10 billion in total — is for Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada, or CIRNAC, and Indigenous Services Canada, or ISC. About $8 billion of the $10 billion seems to be for the negotiation and resolution of outstanding claims. You noted that the budgeting for contingent liabilities related to Indigenous claims situations — where there’s a 70% or greater likelihood of a liability being incurred that can be reasonably quantified — has risen by 360% since 2016-17.

I have two main questions related to that. Beyond the obvious — the litigation — how do you explain the increase? Do you have a sense of how much all of this ongoing litigation is going to cost?

Also, are there any practices you would suggest when parliamentarians are considering proposed legislative and budgetary policy measures that would allow us to more clearly see potential future costs associated for not adequately meeting obligations to Indigenous peoples?

Thank you for that.

Are there situations where the government has already set aside amounts? In terms of reconciliation, it strikes me that it’s beyond just anticipating what litigation is likely to happen; it’s about how we can avoid that litigation. Are you aware of any economic measures that are being taken?

When you were asked about the guardrail example, I just recently saw a boat that was anchored, but — because of a particular climate situation — it got thrown up on rocks. It strikes me that such an analogy or metaphor might apply in this case when we’re talking about Indigenous claims and lack of planning.