Honourable senators, this is the third time in three years that I have spoken about the issue of suicide prevention for reasons that relate to my personal situation years ago. When dealing with the issues of suicide prevention and mental health, we have to be open, transparent and honest if we are going to bring about any changes.

Several years ago, when I was having problems, I went into therapy. The therapy was a mix of mostly men coming out of jail and men who voluntarily enlisted to go to these places to get help. I quickly learned that the success rate for these provincial places where men go to get help was about 2%. That’s not very high.

When I got there, at one point, they knew I was coming to this centre for help, and the people there rolled out the red carpet. When I got there, I didn’t want a red carpet. One of the reasons why men and women go to these places is because they need help; they are hurting. In my case, it was because I had almost completely hit rock bottom. I wanted to live at rock bottom. As you can appreciate, it was not very easy, but I’m here today.

My experiences in those therapies gave me first-hand experience of some of the commonalities that many people who are hurting, people who are contemplating suicide and many people who have committed suicide, have. A lot of it has to do with two things — I’m not an expert. I didn’t study in this field, but through my human connections with the people who were at these therapies, people were hurting and felt that they were not understood. Those are the commonalities that I saw in people who contemplated suicide.

After I went to those places, and once I started slowly getting healthier mentally and physically, I wanted to give back. I didn’t know at that particular point in time how I could give back. There are many suicides of Indigenous people in Canada, and many of them go unreported. We know now, in 2022, what the residential school system has done to Indigenous peoples generation after generation. It has broken individuals, families and nations. People are still hurting today. Even though we are getting apologies left, right and centre, it doesn’t fix the fact that the Government of Canada and others have hurt Indigenous peoples.

Indigenous peoples do not have access to the services that they desperately need to move forward. We all talk about reconciliation, but where is the reparation? I know there is a former government that apologized to residential school survivors, and I know that some things are being done, but until the federal and provincial governments together offer services that are desperately needed to First Nations peoples and other Indigenous peoples across Canada, how will we get to any reconciliation? Will we wait another 20 years? We will still be talking about mental health issues and suicide prevention among Indigenous peoples and other Canadians 20 years from now.

That is why in December 2019 I introduced a motion to deal with mental health, giving particular emphasis to young men and boys and Indigenous peoples. Why did I introduce that motion in 2019? It was my way of giving back. But it was not just that. My office conducted research, and the conclusions were very basic. We asked every provincial and territorial government to share with us what they did in terms of suicide prevention. If you recall, the report was shared with all senators at that time.

We have seen that in terms of the services available to young girls and women in the provinces and territories across Canada, they have more access to programs than young boys and men, yet 75% of suicides in Canada are committed by men. We need services for men.

I am the first among many to say that I don’t speak highly of the therapies that I took part in. Numbers are numbers, and facts are facts. There is a 2% success rate, and I will share the fact that I felt that I wasted my time during my six months of therapy. I have some things to say on how to improve those therapies and how to offer more services for young boys and men.

Perhaps if there were services for young boys and men, maybe there would be fewer men using substances and alcohol. Maybe there would be less anger management issues. Maybe there would be less trouble with the law. Maybe men would be in fewer abusive relationships. However, those programs don’t necessarily exist across the board for young boys and men.

For a lot of us, we are taught at a very young age to hide our emotions, to be tough, to suck it up and walk it off. For some of us, when we do that, the more we keep inside, the more we explode when things don’t go right.

I am the first to admit I didn’t have the tools. I met different psychiatrists. Bad experiences. I had one good experience. It is all on a case-by-case basis.

But that motion was never really debated because then COVID came in. In November 2020, I had to reintroduce that same motion. If you recall, I also asked you, colleagues, for help. In particular, I went to Senator Kutcher — because we are dealing with his motion today — and I asked him for his help because he is an expert. Senator Kutcher told me that he was going to help me, he was going to be in touch with my office and his staff was going to be in touch with my office. Unfortunately, I never heard from Senator Kutcher.

I want to bring in some context. I’m not taking the floor today to point any fingers or to shame anybody, but I was a little bit surprised that this motion was introduced because I found out about it about a week before it was introduced. As a matter of fact, I found out from other Indigenous colleagues that Senator Kutcher was going to introduce this motion. It caught me by surprise because for two years, I had this motion that — like I mentioned, it didn’t get properly debated because of outside forces and I never heard from Senator Kutcher for two years. And Senator Kutcher decided to introduce this motion.

Again, this is not a question of sour grapes. It is not a question of trying to take credit. It is not a question of ego because, for myself, I parked my ego in January 2016 when I tried to commit suicide, and I left my ego there.

When we talk about suicide prevention, a lot of people, including myself — I was hurting, I was ashamed to ask for help. When I gave those speeches in 2019 and 2020, I was proud because it was my way of not just healing but of trying to give back because I had hurt so many people.

This is why this motion surprised me. I know that Senator Batters and Senator Patterson spoke to it, and I agree with their concerns. I have concerns as well. I know that Senator Kutcher is an expert. I respect Senator Kutcher, but I have to say, colleagues, there are some people who believe that Indigenous people don’t belong in the Senate. I’ve heard it before. There are some who believe that Indigenous peoples have just knowledge or expertise in Indigenous issues. This is why I was sort of hurt and surprised.

Obviously, it is Senator Kutcher’s right to introduce what he wants, but I was a little bit surprised because I just sat back and thought, well, if I can’t as an Indigenous person receive an acknowledgment that perhaps I do have — maybe not expertise, but I certainly have, unfortunately, experience in this issue, but my call wasn’t heeded and my call was ignored — then that kind of goes against what we preach when we talk about mental health when asking for help.

I am going to support this motion. Hopefully, Senator Kutcher and the committee will work with me because my hand as an Indigenous person is always extended, and is always open. My heart is open. My mind is open. It is clear. I don’t want to work on these issues to take credit for anything. I want to learn and I want to help if I can.

Senator Kutcher, as an Indigenous person, this is also part of reconciliation. You have your whole life that you have contributed to this and you have your expertise, and I have lived experience. As an example, when we talk about suicide prevention, there are some who will say, well, if we take away guns, we will reduce the number of suicides. And that’s true. But that’s just one way of looking at statistics. Because at the same time, we know that many law enforcement individuals who commit suicide use their guns.

When we talk about Indigenous suicide, number one, suicide wasn’t really exercised by Indigenous peoples before the arrival of the White man. I say “White man,” and my mom was White, so I hope nobody takes offence to me saying that. When we look at Indigenous suicides, they don’t necessarily use guns. They use other methods. There is not a one-stop shop in dealing with these issues. It is really a case-by-case basis. No one recipe can fix this, and this is why we need to work together.

Just look at the other place. How long did they debate having a three-digit number for people in distress? This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. I know it’s a Conservative who introduced it. I mean, one of the suicide numbers is 833-456-4566. It just rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it? But in the other place, having a three-digit hotline number for people with mental health issues or a suicide line, the motion was unanimously adopted in November 2020, I believe, and we are still not there yet. We still don’t have the three-digit number. So this cannot be a partisan issue.

As I say, this is not to throw mud, but it is to show that, regardless of me, Indigenous peoples have more contributions to bring to Parliament than just on Indigenous issues. Going forward, I hope that not only will you work with me because I look forward to working with you, Senator Kutcher, and the committee so that not only do we get this right, but we actually do something meaningful — meaningful and not just words. Kitchi meegwetch for listening.

Senator Brazeau, your time has expired, but I see that Senator McCallum has a question. Do you wish to ask for five additional minutes?

I will always answer a question from my dear Senator Mary Jane McCallum.

Honourable senators, do you agree for five additional minutes?

Thank you very much for your question.

Absolutely. Like I said, there is not and cannot be one recipe. It is on a case-by-case basis. There are some commonalities, obviously. Just north of my home community of Kitigan Zibi, in Barrière Lake, there was a youth that committed suicide last August. Two months after that suicide, there were 12 — count them, 12 — attempts at suicide by community members of Barrière Lake.

It’s not going to be one magic recipe that is going to help or shed light on the issue. Are there really experts in suicide prevention? I don’t know. But is there really an expert that will come and just wave a magic wand? No. There are traditional practices out there, in terms of healing, but the issue is like everything else. There needs to be resources. People don’t work for free, and Indigenous peoples don’t work for free either.

They need those resources to continue to work that they’re currently doing — and I’m hopeful that’s going to be a major part of the committee’s work because we know that there are Indigenous peoples committing suicide. There’s an overrepresentation of suicide. Let’s fix that. We know that 75% of suicides are committed by men. They’re easy numbers. Let’s fix that; let’s reduce that. It’s easy to understand.

We need Indigenous experts who have their own programs and their own healing processes, in terms of therapy, who can come and shed light so that they share some of that knowledge going forward with non-Indigenous health practitioners, because, I’m sorry to say, they don’t have all the ideas either. This is why Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous experts and professionals need to work together on this. We’re not going to prevent every suicide, because nobody has the magic wand.

Is it your pleasure, honourable senators, to adopt the motion?

Some Hon. Senators: Agreed.

An Hon. Senator: On division.

(Motion agreed to, on division.)