May 12, 2025 • 75 mins
Why are Indigenous people overrepresented in the justice system? Grand Chief Steven Point joins Aaron Pete to discuss poverty, law school, becoming Lieutenant Governor, leadership, justice, and systemic reform.
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Episode Transcript
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Aaron Pete (00:00):
Welcome back to another episode of the Bigger
Than Me podcast.
Here is your host, aaron.
Peet, Thank you so much forjoining for another episode.
I'm speaking with a locallegend from my city and we're
going to explore his background,how he became a role model to
so many, his thoughts on thecriminal justice system and the
living conditions for so manyIndigenous people.
(00:22):
My guest today is Grand ChiefStephen Point.
Grand Chief Stephen Point, itis an honour to have you on the
show today.
Thank you so much for beingwilling to join us.
Would you mind first brieflyintroducing yourself?
Steven Point (00:36):
Sure, my name is Huli Kutul.
I'm from Skowkale First Nation.
My mother is actually fromSumas and my dad's from Musqueam
, so my English name is StephenPoint.
I'm Grand Chief for the StullerTribal Council.
Aaron Pete (00:54):
Can you tell us just a bit about your background,
your legal background, thosepieces?
Steven Point (01:00):
Yeah, I went to law school in 1982 to 85.
I was called to bar in 86 andhad my own practice here in
Chilliwack for three years, andI took a job with the federal
government as a case presentingofficer in the refugee backlog
for a few years.
(01:20):
Then I was called to take upthe acting position at the
University of British ColumbiaFaculty of Law for the Native
Law Program and their personthere had left, so they called
me to take up the position.
So I did that for a few yearsand eventually was the person in
(01:42):
charge of the Native Lawprogram there for one year,
because I was then called backto work with the tribal council.
They called me back to home.
They said they wanted help withworking on the treaty process,
so I came back home and left myjob at UBC and I did that for
(02:04):
quite a few years.
I was a chief for about 15 years, and I was called to the bench
in 1999.
For between 1999 and 2018, Iwas called to the bench at
Provincial Government.
I applied to be a judge.
(02:24):
I wanted to be a judge forquite some time, so I got
accepted and was interviewed andwhatnot.
So during that time though, Iserved three years as the chief
commissioner for the BC TreatyCommission, and then I had to
leave the bench to take up thejob as the 28th left-hand
(02:49):
governor of British Columbia in2005, or 2007, rather.
So I did that for five years,and then I came back to the
bench and served again for a fewyears on the bench, so I had a
mixed career.
Aaron Pete (03:05):
I wanted to start just by reflecting on my own
experience growing up.
You actually visited uhChilliwack Middle School and
that was a big deal for myselfand so many others when you came
and visited when I was in, Ithink, grade seven, eight or
nine, and it was fascinating.
The piece that really stood outto me was how many people
wanted to find a familialconnection to you to brag about,
(03:28):
and they were like oh, I'mrelated to him, that's my,
that's my great cousin or like,and it just.
It showed me somethinginteresting about how one person
can be such a role model for somany others that so many people
looked up to you with like.
I want to be able to say I'mrelated to this man and there's
something really deep about thatthat personally, I've said this
(03:50):
many times.
I think First Nations often lackrole models in comparison to
other communities, and you'reone of those individuals who's
just gone on and become anoutlier of outliers, who's
really set an example that somany aspire to work towards and
likely have inspired others towant to go to law school and
believe that that's somethingthey can do, because you were
(04:12):
able to do it and you've setthat stage.
Have you experienced that inyour own life and heard these
stories from people.
Oh yeah.
Steven Point (04:20):
I had young people come up to me and they said
well, I'm going to go to lawschool just because you went.
And I tell them you know, it'snot that hard, you just have to
work for it.
And I think a lot of people,First Nations particularly
wonder if they could succeed inlaw school.
(04:41):
Is it too much work?
Or am I smart enough?
And you know, we suffer thishangover from colonialism and we
don't have a high enoughopinion of our abilities.
I think a lot of times, and soa lot of the times when I go to
schools or I'm talking to youngpeople working with them, a lot
(05:02):
of it is encouraging them tospread your wings.
Now, try it.
Because you know it isdifficult to be self-driven and
to work hard, but it doesn'ttake anything more than average
intelligence to do what I did.
I mean I'm no brainiac.
(05:22):
I did.
I mean I'm no brainiac, but andI wasn't the best law student
in school, but I made it throughand so I figure, hey, anybody
can do it.
Aaron Pete (05:34):
May I ask you to take us back to your childhood
growing up.
There's not a lot ofinformation that's publicly
available about that, but theremust've been some pieces along
the way.
You must have faced someadversity in ending up in law
school.
I mean you became chief at 23years old.
What was some of thosechildhood experiences like,
where you kind of set on such anextraordinary path?
Steven Point (05:59):
Well, I don't know if they were extraordinary or
ordinary Grew up at Scout Kale,with my parents, of course, in a
house my dad built.
You know, the Indian Affairs inthose days used to drop off
lumber for the families and youjust built your own house.
(06:21):
And so we had a house that hada living room and a bedroom for
my parents, a kitchen, and thatwas it.
There wasn't any indoorplumbing.
There was a stove that my dadburned coal in.
We didn't have insulation inthe walls.
We didn't have cement under thehouse.
(06:44):
In the walls we didn't havecement under the house.
It was no foundation, it wasjust on pilings that my dad
built there.
He built the house himself andwe had children, my brothers and
sisters.
We used to sleep on the floorand pretty much in the living
room, and until my dad built alean-to of the poles that we got
(07:06):
from Sewally, and he, we allhelped him.
My uncle Merle was living withus, uncle Tuner was living with
us too, and the two aunties usedto live with us, and so we had
ten kids plus relatives livingwith us, and so when they dug
the hole, we helped dig the holeand they got the poles from
(07:27):
suwali to build the room for thekids to sleep in.
That was a big deal because thethe girls had a double wide
bunk bed to sleep on.
There was five of them and thenI slept on the top bunk of a
three triple bunk bed and thenthe brothers slept on pretty
(07:48):
much beds on their own on theside, and my grandfather when he
moved in with us, he was 90some years old.
He's asleep in between the bedson his own bed.
So, um, yeah, we were crowded.
It was uh, and, and you didn'twant to be the first one to the
outhouse in the middle of thewinter because there's snow out
(08:10):
there and my mom used to breakwater and melt the snow so that
we could bath in one of thosebig galvanized tubs.
And God help you if you werenumber five the water was pretty
dirty by then.
But Mom used to cook on thewooden stove and you know,
(08:43):
thinking about it, I don't knowhow she did that, it was, it was
.
We didn't know we were poorthough we didn't think we were
poor but people used to drop offboxes at Christmas time, you
know.
So I guess we were prettyimpoverished.
(09:06):
My dad was a longer though comehome with um.
I remember getting home andhe'd throw oranges at us because
that's when we would get tohave an orange.
He'd bring it from the loggingcamps.
We never had them, uh, untilthen.
And so you know it's like.
I never used to.
(09:27):
You know, go visit anybody else.
Nobody would come to our place.
I never brought anybody home,except for the boy who lived
across the road.
He used to bring his guitar andleft it at our house because
his dad wouldn't let him have aguitar and Rick works, and.
(09:48):
But you know, we used to work inthe fields with my mom, because
she had raspberries, we had acow, we had a pig, we had
chickens.
I used to look after thechickens and, yeah, everybody
had a job, everybody did stuff.
I used to cut the grass.
But I remember when I was inhigh school and every year, for
(10:20):
some reason, I was on studentcouncil.
For some reason I was onstudent council Even from grade
8 to grade 12, I would beelected from the student body to
be on the student council andso I was always sitting in
council meetings, right?
And when I got to grade 12, Iran for the presidency and I got
(10:41):
the presidency.
I won the presidency.
But Mr Wilson brought me in theback and he sat me down.
He said you know, steve, yourgrades aren't that good.
He said we're going to letso-and-so take the presidency
and you can be the vicepresident, even though I won the
election.
Wow, I didn't know what tothink about that.
I said what the heck Can you dothat?
(11:02):
I thought what the heck Can youdo that?
But that's what they did inthose days.
But there wasn't many of us ingrade 12.
By the time we got to highschool, most of the people had
stopped coming to school.
Aaron Pete (11:22):
What made you the outlier in that circumstance?
So many, unfortunately,Indigenous people don't end up
graduating.
What made you want to continue?
What made you stay on thattrajectory when so many people
choose to walk away?
Steven Point (11:35):
Yeah, I don't know why, and I think about it like
I wasn't like an A B studentright, I wasn't, in fact, I
never read a full book until Igot out of high school.
But I do remember my mom usedto sit us around the table after
(12:00):
dinner and we would talk.
She would talk to us aboutthings, talk to us about what,
talk to us about, um, uh, whatwas going on in the world, and
ask us for our views and thingslike that and and um, you know,
so I, I, at some point, Idecided, like I remember talking
(12:21):
to my school counselor at highschool said what do you want to
become?
And I thought, well, and mydad's a logger.
I remember talking to my schoolcounselor at high school.
I said what do you want tobecome?
And I thought, well, my dad's alogger, I'd like to become a
logger.
I thought that'd be a goodthing to do.
Then, by the time I got to grade12, I said, you know, I think
I'd like to become a lawyer.
That's what I wanted to do.
And the counselor looked at meand said, well, you know, you
(12:41):
can make a really good job byjust working in construction or
being a plumber.
They make good money too.
You should think about that,discouraging you.
Yeah, wow, I guess he sort ofassessed, looked at my grades
and goes this guy's not thatbright or something.
Boy was he wrong?
Boy was he wrong?
(13:05):
Well, and so then after Igraduated, I did apply to go to
UBC and I got acceptedno-transcript.
I didn't have the study skillseither, and you're not really
(13:31):
well prepared from the kind ofway that things are in high
school, right, where teacherstell you everything, sometimes
even write your notes for you,that sort of thing.
They're not really preparingkids to be on their own, to be
self-driven, to study on theirown too.
So how to organize your time sothey can get things done?
And I was in a city where my momand dad were a long ways away
(13:54):
and I was living with my aunt inVancouver and I was on my own
and being in Vancouver wasawesome, you know, being in
Vancouver was awesome, you know.
But yeah, I didn't stay at theuniversity For a year and a half
I stayed.
Then I came home because I toldMrs Kent I don't know why I'm
(14:17):
here.
I said I have no idea what Iwant to do.
I don't know really, really,why I'm here.
The last thing she said to mebefore I walked out of the
office she said Steve, don't youcome back here until you really
(14:39):
, really, really want it.
Okay, she was a really wiselady, indian affairs lady.
And so I left and came home, gotmarried, went logging for about
seven, eight years Wow yeah,and sitting up on that mountain,
(15:04):
I was sitting there one eveningbecause we used to work after
dinner, going loading logs,because you make an extra 10
cents a log loading logs andjust extra money.
And I used to go work afterdinner and I was sitting there
watching the sun go down,thinking to myself I don't have
(15:29):
to do this work the way this is.
I don't have to be here in thislogging camp.
I have a chance to do higherwork in school, because I could
go to school and get a differentjob.
I'm taking somebody's job hereand really I should be doing
(15:50):
something different.
And that was what was going onin my brain, right?
So I got up from there and Idecided to leave.
I left the job and went home,applied to law school and I
remember Doug Sanders wrote me aletter because I'd been the
(16:11):
chief by then 15 years.
Eh no, seven years, eight years,half the time, and he knew me
and I knew him and he said,steve, he says we're accepting
your application to law school,but we want you to do two more
years of undergraduate work.
(16:32):
So that's when I started.
I went back to school andstayed and finished and learned
how to be a student, learned howto do the work properly, and I
was motivated by then because Iused to attend the meetings the
chiefs had and listening to thereports by the lawyers, right,
(16:54):
and the accountants and peoplewho were hired by the agency, by
the organization, to work forus.
I'd look around the room andthe chiefs that I knew and the
people that I had been therewith, I knew they didn't
understand what they weretalking about.
They didn't understand theSupreme Court of Canada rulings,
(17:18):
they knew what their rightswere, but they didn't understand
what these people were saying.
And I didn't understand iteither.
And I thought it would be goodif we had our own lawyers, we
had our own people that knewwhat was going on, right?
So that's when I decided I'mgoing to go back to become a
(17:41):
lawyer and I did.
Aaron Pete (17:45):
Wow, if you can take me back just for a brief moment
, back to your mom and herwillingness to talk to you about
issues and almost show you thewell, definitely show you the
respect that you have thoughtsand opinions that you come to
that are valid and that justthat makes me think this
(18:05):
self-confidence issue that wehave in, I think, all vulnerable
populations, but particularlywith indigenous people, that
they don't have a thought toshare or that's worth hearing,
that that could be such a adiscouraging message to young
people when you don't ask fortheir opinions, even right or
wrong, or you've got lots tolearn.
But that willingness to engageyou on issues and hear your
(18:29):
perspective, do you think thatplayed a large role in shaping
your willingness to?
Because there's something aboutyou that has to say I'm willing
to apply to law school, I'mwilling to push forward despite
having no idea what to expect.
And you didn't have a ton ofother people to go.
That's a lawyer, I know them,this person's a lawyer and like
it's not like all your friendswere doing that this was a very
solo mission and I'm just tryingto figure out the impetus and
(18:51):
the, the confidence you had tofind in yourself to go down that
path oh yeah.
Steven Point (18:57):
Well, my mother was actively involved in the
Homemakers Organization in thosedays.
She was one of the executivemembers and they were doing a
lot of work trying to improvehomes on reserve.
So that meant that Mom went toa lot of these meetings and I
(19:19):
used to drive her sometimes.
I used to go to some of themeetings and hear the dialogue,
you know, and I drove her onceto meet Pierre Trudeau, for
example.
She was having lunch with himand I think I just turned 17 to
get my license and I was drivingdown the wrong way in a one-way
street in Vancouver.
(19:40):
But in those times we spenttogether.
My mama talked to me aboutthings and I remember before I
left, before I left university,the first time, she had a lawyer
pick me up at the university.
(20:00):
Actually, she says to me youwait at the student union
building and have.
I said Jim is going to come andpick you up.
I didn't know who this was andso I was waiting there and he
(20:20):
was.
Jim Thompson came and he's alawyer from Chilliwack and his
wife was a friend of my mom's,and so he brought me to his
house.
When I got there, my mom anddad were there and we were there
having dinner.
So I was sitting there what'sgoing on here?
And after dinner Jim comes overand gives me a book to read.
(20:46):
Well, I never read anything.
Up until then, I never couldread very well.
I vocalize all the things Iread.
Even today it takes me a longtime to read things.
But it was a book about Clarencedarrow's life.
(21:07):
He's a lawyer from the unitedstates and he used to fight for
the unions and he fought forchildren.
He did the monkey trial insouthern united states where
they were trying to stop theteachers from teaching the
theory of darwin, darwin'stheory of evolution.
The religious folks were tryingto stop it.
Teachers from teaching thetheory of Darwin, Darwin's
theory of evolution thereligious folks were trying to
(21:28):
stop it being taught in theschools.
And I had the book for some timeand I didn't read it at first,
but it was under my bed.
I had only one book in my wholeroom and that was it, and I
remember clearing things out onetime and I found that book and
(21:53):
I decided to try to read it andI did read it and I was inspired
by what he did for children whowere working in coal mines, for
children who were working incoal mines, in the work that he
did, you know, fighting for therights of the union people to
work under positive conditions.
(22:14):
And I thought to myself there'sa man that's got a purpose,
that he's living his purpose,he's doing something with his
education, that he's living hispurpose, he's doing something
with his education.
And so that's when I did thekind of thing my mom used to do
to try to push me along rightand yeah, so that's the way she
(22:39):
was.
Aaron Pete (22:40):
She's still alive now, she's 97 now Wow, that's
amazing alive now she's 97.
Now, that's amazing.
You chose to run for chief at23 years old and I'm wondering
did you know the responsibilitythat that would entail?
It sounds like you were onstudent council so you had some
idea of governance.
(23:01):
But when I ran for council,they gave me the housing
portfolio and immediately therewas this very heavy weight that
the homes on reserve are myresponsibility, that the quality
of living conditions on thereserve were my responsibility,
that I couldn't blame I mean,people do.
They blame the federalgovernment, they blame the
(23:22):
provincial, they blame anybody.
But ultimately you have to goto bed knowing I can make a
difference in improving thequality of life and we've
renovated 35 of 89 homes withinthe past two years.
We've applied for more housingon reserve.
We're doing things.
But that weight hit me reallyhard and it didn't hit me when I
was running.
And I'm wondering you're 23.
(23:44):
I think I was 27 or 28.
What was that weight on yourshoulders like?
Steven Point (23:49):
well I?
I just remember walking homefrom Sardis one time and and
this is after I'd leftuniversity and Robbie Sapassi
was one of our elders on thereserve called me into his yard.
He said, steve, you went touniversity.
He says I want you to run, runfor council.
(24:12):
And, oh, you know, the elderasked you to do things he's.
I didn't say no, I just said oh, dear and dear, and so I went
home and I told my wife, I saidwhat happened, and so I went and
(24:34):
I was nominated to be the chief.
And in those days right, therewas a band office.
It was only a berry cabin onskids and there was a telephone
in there and a typewriter and wedidn't get a lot of money to
(24:58):
run that.
Less than $40,000 a year Paidthe electrical bills and the
phone bill and something for asecretary.
But we had no money as a bandin those days and the chiefs got
together as a tribal counciland they used to meet and they
(25:20):
would meet with Indian Affairs.
Indian Affairs used to give usan honorarium $35, I think for
coming to a meeting.
Indian Affairs was stillresponsible for everything back
then housing, education, welfare, all of that.
But part of that responsibilityhad been transferred to the
(25:43):
Chilliwack Area Indian Councilwhere they were handling welfare
now and education.
Those are the only programsthat we had that we were working
on, and so when I became thechief I was essentially working
with other elderly chiefs andgoing to meetings, listening,
(26:06):
you know, listening to what'sgoing on, and it's a steep
learning curve.
I had no idea what a BCR was.
I had no idea who the Indianagent was, or I didn't know what
Aboriginal rights were, agentwas, or I didn't know what
(26:27):
Aboriginal rights were, and allof those things you got to learn
on the job at just going to themeetings and listening.
So a lot of listening and a lotof asking questions sometimes,
and and you didn't reallyrealize that what was on your
shoulders was really the povertythat we're living under and the
(26:53):
lack of education and thedestruction of our rights and
the need to get more fishingtime, the need to improve the
homes that were being built andnot being built, and how do we
help the young people.
The whole thing was on yourshoulders.
(27:13):
Everything was on there.
And the old counselors thatwere with me there they'd come
to meetings, but I was 23.
That were with me there.
They'd come to meetings, but Iwas 23.
I'd start going to the Union ofChiefs meetings, listening to
what they're talking about.
(27:36):
Yeah, it's a learning curve.
And then it's this awarenessthat we have lots of things that
need to be done, lots of issuesthat need to be resolved, and
very little resources to do itanything.
Yeah, so there was no money todo anything.
(27:56):
The chiefs used to sit around atable.
I attended one of the meetingswith them and they were throwing
money on the table to sendsomebody to Vancouver or then to
Ottawa to talk to thegovernment, but there was no
funding.
They were putting their ownmoney on the table.
Wow, yeah, so it's an entirelydifferent time, a different time
(28:17):
for when I started as a chiefback then.
So, and most of the chiefs,like old Richard Malloy he was
the president but admittedly, hecould sign his name but he
(28:38):
didn't read English or write itvery well, so his language was
El Camino, but he was our oldestchief and he was the most
respected of all the chiefs.
Eh, so I came at a time justwhen the old guys were leaving,
beginning to leave office andleave our world even.
Aaron Pete (29:03):
Is there any lessons you think this generation of
leaders should learn from thatgeneration of leaders?
Steven Point (29:12):
Well, we should be feeling very grateful that you
know that this generation ofleaderships has got
opportunities that those folksnever had, right, and and it was
(29:33):
always this feeling of unityamongst the chiefs I mean there
was never this idea of divisionsor them and us sort of thing.
They all meet together.
They all used to go to theriver together fish meetings.
They'd all meet at RT Charles'place and stand around ina fish
(29:56):
cabin, have a chief's meeting,and when Sam Douglas would block
the railway, everybody would go.
There was this instantbrotherhood amongst the
leadership right across thecountry.
If somebody needed helpsomewhere else, they'd send
(30:16):
people to go and they allunderstood that we were fighting
for a common cause, which wasour rights to be recognized.
But you know, younger peopletoday didn't experience a lot of
the things that we went throughand we were poor.
(30:42):
We had nothing when we startedorganizations.
And now there's all kinds ofresources, there's all kinds of
funds available right, shoulderto shoulder, to protect the
(31:16):
rights that we have now beingrecognized by the Supreme Court
and protected in theConstitution.
There's a lot of people thatlike to take those away.
I mean they were talking aboutthat in this latest federal
election.
If the Conservatives won.
They wanted to change things.
We can't allow that to happen.
We have to stand together tohold our line, hold the rights
(31:39):
that we've been achievingthrough the years, and we need
to stand together for thatpurpose.
But more and more, we seedivisions happening and not
unity.
Anyway, that's the way I see it.
Aaron Pete (31:57):
When you look at Skokale now and the growth that
it's seeing, it's remarkable tosee the new administration
office, the housing that'scoming about.
How does that make you feelknowing how everything started
and having wood dropped off tobuild a house to what it looks
like today and to see theapproach leadership is taking.
Steven Point (32:19):
Oh yeah, I mean it's very true that I look back
over the 73, now 50, 60 years,I've been aware, 60 years I've
been aware and our reserve.
We've come from the kind ofhouses that were built back then
(32:40):
by their own people to housesthat they're now built to code,
and these are nice homes, youknow, and I think a lot of young
people don't realize thedistance that we've come in
terms of just good housing,right, and the distance that
(33:02):
we've come, because I rememberwhen we had no band office and
Chief Gordon Hall built a smallcabin so that we could have an
office there that we called itwas just on stilts, it wasn't
even on, it was on skids, ratherit wasn't on a cement
foundation.
And now what they have and wehave a gymnasium and we have a
(33:25):
beautiful place to exercise andmeeting halls there and it's
just a fantastic facility.
I mean we have every reason tobe happy for the next generation
, but we should be thankful tooto have these, to be
appreciating what we have nowand to take care of it too,
(33:50):
because there was a time when wehad none of that, none of that
at all.
We didn't have playgrounds.
We used to collect rocks andplay games with rocks on the
fields right there.
We used to collect bottles sothat we'd go and get a 10-cent
(34:13):
pop at Sardis.
You know, a bag of chips for adime and penny candies and you
know, walk around thinkingyou're rich because you got 50
cents.
I remember those times and nowit's, I don't know.
(34:33):
I guess we are maybe a victimof our own success.
Sometimes People don'tappreciate what we have.
Now we have to take care of it.
Look after what we have.
Aaron Pete (34:46):
You were a native court worker, right.
Steven Point (34:49):
Well, I didn't do the job.
Actually, the native courtworker that started that here
was Alex James.
He was an elder that worked ina court system helping Native
people who were coming to court.
Well, when I opened my practiceup here in 86, I became the
(35:13):
duty counsel for Chilliwack,hope and Abbotsford and so I'd
be traveling back and forthdoing duty counsel.
The lawyers here, they're sobusy.
Oh, steve's, here you can dothe duty counsel.
I opened my practice up andbrand new lawyer and I got all
the work to do, which which isgood.
(35:34):
You got to learn your craftsomewhere and and it's not like
the other lawyers left me onlythey supported me, they talked
to me and helped me out.
You know so, uh, but I was.
I did a lot of the uh, the guysthat were coming from the jails
.
We we have seven institutionsaround here.
I did a lot of the daily Mondaywork for Indigenous people
(35:58):
because Monday morning was ourday in the criminal law.
So I did a lot of that workhelping people stay out of jail,
doing the bail hearings andthen assisting with legal aid to
fight some of the cases.
But there was a time when I had90 fish cases in my back pocket
(36:21):
because of the demonstrationsthat used to take place on a
Fraser, on a GM, and I had allthose clients.
But yeah, that's how I learnedhow to become a lawyer, actually
doing legal aid.
You don't make any money out ofit, but you sure learn how to
do your job One piece.
Aaron Pete (36:39):
So I was a native co-worker for four and a half
years and I just kept runninginto the client needs housing or
the client needs support withaddiction services or treatment
or recovery, and I've spoken toPremier Eby and the current AG,
nikki Sharma.
There's just not enoughresources for these individuals.
(37:01):
But the other piece after goingto law school was that I
realized a lot of these issuesshould be addressed and can be
prevented in the community.
And that's what made me sointerested in running for
council Was because you don'tsay you have an individual who's
First Nations, who needshousing.
(37:22):
Well, it's the council members'responsibility within that
nation to help get housing sothat they could return home or
start to address those issues.
It's the community that canapply for addiction services.
But me, as a court worker, Ican say they can go to this
place or that place, but thatperson's more likely than not
unfortunately going torecidivate and come back into
(37:43):
the criminal justice system.
If we want to prevent this, wehave to go to the community and
we have to start offering theeducation resources and the
programs and those supports.
And the only criticism I haveof organizations that are
focused on justice is if you'renot talking about housing in
First Nation communities, ifyou're not talking about
treatment services and eldersprograms on reserve to support
(38:06):
people so they don't go downthat path to begin with, I'm
never going to be able to solvethose individuals coming through
the criminal justice system.
Some people manage to findtheir way out, but unfortunately
that's less common than thecommon circumstance which is
somebody struggling withhomelessness comes back and
comes back and they deservesupport.
(38:28):
One thing that I learned fromthe person training me was she
was very hard on a person whohad committed again a crime and
was like why are you doing this?
What are you up to?
You shouldn't be doing that.
And there was just a part of methat was like that's, that's
just not my job.
My job isn't to judge thatperson based on the fact that
they're back.
It's to help them get up again,because somebody can fall down
(38:49):
a hundred times, but you shouldalways try and support them in
returning back to community.
And so I'm just wondering howdo you balance the perspective
of?
A lot of things happen in thecourt system, but I just I'm not
sold that that's where we endup, reducing the
over-incarceration rates ofIndigenous people.
My personal belief is it's morelikely solved in the community
(39:10):
and I'm just curious to get yourtake on that.
Steven Point (39:13):
Oh yeah, I know you're right there.
I mean, criminologists for along time have studied what's
the psychological root ofcriminal behavior, or what is
the psychosocial result fromparenting, or what are the
economic factors.
Why do we have criminalbehavior and all that?
Why do we have criminalbehavior and all of that?
(39:37):
And I remember going down to aconference one time and the
United States had been trying towork on this issue of you know,
the revolving door, theircivism rate, the number of
(39:58):
people that are, the number ofblack people, the number of poor
people, the number of women,the number of youth that are in
the system and whatnot, andtrying to sort of address these
issues.
And what they came to in NewYork was exactly your conclusion
that the justice system is notwell equipped to deal with
criminal behavior.
We're there to.
The justice system is there toactually punish people and
hopefully protect the community,if we can by putting people in
(40:19):
jail, but that's it.
They don't have any other toolsto stop people from committing
crimes and offenses, right.
And so what they started in NewYork was what's called
community court, where, insteadof treating the people as if
they're criminals, they treatedthem like they have social
(40:43):
problems.
That's driving their criminalbehavior.
So you'd get into the courtroomand the judge would say OK,
jimmy, we want you to stopdrinking for seven days.
Okay, your Honor, seven days,come by.
Are you sober?
Yes, your Honor.
Oh good, we have a cake for you.
And the judge would come downwith a candle, seven days sober.
(41:04):
And then they'd say now, jimmy,we want you to work on getting
a real place to stay.
There'd be social workerscoming in.
I want to see you in 30 dayswith a reg, still sober and with
a place to stay.
Social workers come in and takeJimmy out and they get him a
place to stay in 30 days.
They back him.
Jimmy, did you get a place tostay?
(41:26):
Yes, I did.
Are you still sober yet?
Cake again, there's anothercake.
And so, and then this communitycourt idea caught on in Toronto
and then it caught on inVancouver after Judge Gove did a
report on Tutu Tumain.
I don't know if you've everbeen to Tutu Tumain and we
called it the zoo back in theday when I was there and when
(41:49):
you walked into Tutu Tumain, thecourt list ran right to the
ground.
It used to be right on thefloor.
You used to pick them up andand see who was.
And every week it was the samepeople, it was the same, it
wouldn't different.
And um, so the last time I wasa judge I went down to sit at
222 main and and, um, I went tolook at the court list Two pages
(42:14):
stuck in the wall.
I was looking at that.
What the heck he says, oh, thecommunity court's got the rest.
Wow, and, judge Gove, and theyhave a community court.
I went, I said, can I see it?
He said, yeah, we'll take youover.
So we went and observed thecommunity court and of course
(42:34):
you see all the people indowntown Vancouver who are
living on the streets andthey're addicts or they don't
have a place to stay or they'rejust poor people, whatever.
They've drifted into the citiesand they're committing offenses
because they need their nextdrug fix or they need food to
eat or they just need money tosurvive in some way.
(42:55):
And so criminality was drivenby poverty and driven by drug
addiction or driven by lots ofsocial issues.
There was a guy in one of thetowns I was sitting at.
He used to wait in the middleof the street with a police car
and he'd bust the headlight on acop car with a wrench and wait
(43:19):
to get arrested.
He always got three months injail.
But it's not designed to helppeople.
(43:40):
For instance, rehabilitation isone of the objectives of
sentencing, but in the end whatyou really see is just people
going into custody, going intojail, coming out, going back
into custody, coming out.
But the community court ideapassed on to now that we have
(44:00):
First Nations court, where theFirst Nations court, people come
in, first Nations come in, theysit with the judge and they sit
with an elder and they talkabout what's going on with you,
jimmy, oh well.
And they say, okay, well, let'swork on that.
Let's you know you're havingtrouble with drinking, let's see
(44:20):
if we can help you with that.
And so the whole idea behindcommunity court is to do exactly
what the car system is notdesigned to do.
You know, I as a judge I meanwhen I was sitting on the bench
anyway Native people would comein front of me right and say to
(44:46):
them well, I could get a GLADUreport and that would probably
take six months, but I'm goingto stand on right now.
I went in the back and I phonedup to Chihayla.
I said do you guys have a bedfor us also?
Yeah, we do.
Go back in the court.
You're going to go toChihayla's, I mean, and then I'm
going to call you back in sixmonths after you finish the
(45:08):
program to see how you did.
Okay, judge and then goes offto jail, comes back after the
program.
How did you do?
I've been dry since they wentup and I'm seeing my family
again and working on getting myjob back.
All that right.
And the justice system can doother things, but it's not its
(45:32):
inclination, it's not the reasonit was created, and so it's
just.
It's not well equipped to dealwith young offenders, for
example.
It's not well equipped to dealwith drug addicts or homeless
people or people who've gotschizophrenia or should be
taking their medication, whodon't all that sort of stuff.
(45:56):
In society.
We keep recycling our peopleinto justice system that should
be getting help somewhere elseand should be getting services
somewhere else, because we'renot a health center.
We're not a health center,we're not a place to dry out.
(46:20):
But the justice system isdesigned to protect people's
property.
That's what it's designed to domostly.
It came from England for thatpurpose.
So who gets tangled up in it?
(46:40):
People that don't have.
There's the haves and have-nots, and most poor people and
indigenous people are have-nots,and so they get tangled up in
that system.
Once you get tangled up into itit's hard to get out of it,
it's hard to get untangled, andso you see these few folks I
used to get when I was a lawyer.
(47:00):
I'd file somebody as a youngoffender and they would be 13 or
14 years old.
Then they become adults andthen I got to file for them as
an adult.
And then they get married andthen I got a file for them as an
adult.
And then they get married andthen I have a file for them
because they're in family courtand my file's getting fatter and
(47:21):
fatter and fatter.
And all that time nobody'sasked them about whether you're
living in a good place or not,or have you got help with your
drug addiction, or do you needcounseling to get into school,
or you know nothing like that.
They come to us for a verynarrow reason, and that's what
we deal with.
Aaron Pete (47:43):
So I have a few statistics here.
In 2021, indigenous individualscomprised approximately 32% of
the federal prison population Inprovinces.
Indigenous adults accounted for30% of admissions into
provincial and territorialcorrectional services.
Indigenous youth made up 46% ofadmissions to correctional
(48:07):
services in 2016 and 2017, whileonly representing 8% of the
population.
Indigenous women only represent4% of the population in Canada,
but account for 50% of femalefederal inmate population.
We've seen and I spoke to NikkiSharma about this we've seen the
Native court workers, who haveexisted for 50 years and have
(48:28):
done, in my opinion, importantwork, but we're not making
significant progress on theseissues.
And what are your thoughts?
Is there a silver bullet?
Or is this just poverty mixedwith addictions that it's very
hard to untangle this problem?
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't need First
(48:51):
Nations?
I know a lot of people areexcited about First Nations
Court.
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't need First
Nations?
I know a lot of people areexcited about First Nations
court.
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't want or need that
, that there's no opportunitiesfor that to be a service, where
there is no need for a Nativecourt worker, where there is no
need for further culturalservices in prisons Because
they're not a highrepresentative or Gladue reports
, are an obsolete piece of thepast.
(49:12):
It feels more and more likethere's less and less hope on
addressing these issues.
Steven Point (49:18):
Oh yeah, Well, I don't think there is any one
answer that comes to mind.
Right comes to mind right.
The truth is, this system isimposed on Native people.
(49:40):
We never agreed to it.
We never.
I mean, these people came hereand set up governments, set up
courts and started arresting usas Native people.
We know that.
We know that this isn't, thatthese are not our laws, right,
(50:01):
and that's a problem.
Creating a social contract withpeople, though, would go a long
way to, I think, helping peopleunderstand their place in
society.
Right Right now, we're on theoutside, looking in the Canadian
society, and we've becomevictims of that society through
their justice system.
(50:22):
I think the other thing is,it's clear and I talk to people
in Vancouver through the onesociety that's working with
homeless people society'spriorities is not around sharing
(50:43):
the wealth of society otherthan through taxation.
The truth about housing in anycity is that if you took the
homeless population and just putthem into decent, clean housing
, provided them enough food toeat, it would be cheaper than
(51:06):
what we're doing now.
The cost that we have for thejustice system, the cost that we
have for health care, right,the cost that we bring up for
all of the addictions and allthe work that we're doing in
those areas, All the money beingspent a million dollars a day
in East Vancouver to help people.
(51:29):
It's cheaper just to build thembrand new houses and units.
It's cheaper to get them toschool for free, as they're
doing in Finland.
It's cheaper to make sure theyhave enough to eat, right.
But society isn't about doingthat.
(51:51):
They're not wanting to providethat sort of socialist
perspective, right?
I think society takes a viewthat this is their fault, that
they created that themselves andthey should pull up their socks
(52:11):
and make a better life forthemselves the way I did, sort
of thing.
So that's the other thing.
I think society's prioritiesisn't really around applying
resources that would actuallychange the lives of these folks.
That would actually change thelives of these folks.
(52:34):
The other thing, I think, isthat a lot of indigenous people
that end up in the cities theydon't start in the cities.
They're not born there.
They're coming from reservesand communities where life is
(52:57):
also very bad and and they'refacing social issues that need
to be addressed in thecommunities from where the
they're coming from young girlswho are running away from bad
family situations, and we're notspending enough time and energy
on helping communities dealwith their social issues right,
(53:21):
and when we apprehend children,for example.
Children are being apprehendedhere when the family has had the
crisis.
The crisis, though, is way backhere.
Dad lost his job and momstarted drinking again.
Whatever happened was thecrisis.
It ended up in a situationwhere someone had to intervene
(53:44):
now and take the children away.
It's only at the time when theylook at taking the children
away that they say, well, howcan we provide family services
to the family?
Well, they needed the servicesway back there.
Right, they needed the help wayback then.
And you know what Teachers,when you get kids walking into a
(54:04):
school, they know when thechild is in danger, they know
something's happening,something's changed.
When the child is in danger,they know something's happening,
something's changed, and weneed to pay attention to that
and apply resources early forfamilies, but we don't.
We spend the time and moneyonly to protect and apprehend
(54:29):
the child, and then it's toolate.
It's really too late, and it'sthe same with someone getting
arrested right.
By the time the kid is out, theadult is out running and
they're being arrested right,they're being arrested five, ten
(54:52):
years after things startedgoing bad in the home.
A long time before that, thingswere going awry.
Right Now, they're beingarrested and they're saying how
can we help the family?
Well, it's five or 10 years toolate, right, and so they need
(55:12):
to look at actually helping thefamilies earlier.
One of the things I tried to dowhen I was working with my wife
and I took 17 children with usto Europe.
We raised the money to attend acultural festival and we had a
(55:36):
dance troupe and we'd get thekids dressed up and they would
perform for other people.
And these kids you could seethem blossom as little young
people.
They're just amazed and theyhave this experience outside of
their community.
And I often think we need to domore with our youth before they
(56:03):
get angry, before they getsoured by how bad things are.
To get them, and I startedbringing them to Victoria to do
leadership training with themand kids in elementary school
not elementary, but early highschool they're great kids,
they're just.
They're so open to suggestiontoo.
(56:23):
You can do this, you can becomethis, and we need to take the
young people out of their milieuand into an environment in
which they can make up their ownmind about what they can do and
what they can't do.
The real change has to happenbefore they get arrested, before
(56:47):
the children go and be takenaway.
It has to happen early, and youknow our young people.
Of course it used to be at atime you had a child when you
(57:09):
were young, nobody thoughtanything, that was not a bad
thing.
But now we think it's a badthing.
Our morals have changed and wekick the children out when
they're a certain age to lookafter yourself now.
But in the old days you livedin a longhouse, everybody looked
(57:29):
after the children, everybodywent hunting and fishing
together and the young peoplegot married whenever they wanted
to get married when they wereyoung.
But it was the grandparentsthat actually raised the
children.
Because the grandparents saidthose kids are too young, they
don't know what they're sayingyet.
But nowadays we tell the kids,you made them, you look after
(57:51):
them, whereas even today, underthe current CFCSA I mean,
grandparents aren't givenstanding to talk in court, even
though they should be.
They should be turning to thegrandparents saying how do we
fix this?
Because the grandparents, ifthey all take the children, all
look after them, because that'sour traditional job anyway as
(58:21):
grandparents.
So there's things that they cando in society that I think
society is not willing to do orsociety's not aware enough to do
it.
Aaron Pete (58:26):
So I'd like to talk a little bit about your work.
Being a provincial court judge,I've had the privilege of
working with many and it's areally unique position and the
piece that stands out to me isthe impact you can have on a
person who was abused I thinkprobably her whole life and it
(58:54):
was just a very humanizingmoment when the judge
acknowledged that and held spaceand said I understand why your
circumstance is the way it is.
I've heard your story.
Gladue played a huge role inthe judge being able to hear
that piece of her story, thatshe was just never given a
chance and to have somebodysitting in a chair like that and
(59:18):
be able to kind of acknowledgeyou've been through something I
couldn't imagine and I wouldn'tever let my children go through.
You've been through that and soI hold space for that and
ultimately I want you to take adifferent direction in your life
.
Space for that and ultimately Iwant you to take a different
direction in your life to beable to sit in that seat on a
regular basis is, I imagine, alot of responsibility but I also
(59:38):
imagine, a huge privilege.
Steven Point (59:39):
Can you just reflect on your work and oh yeah
, well, the um my time on thebench was, um, it was a
combination of of stressfulbeing stressed out because of
the amount of work that you havegot to do, the amount of
reading that you've got to doand, in many cases, the writing
(01:00:02):
that you've got to do for cases.
But I never had an issue withsitting in court and talking to
people.
I never had an issue withsitting in court and talking to
people.
Kids used to walk by my courtwhen I was in Prince George,
(01:00:24):
waving at me because they knew Iwas the judge.
And this one guy come in, thislittle guy with wrong glasses I
forget his name now, but I usedto call him Bobby.
I think, bobby, what are youdoing?
And he goes hi, john, he says Igot arrested again and he was
only like 13 or 14.
And a little redheaded face andI just, oh man.
(01:00:46):
And one thing that I neverwanted to judge people the way
they feel like they're beingjudged right, like looking down
their nose at them for what'sgone on in their life.
And certainly, as a judge, yougot to sentence people for their
(01:01:11):
behavior.
But my own attitude was likeeverybody's a person, everybody
has a story, everybody has somevalue and there's still some
hope to help this person.
And the only one time I lost mytemper, I think in court, and
(01:01:32):
that was at a prosecutor.
But most of the time I try tounderstand where the people are
coming from, what's happeningwith them in their lives, and to
express empathy and compassionis not inconsistent with
providing justice.
(01:01:54):
It's, I think, necessary to dothat and to be respectful to
them, regardless of what theymay be charged with.
Aaron Pete (01:02:08):
To treat them as a human being.
Steven Point (01:02:10):
I think that if you treat people in a certain
way, they will live up to yourexpectation right.
Aaron Pete (01:02:17):
That sounds like what your mom had done for you
during that period is that sheheld that space for you and
treated you like a person, andthat that was passed on.
I also wanted to ask you becameat age 56, you became the
lieutenant governor of BritishColumbia.
What did that role involve?
Steven Point (01:02:37):
Well, quite honestly, when they asked me to
do this, I was given fairwarning that the prime minister
was going to call me.
And so Gwen and I looked it upon the internet what is the
left-hand guy?
Because we didn't know what itwas.
And she says doesn't he have ahouse to live in?
(01:02:59):
I go, let's find out.
And he does.
I said, yeah, there is a housein Victoria.
We didn't know that either.
And so when I got the job, ofcourse I was rebuilding an old
green 77 GMC truck and my owncar was.
(01:03:24):
We only had one other car.
Gwen needed it for her to work.
I said I'll just go over in mytruck.
I said the first day I wasgoing over and I was sitting in
my truck and waiting to get on aferry and a guy walks by.
He says he comes up to thewindow and he says you work for
the government now.
And I go yeah, it's his firstday.
(01:03:45):
He goes ah, he says come withme.
He says where are we going?
He says come with me.
I said where are we going?
He says come on.
I was way in the back of theline behind my old truck and he
started bringing me up to thefront of the line and all those
people were looking at me whatthe heck is that guy going in?
They brought me to the front ofthe line and I got to go on the
ferry before everybody, wow.
(01:04:07):
And they put the flag up thatthe left-hand governor was on
the ferry.
And then he brought me to aroom and they said this is your
room, sir, you can sit here,we'll bring you some lunch.
And I go holy moly and I gotinto the house there late that
night and nobody was there whenI got there, just security.
(01:04:29):
And the next morning I realizedhey, I didn't have any socks.
I forgot socks.
I better go to the store andget some socks.
So I caught the bus downtownbecause I didn't want to drive
my old truck down there, becauseI didn't know what the parking
was going to be like.
This is a city bus, you mightas well just catch a bus.
So I went down there and gotdown.
(01:04:50):
His husband's bay was closedalready.
This is a city bus, you mightas well just catch a bus.
So I went down there and gotdown.
It was Hudson's Bay.
It was closed.
Really it was not open until9.30, so I thought I'll go have
breakfast, got some eggs andbacon and finally at 10 o'clock
they were open.
So I went in and got my socksand I was coming back on the bus
and I said to the bus driver Isaid I know the address, it's
(01:05:12):
1410, rockland.
He goes, oh, he goes, you haveto wait for this bus, he said.
So I got on the bus that hetold me to get on.
The bus driver says no, youwalk that way, sir.
When you see the stone wall,that's where you're going.
Okay, so I took off and Iwalked.
(01:05:34):
I got off the bus at a certainspot and I walked down the road
and there was the gate, the IronGate.
I recognized it.
I walked in and all of a suddenthe secretary and staff are
running towards me.
They grabbed me by the arms.
I had a radio.
We found him.
He's right here.
It's just secretary.
(01:05:54):
This is my first day in the job,but we lost the left hand
governor.
I was just what are you guysworried about?
I was just getting socks, youknow.
But everything you do, Irealized, is you're followed
around and they know everythingthat you say.
I realized is you're followedaround and they know everything
(01:06:14):
that you say.
And we got up one morning andThomas stuck his head in the
door.
He says your Honor, he says,tell your wife to quit making
the beds.
That's my job.
Gwen looked at me.
He's the one making the beds.
It was a total shift.
(01:06:36):
You have a chef there, you havea car and a driver and then
they take you down to parliamentand you walk in and there's
guns going off and there wasdemonstrators in the front of
the parliament.
My brother was in theredemonstrating against government
(01:06:57):
.
They all put their signs on orwaving at me.
Is that what it is?
But I mean, we were raised withvery little and everything I
made in my life I earned thatright to sit down and have that
piece of bacon or whatever I'meating.
But to be brought into a placelike that where you know there's
(01:07:22):
a swimming pool we never had aswimming pool.
There's a whole room down therejust to hang your coat up, and
17 bedrooms, and that wasamazing.
I, I, we finally figured outthat the government can't run
(01:07:43):
without the queen'srepresentative, because the
crown is the sovereign head ofbritish columbia and can, and
they need to pass laws.
They need the Queen's consentor the King's consent.
Now they can't even pass amoney bill on their own.
They can't even introduce amoney bill.
(01:08:03):
It's the left-hand governorthat actually has to introduce
money bills in the parliament.
Wow, and if the premier, forwhatever reason reason, gets
sick or maybe gets arrested orsomething, you have to fire that
person and hire a differentpremier.
It's called a constitutionalcrisis, right, and you really
(01:08:25):
are the queen's representative,and but nobody knows that,
nobody understands that.
I went to school after and theyall say to me are you the
governor general?
No, I'm the lieutenant governor.
What do you do?
And all that.
Aaron Pete (01:08:38):
And it's actually lieutenant governor right.
It's not lieutenant right.
Steven Point (01:08:41):
It's lieutenant.
Yeah, lieutenant is what theysay in the United States, yeah,
yeah, and even teachers.
They would ask you what doesthat job mean and where do you
work at?
They don't know.
People don't understand theconstitutional nature of our
governance in Canada.
Aaron Pete (01:08:56):
Are you allowed to say no in those circumstances,
like if you need to introduce amoney bill?
Are you able to say not today,I don't want to.
Steven Point (01:09:04):
Yeah, I could have , but it's not done.
Oh yeah, there were times whenthe left-hand governor actually
in Alberta apparently refused topass an act and they cut his
water off his house.
He didn't have a house for along time.
I think they have one now.
(01:09:30):
But I mean, constitutionallyyou're allowed to, but just as a
matter of fact, it's never doneso.
My last question that I justwant to get to um, you don't do
this alone and you've mentionedgwen a few times and I'm
wondering if you can justreflect on the partnership, the
relationship that you have andthe work you've been able to
accomplish together.
Well, gwen and I have beentogether 53 years now.
(01:09:53):
I always say her and I grew uptogether.
She went to school.
When I went to school she was ahairdresser.
She started out.
She didn't finish high school.
She finished high school, thenshe went on to get her
bachelor's degree in education,then her master's of education,
then her PhD in education.
(01:10:14):
She's an intelligent person,but we've been partners now for
a long time and we do everythingpretty much together cultural
work, the healing work all ofthat we do together.
So I don't know.
(01:10:39):
Honestly, she's been my teacheras well over the years, you
know, and I honestly don't thinkI would have gotten this far
but for the fact that I've hadstrong support from her and
she's been there.
She still washes my clothes,she still looks after me and you
(01:11:03):
know, it's just been a great.
I've been very fortunate, Ican't.
I've been very lucky to havehad her all these years.
Aaron Pete (01:11:10):
Is there anything you want to leave listeners with
a reflection advice?
Steven Point (01:11:17):
Well, you know, my granddaughter said to me, and
my grandson said to me one day.
He says you know, well, allthis is about Papa.
He was only about eight yearsold.
I said what he said it's aboutliving.
It's about living your life.
And that's what mygranddaughter said to me one
time.
Aaron Pete (01:11:37):
She says Papa you should just live your life.
Steven Point (01:11:40):
You know what you want to buy that old car, go
ahead.
And I thought to myself wow,how is she able to see this
inside in me, right, to see thisinside in me, right?
And I think that people in thismodern day and age are afraid,
(01:12:02):
there's too much fear, andthat's how we're controlled by
people who want to control us.
And they say that we need to dothis out of fear, and we
conform, we listen out of fear,and I think we need to try to
(01:12:27):
exercise our own personalsovereignty, make up our own
mind, try to exercise our ownpersonal sovereignty, make up
our own mind, because sometimesthe people telling us what is
real and what is not realthey're not right.
It's not right.
And right now we're being tolda lot of things and it's too
(01:12:53):
easy, I think, just to allowsomeone else to do our thinking
for us.
We need to sit down and groundourself and center ourself and
really come to our own view andour own perspective about what
is true and what is not true.
Governments aren't always right, teachers aren't always right,
(01:13:28):
judges aren't always right.
And when we can listen with ourheart to that good voice
sometimes that we hear in ourbrain and help us to do what is
right and I think that's a hardthing to do sometimes is to
really think about what is rightand what is not right and then
(01:13:54):
to act on it.
It's not easy to do.
Look what happened in the SecondWorld War.
How many people six millionJews were killed because one man
said it was the right thing todo.
And now we've got one mantelling us all kinds of things.
(01:14:16):
He's the ruler of the world.
He thinks, and I think we needto pause and sit down and ask
ourselves is this right, what isright?
Sit down and ask ourselves isthis right, what is right?
(01:14:38):
Otherwise, history tends torepeat itself over and over and
over again.
We can bring about change.
We can bring about positivechange.
We only have to have the desireand the courage to do it.
That's all.
Aaron Pete (01:14:58):
Grand Chief, thank you so much for sharing your
time today.
It's been an absolute honor,thank you for having me over.
Steven Point (01:15:04):
It's an honor to meet you Well.
Welcome back to another episode of the Bigger
Than Me podcast.
Here is your host, aaron.
Peet, Thank you so much forjoining for another episode.
I'm speaking with a locallegend from my city and we're
going to explore his background,how he became a role model to
so many, his thoughts on thecriminal justice system and the
living conditions for so manyIndigenous people.
(00:22):
My guest today is Grand ChiefStephen Point.
Grand Chief Stephen Point, itis an honour to have you on the
show today.
Thank you so much for beingwilling to join us.
Would you mind first brieflyintroducing yourself?
Steven Point (00:36):
Sure, my name is Huli Kutul.
I'm from Skowkale First Nation.
My mother is actually fromSumas and my dad's from Musqueam
, so my English name is StephenPoint.
I'm Grand Chief for the StullerTribal Council.
Aaron Pete (00:54):
Can you tell us just a bit about your background,
your legal background, thosepieces?
Steven Point (01:00):
Yeah, I went to law school in 1982 to 85.
I was called to bar in 86 andhad my own practice here in
Chilliwack for three years, andI took a job with the federal
government as a case presentingofficer in the refugee backlog
for a few years.
(01:20):
Then I was called to take upthe acting position at the
University of British ColumbiaFaculty of Law for the Native
Law Program and their personthere had left, so they called
me to take up the position.
So I did that for a few yearsand eventually was the person in
(01:42):
charge of the Native Lawprogram there for one year,
because I was then called backto work with the tribal council.
They called me back to home.
They said they wanted help withworking on the treaty process,
so I came back home and left myjob at UBC and I did that for
(02:04):
quite a few years.
I was a chief for about 15 years, and I was called to the bench
in 1999.
For between 1999 and 2018, Iwas called to the bench at
Provincial Government.
I applied to be a judge.
(02:24):
I wanted to be a judge forquite some time, so I got
accepted and was interviewed andwhatnot.
So during that time though, Iserved three years as the chief
commissioner for the BC TreatyCommission, and then I had to
leave the bench to take up thejob as the 28th left-hand
(02:49):
governor of British Columbia in2005, or 2007, rather.
So I did that for five years,and then I came back to the
bench and served again for a fewyears on the bench, so I had a
mixed career.
Aaron Pete (03:05):
I wanted to start just by reflecting on my own
experience growing up.
You actually visited uhChilliwack Middle School and
that was a big deal for myselfand so many others when you came
and visited when I was in, Ithink, grade seven, eight or
nine, and it was fascinating.
The piece that really stood outto me was how many people
wanted to find a familialconnection to you to brag about,
(03:28):
and they were like oh, I'mrelated to him, that's my,
that's my great cousin or like,and it just.
It showed me somethinginteresting about how one person
can be such a role model for somany others that so many people
looked up to you with like.
I want to be able to say I'mrelated to this man and there's
something really deep about thatthat personally, I've said this
(03:50):
many times.
I think First Nations often lackrole models in comparison to
other communities, and you'reone of those individuals who's
just gone on and become anoutlier of outliers, who's
really set an example that somany aspire to work towards and
likely have inspired others towant to go to law school and
believe that that's somethingthey can do, because you were
(04:12):
able to do it and you've setthat stage.
Have you experienced that inyour own life and heard these
stories from people.
Oh yeah.
Steven Point (04:20):
I had young people come up to me and they said
well, I'm going to go to lawschool just because you went.
And I tell them you know, it'snot that hard, you just have to
work for it.
And I think a lot of people,First Nations particularly
wonder if they could succeed inlaw school.
(04:41):
Is it too much work?
Or am I smart enough?
And you know, we suffer thishangover from colonialism and we
don't have a high enoughopinion of our abilities.
I think a lot of times, and soa lot of the times when I go to
schools or I'm talking to youngpeople working with them, a lot
(05:02):
of it is encouraging them tospread your wings.
Now, try it.
Because you know it isdifficult to be self-driven and
to work hard, but it doesn'ttake anything more than average
intelligence to do what I did.
I mean I'm no brainiac.
(05:22):
I did.
I mean I'm no brainiac, but andI wasn't the best law student
in school, but I made it throughand so I figure, hey, anybody
can do it.
Aaron Pete (05:34):
May I ask you to take us back to your childhood
growing up.
There's not a lot ofinformation that's publicly
available about that, but theremust've been some pieces along
the way.
You must have faced someadversity in ending up in law
school.
I mean you became chief at 23years old.
What was some of thosechildhood experiences like,
where you kind of set on such anextraordinary path?
Steven Point (05:59):
Well, I don't know if they were extraordinary or
ordinary Grew up at Scout Kale,with my parents, of course, in a
house my dad built.
You know, the Indian Affairs inthose days used to drop off
lumber for the families and youjust built your own house.
(06:21):
And so we had a house that hada living room and a bedroom for
my parents, a kitchen, and thatwas it.
There wasn't any indoorplumbing.
There was a stove that my dadburned coal in.
We didn't have insulation inthe walls.
We didn't have cement under thehouse.
(06:44):
In the walls we didn't havecement under the house.
It was no foundation, it wasjust on pilings that my dad
built there.
He built the house himself andwe had children, my brothers and
sisters.
We used to sleep on the floorand pretty much in the living
room, and until my dad built alean-to of the poles that we got
(07:06):
from Sewally, and he, we allhelped him.
My uncle Merle was living withus, uncle Tuner was living with
us too, and the two aunties usedto live with us, and so we had
ten kids plus relatives livingwith us, and so when they dug
the hole, we helped dig the holeand they got the poles from
(07:27):
suwali to build the room for thekids to sleep in.
That was a big deal because thethe girls had a double wide
bunk bed to sleep on.
There was five of them and thenI slept on the top bunk of a
three triple bunk bed and thenthe brothers slept on pretty
(07:48):
much beds on their own on theside, and my grandfather when he
moved in with us, he was 90some years old.
He's asleep in between the bedson his own bed.
So, um, yeah, we were crowded.
It was uh, and, and you didn'twant to be the first one to the
outhouse in the middle of thewinter because there's snow out
(08:10):
there and my mom used to breakwater and melt the snow so that
we could bath in one of thosebig galvanized tubs.
And God help you if you werenumber five the water was pretty
dirty by then.
But Mom used to cook on thewooden stove and you know,
(08:43):
thinking about it, I don't knowhow she did that, it was, it was
.
We didn't know we were poorthough we didn't think we were
poor but people used to drop offboxes at Christmas time, you
know.
So I guess we were prettyimpoverished.
(09:06):
My dad was a longer though comehome with um.
I remember getting home andhe'd throw oranges at us because
that's when we would get tohave an orange.
He'd bring it from the loggingcamps.
We never had them, uh, untilthen.
And so you know it's like.
I never used to.
(09:27):
You know, go visit anybody else.
Nobody would come to our place.
I never brought anybody home,except for the boy who lived
across the road.
He used to bring his guitar andleft it at our house because
his dad wouldn't let him have aguitar and Rick works, and.
(09:48):
But you know, we used to work inthe fields with my mom, because
she had raspberries, we had acow, we had a pig, we had
chickens.
I used to look after thechickens and, yeah, everybody
had a job, everybody did stuff.
I used to cut the grass.
But I remember when I was inhigh school and every year, for
(10:20):
some reason, I was on studentcouncil.
For some reason I was onstudent council Even from grade
8 to grade 12, I would beelected from the student body to
be on the student council andso I was always sitting in
council meetings, right?
And when I got to grade 12, Iran for the presidency and I got
(10:41):
the presidency.
I won the presidency.
But Mr Wilson brought me in theback and he sat me down.
He said you know, steve, yourgrades aren't that good.
He said we're going to letso-and-so take the presidency
and you can be the vicepresident, even though I won the
election.
Wow, I didn't know what tothink about that.
I said what the heck Can you dothat?
(11:02):
I thought what the heck Can youdo that?
But that's what they did inthose days.
But there wasn't many of us ingrade 12.
By the time we got to highschool, most of the people had
stopped coming to school.
Aaron Pete (11:22):
What made you the outlier in that circumstance?
So many, unfortunately,Indigenous people don't end up
graduating.
What made you want to continue?
What made you stay on thattrajectory when so many people
choose to walk away?
Steven Point (11:35):
Yeah, I don't know why, and I think about it like
I wasn't like an A B studentright, I wasn't, in fact, I
never read a full book until Igot out of high school.
But I do remember my mom usedto sit us around the table after
(12:00):
dinner and we would talk.
She would talk to us aboutthings, talk to us about what,
talk to us about, um, uh, whatwas going on in the world, and
ask us for our views and thingslike that and and um, you know,
so I, I, at some point, Idecided, like I remember talking
(12:21):
to my school counselor at highschool said what do you want to
become?
And I thought, well, and mydad's a logger.
I remember talking to my schoolcounselor at high school.
I said what do you want tobecome?
And I thought, well, my dad's alogger, I'd like to become a
logger.
I thought that'd be a goodthing to do.
Then, by the time I got to grade12, I said, you know, I think
I'd like to become a lawyer.
That's what I wanted to do.
And the counselor looked at meand said, well, you know, you
(12:41):
can make a really good job byjust working in construction or
being a plumber.
They make good money too.
You should think about that,discouraging you.
Yeah, wow, I guess he sort ofassessed, looked at my grades
and goes this guy's not thatbright or something.
Boy was he wrong?
Boy was he wrong?
(13:05):
Well, and so then after Igraduated, I did apply to go to
UBC and I got acceptedno-transcript.
I didn't have the study skillseither, and you're not really
(13:31):
well prepared from the kind ofway that things are in high
school, right, where teacherstell you everything, sometimes
even write your notes for you,that sort of thing.
They're not really preparingkids to be on their own, to be
self-driven, to study on theirown too.
So how to organize your time sothey can get things done?
And I was in a city where my momand dad were a long ways away
(13:54):
and I was living with my aunt inVancouver and I was on my own
and being in Vancouver wasawesome, you know, being in
Vancouver was awesome, you know.
But yeah, I didn't stay at theuniversity For a year and a half
I stayed.
Then I came home because I toldMrs Kent I don't know why I'm
(14:17):
here.
I said I have no idea what Iwant to do.
I don't know really, really,why I'm here.
The last thing she said to mebefore I walked out of the
office she said Steve, don't youcome back here until you really
(14:39):
, really, really want it.
Okay, she was a really wiselady, indian affairs lady.
And so I left and came home, gotmarried, went logging for about
seven, eight years Wow yeah,and sitting up on that mountain,
(15:04):
I was sitting there one eveningbecause we used to work after
dinner, going loading logs,because you make an extra 10
cents a log loading logs andjust extra money.
And I used to go work afterdinner and I was sitting there
watching the sun go down,thinking to myself I don't have
(15:29):
to do this work the way this is.
I don't have to be here in thislogging camp.
I have a chance to do higherwork in school, because I could
go to school and get a differentjob.
I'm taking somebody's job hereand really I should be doing
(15:50):
something different.
And that was what was going onin my brain, right?
So I got up from there and Idecided to leave.
I left the job and went home,applied to law school and I
remember Doug Sanders wrote me aletter because I'd been the
(16:11):
chief by then 15 years.
Eh no, seven years, eight years,half the time, and he knew me
and I knew him and he said,steve, he says we're accepting
your application to law school,but we want you to do two more
years of undergraduate work.
(16:32):
So that's when I started.
I went back to school andstayed and finished and learned
how to be a student, learned howto do the work properly, and I
was motivated by then because Iused to attend the meetings the
chiefs had and listening to thereports by the lawyers, right,
(16:54):
and the accountants and peoplewho were hired by the agency, by
the organization, to work forus.
I'd look around the room andthe chiefs that I knew and the
people that I had been therewith, I knew they didn't
understand what they weretalking about.
They didn't understand theSupreme Court of Canada rulings,
(17:18):
they knew what their rightswere, but they didn't understand
what these people were saying.
And I didn't understand iteither.
And I thought it would be goodif we had our own lawyers, we
had our own people that knewwhat was going on, right?
So that's when I decided I'mgoing to go back to become a
(17:41):
lawyer and I did.
Aaron Pete (17:45):
Wow, if you can take me back just for a brief moment
, back to your mom and herwillingness to talk to you about
issues and almost show you thewell, definitely show you the
respect that you have thoughtsand opinions that you come to
that are valid and that justthat makes me think this
(18:05):
self-confidence issue that wehave in, I think, all vulnerable
populations, but particularlywith indigenous people, that
they don't have a thought toshare or that's worth hearing,
that that could be such a adiscouraging message to young
people when you don't ask fortheir opinions, even right or
wrong, or you've got lots tolearn.
But that willingness to engageyou on issues and hear your
(18:29):
perspective, do you think thatplayed a large role in shaping
your willingness to?
Because there's something aboutyou that has to say I'm willing
to apply to law school, I'mwilling to push forward despite
having no idea what to expect.
And you didn't have a ton ofother people to go.
That's a lawyer, I know them,this person's a lawyer and like
it's not like all your friendswere doing that this was a very
solo mission and I'm just tryingto figure out the impetus and
(18:51):
the, the confidence you had tofind in yourself to go down that
path oh yeah.
Steven Point (18:57):
Well, my mother was actively involved in the
Homemakers Organization in thosedays.
She was one of the executivemembers and they were doing a
lot of work trying to improvehomes on reserve.
So that meant that Mom went toa lot of these meetings and I
(19:19):
used to drive her sometimes.
I used to go to some of themeetings and hear the dialogue,
you know, and I drove her onceto meet Pierre Trudeau, for
example.
She was having lunch with himand I think I just turned 17 to
get my license and I was drivingdown the wrong way in a one-way
street in Vancouver.
(19:40):
But in those times we spenttogether.
My mama talked to me aboutthings and I remember before I
left, before I left university,the first time, she had a lawyer
pick me up at the university.
(20:00):
Actually, she says to me youwait at the student union
building and have.
I said Jim is going to come andpick you up.
I didn't know who this was andso I was waiting there and he
(20:20):
was.
Jim Thompson came and he's alawyer from Chilliwack and his
wife was a friend of my mom's,and so he brought me to his
house.
When I got there, my mom anddad were there and we were there
having dinner.
So I was sitting there what'sgoing on here?
And after dinner Jim comes overand gives me a book to read.
(20:46):
Well, I never read anything.
Up until then, I never couldread very well.
I vocalize all the things Iread.
Even today it takes me a longtime to read things.
But it was a book about Clarencedarrow's life.
(21:07):
He's a lawyer from the unitedstates and he used to fight for
the unions and he fought forchildren.
He did the monkey trial insouthern united states where
they were trying to stop theteachers from teaching the
theory of darwin, darwin'stheory of evolution.
The religious folks were tryingto stop it.
Teachers from teaching thetheory of Darwin, Darwin's
theory of evolution thereligious folks were trying to
(21:28):
stop it being taught in theschools.
And I had the book for some timeand I didn't read it at first,
but it was under my bed.
I had only one book in my wholeroom and that was it, and I
remember clearing things out onetime and I found that book and
(21:53):
I decided to try to read it andI did read it and I was inspired
by what he did for children whowere working in coal mines, for
children who were working incoal mines, in the work that he
did, you know, fighting for therights of the union people to
work under positive conditions.
(22:14):
And I thought to myself there'sa man that's got a purpose,
that he's living his purpose,he's doing something with his
education, that he's living hispurpose, he's doing something
with his education.
And so that's when I did thekind of thing my mom used to do
to try to push me along rightand yeah, so that's the way she
(22:39):
was.
Aaron Pete (22:40):
She's still alive now, she's 97 now Wow, that's
amazing alive now she's 97.
Now, that's amazing.
You chose to run for chief at23 years old and I'm wondering
did you know the responsibilitythat that would entail?
It sounds like you were onstudent council so you had some
idea of governance.
(23:01):
But when I ran for council,they gave me the housing
portfolio and immediately therewas this very heavy weight that
the homes on reserve are myresponsibility, that the quality
of living conditions on thereserve were my responsibility,
that I couldn't blame I mean,people do.
They blame the federalgovernment, they blame the
(23:22):
provincial, they blame anybody.
But ultimately you have to goto bed knowing I can make a
difference in improving thequality of life and we've
renovated 35 of 89 homes withinthe past two years.
We've applied for more housingon reserve.
We're doing things.
But that weight hit me reallyhard and it didn't hit me when I
was running.
And I'm wondering you're 23.
(23:44):
I think I was 27 or 28.
What was that weight on yourshoulders like?
Steven Point (23:49):
well I?
I just remember walking homefrom Sardis one time and and
this is after I'd leftuniversity and Robbie Sapassi
was one of our elders on thereserve called me into his yard.
He said, steve, you went touniversity.
He says I want you to run, runfor council.
(24:12):
And, oh, you know, the elderasked you to do things he's.
I didn't say no, I just said oh, dear and dear, and so I went
home and I told my wife, I saidwhat happened, and so I went and
(24:34):
I was nominated to be the chief.
And in those days right, therewas a band office.
It was only a berry cabin onskids and there was a telephone
in there and a typewriter and wedidn't get a lot of money to
(24:58):
run that.
Less than $40,000 a year Paidthe electrical bills and the
phone bill and something for asecretary.
But we had no money as a bandin those days and the chiefs got
together as a tribal counciland they used to meet and they
(25:20):
would meet with Indian Affairs.
Indian Affairs used to give usan honorarium $35, I think for
coming to a meeting.
Indian Affairs was stillresponsible for everything back
then housing, education, welfare, all of that.
But part of that responsibilityhad been transferred to the
(25:43):
Chilliwack Area Indian Councilwhere they were handling welfare
now and education.
Those are the only programsthat we had that we were working
on, and so when I became thechief I was essentially working
with other elderly chiefs andgoing to meetings, listening,
(26:06):
you know, listening to what'sgoing on, and it's a steep
learning curve.
I had no idea what a BCR was.
I had no idea who the Indianagent was, or I didn't know what
Aboriginal rights were, agentwas, or I didn't know what
(26:27):
Aboriginal rights were, and allof those things you got to learn
on the job at just going to themeetings and listening.
So a lot of listening and a lotof asking questions sometimes,
and and you didn't reallyrealize that what was on your
shoulders was really the povertythat we're living under and the
(26:53):
lack of education and thedestruction of our rights and
the need to get more fishingtime, the need to improve the
homes that were being built andnot being built, and how do we
help the young people.
The whole thing was on yourshoulders.
(27:13):
Everything was on there.
And the old counselors thatwere with me there they'd come
to meetings, but I was 23.
That were with me there.
They'd come to meetings, but Iwas 23.
I'd start going to the Union ofChiefs meetings, listening to
what they're talking about.
(27:36):
Yeah, it's a learning curve.
And then it's this awarenessthat we have lots of things that
need to be done, lots of issuesthat need to be resolved, and
very little resources to do itanything.
Yeah, so there was no money todo anything.
(27:56):
The chiefs used to sit around atable.
I attended one of the meetingswith them and they were throwing
money on the table to sendsomebody to Vancouver or then to
Ottawa to talk to thegovernment, but there was no
funding.
They were putting their ownmoney on the table.
Wow, yeah, so it's an entirelydifferent time, a different time
(28:17):
for when I started as a chiefback then.
So, and most of the chiefs,like old Richard Malloy he was
the president but admittedly, hecould sign his name but he
(28:38):
didn't read English or write itvery well, so his language was
El Camino, but he was our oldestchief and he was the most
respected of all the chiefs.
Eh, so I came at a time justwhen the old guys were leaving,
beginning to leave office andleave our world even.
Aaron Pete (29:03):
Is there any lessons you think this generation of
leaders should learn from thatgeneration of leaders?
Steven Point (29:12):
Well, we should be feeling very grateful that you
know that this generation ofleaderships has got
opportunities that those folksnever had, right, and and it was
(29:33):
always this feeling of unityamongst the chiefs I mean there
was never this idea of divisionsor them and us sort of thing.
They all meet together.
They all used to go to theriver together fish meetings.
They'd all meet at RT Charles'place and stand around ina fish
(29:56):
cabin, have a chief's meeting,and when Sam Douglas would block
the railway, everybody would go.
There was this instantbrotherhood amongst the
leadership right across thecountry.
If somebody needed helpsomewhere else, they'd send
(30:16):
people to go and they allunderstood that we were fighting
for a common cause, which wasour rights to be recognized.
But you know, younger peopletoday didn't experience a lot of
the things that we went throughand we were poor.
(30:42):
We had nothing when we startedorganizations.
And now there's all kinds ofresources, there's all kinds of
funds available right, shoulderto shoulder, to protect the
(31:16):
rights that we have now beingrecognized by the Supreme Court
and protected in theConstitution.
There's a lot of people thatlike to take those away.
I mean they were talking aboutthat in this latest federal
election.
If the Conservatives won.
They wanted to change things.
We can't allow that to happen.
We have to stand together tohold our line, hold the rights
(31:39):
that we've been achievingthrough the years, and we need
to stand together for thatpurpose.
But more and more, we seedivisions happening and not
unity.
Anyway, that's the way I see it.
Aaron Pete (31:57):
When you look at Skokale now and the growth that
it's seeing, it's remarkable tosee the new administration
office, the housing that'scoming about.
How does that make you feelknowing how everything started
and having wood dropped off tobuild a house to what it looks
like today and to see theapproach leadership is taking.
Steven Point (32:19):
Oh yeah, I mean it's very true that I look back
over the 73, now 50, 60 years,I've been aware, 60 years I've
been aware and our reserve.
We've come from the kind ofhouses that were built back then
(32:40):
by their own people to housesthat they're now built to code,
and these are nice homes, youknow, and I think a lot of young
people don't realize thedistance that we've come in
terms of just good housing,right, and the distance that
(33:02):
we've come, because I rememberwhen we had no band office and
Chief Gordon Hall built a smallcabin so that we could have an
office there that we called itwas just on stilts, it wasn't
even on, it was on skids, ratherit wasn't on a cement
foundation.
And now what they have and wehave a gymnasium and we have a
(33:25):
beautiful place to exercise andmeeting halls there and it's
just a fantastic facility.
I mean we have every reason tobe happy for the next generation
, but we should be thankful tooto have these, to be
appreciating what we have nowand to take care of it too,
(33:50):
because there was a time when wehad none of that, none of that
at all.
We didn't have playgrounds.
We used to collect rocks andplay games with rocks on the
fields right there.
We used to collect bottles sothat we'd go and get a 10-cent
(34:13):
pop at Sardis.
You know, a bag of chips for adime and penny candies and you
know, walk around thinkingyou're rich because you got 50
cents.
I remember those times and nowit's, I don't know.
(34:33):
I guess we are maybe a victimof our own success.
Sometimes People don'tappreciate what we have.
Now we have to take care of it.
Look after what we have.
Aaron Pete (34:46):
You were a native court worker, right.
Steven Point (34:49):
Well, I didn't do the job.
Actually, the native courtworker that started that here
was Alex James.
He was an elder that worked ina court system helping Native
people who were coming to court.
Well, when I opened my practiceup here in 86, I became the
(35:13):
duty counsel for Chilliwack,hope and Abbotsford and so I'd
be traveling back and forthdoing duty counsel.
The lawyers here, they're sobusy.
Oh, steve's, here you can dothe duty counsel.
I opened my practice up andbrand new lawyer and I got all
the work to do, which which isgood.
(35:34):
You got to learn your craftsomewhere and and it's not like
the other lawyers left me onlythey supported me, they talked
to me and helped me out.
You know so, uh, but I was.
I did a lot of the uh, the guysthat were coming from the jails
.
We we have seven institutionsaround here.
I did a lot of the daily Mondaywork for Indigenous people
(35:58):
because Monday morning was ourday in the criminal law.
So I did a lot of that workhelping people stay out of jail,
doing the bail hearings andthen assisting with legal aid to
fight some of the cases.
But there was a time when I had90 fish cases in my back pocket
(36:21):
because of the demonstrationsthat used to take place on a
Fraser, on a GM, and I had allthose clients.
But yeah, that's how I learnedhow to become a lawyer, actually
doing legal aid.
You don't make any money out ofit, but you sure learn how to
do your job One piece.
Aaron Pete (36:39):
So I was a native co-worker for four and a half
years and I just kept runninginto the client needs housing or
the client needs support withaddiction services or treatment
or recovery, and I've spoken toPremier Eby and the current AG,
nikki Sharma.
There's just not enoughresources for these individuals.
(37:01):
But the other piece after goingto law school was that I
realized a lot of these issuesshould be addressed and can be
prevented in the community.
And that's what made me sointerested in running for
council Was because you don'tsay you have an individual who's
First Nations, who needshousing.
(37:22):
Well, it's the council members'responsibility within that
nation to help get housing sothat they could return home or
start to address those issues.
It's the community that canapply for addiction services.
But me, as a court worker, Ican say they can go to this
place or that place, but thatperson's more likely than not
unfortunately going torecidivate and come back into
(37:43):
the criminal justice system.
If we want to prevent this, wehave to go to the community and
we have to start offering theeducation resources and the
programs and those supports.
And the only criticism I haveof organizations that are
focused on justice is if you'renot talking about housing in
First Nation communities, ifyou're not talking about
treatment services and eldersprograms on reserve to support
(38:06):
people so they don't go downthat path to begin with, I'm
never going to be able to solvethose individuals coming through
the criminal justice system.
Some people manage to findtheir way out, but unfortunately
that's less common than thecommon circumstance which is
somebody struggling withhomelessness comes back and
comes back and they deservesupport.
(38:28):
One thing that I learned fromthe person training me was she
was very hard on a person whohad committed again a crime and
was like why are you doing this?
What are you up to?
You shouldn't be doing that.
And there was just a part of methat was like that's, that's
just not my job.
My job isn't to judge thatperson based on the fact that
they're back.
It's to help them get up again,because somebody can fall down
(38:49):
a hundred times, but you shouldalways try and support them in
returning back to community.
And so I'm just wondering howdo you balance the perspective
of?
A lot of things happen in thecourt system, but I just I'm not
sold that that's where we endup, reducing the
over-incarceration rates ofIndigenous people.
My personal belief is it's morelikely solved in the community
(39:10):
and I'm just curious to get yourtake on that.
Steven Point (39:13):
Oh yeah, I know you're right there.
I mean, criminologists for along time have studied what's
the psychological root ofcriminal behavior, or what is
the psychosocial result fromparenting, or what are the
economic factors.
Why do we have criminalbehavior and all that?
Why do we have criminalbehavior and all of that?
(39:37):
And I remember going down to aconference one time and the
United States had been trying towork on this issue of you know,
the revolving door, theircivism rate, the number of
(39:58):
people that are, the number ofblack people, the number of poor
people, the number of women,the number of youth that are in
the system and whatnot, andtrying to sort of address these
issues.
And what they came to in NewYork was exactly your conclusion
that the justice system is notwell equipped to deal with
criminal behavior.
We're there to.
The justice system is there toactually punish people and
hopefully protect the community,if we can by putting people in
(40:19):
jail, but that's it.
They don't have any other toolsto stop people from committing
crimes and offenses, right.
And so what they started in NewYork was what's called
community court, where, insteadof treating the people as if
they're criminals, they treatedthem like they have social
(40:43):
problems.
That's driving their criminalbehavior.
So you'd get into the courtroomand the judge would say OK,
jimmy, we want you to stopdrinking for seven days.
Okay, your Honor, seven days,come by.
Are you sober?
Yes, your Honor.
Oh good, we have a cake for you.
And the judge would come downwith a candle, seven days sober.
(41:04):
And then they'd say now, jimmy,we want you to work on getting
a real place to stay.
There'd be social workerscoming in.
I want to see you in 30 dayswith a reg, still sober and with
a place to stay.
Social workers come in and takeJimmy out and they get him a
place to stay in 30 days.
They back him.
Jimmy, did you get a place tostay?
(41:26):
Yes, I did.
Are you still sober yet?
Cake again, there's anothercake.
And so, and then this communitycourt idea caught on in Toronto
and then it caught on inVancouver after Judge Gove did a
report on Tutu Tumain.
I don't know if you've everbeen to Tutu Tumain and we
called it the zoo back in theday when I was there and when
(41:49):
you walked into Tutu Tumain, thecourt list ran right to the
ground.
It used to be right on thefloor.
You used to pick them up andand see who was.
And every week it was the samepeople, it was the same, it
wouldn't different.
And um, so the last time I wasa judge I went down to sit at
222 main and and, um, I went tolook at the court list Two pages
(42:14):
stuck in the wall.
I was looking at that.
What the heck he says, oh, thecommunity court's got the rest.
Wow, and, judge Gove, and theyhave a community court.
I went, I said, can I see it?
He said, yeah, we'll take youover.
So we went and observed thecommunity court and of course
(42:34):
you see all the people indowntown Vancouver who are
living on the streets andthey're addicts or they don't
have a place to stay or they'rejust poor people, whatever.
They've drifted into the citiesand they're committing offenses
because they need their nextdrug fix or they need food to
eat or they just need money tosurvive in some way.
(42:55):
And so criminality was drivenby poverty and driven by drug
addiction or driven by lots ofsocial issues.
There was a guy in one of thetowns I was sitting at.
He used to wait in the middleof the street with a police car
and he'd bust the headlight on acop car with a wrench and wait
(43:19):
to get arrested.
He always got three months injail.
But it's not designed to helppeople.
(43:40):
For instance, rehabilitation isone of the objectives of
sentencing, but in the end whatyou really see is just people
going into custody, going intojail, coming out, going back
into custody, coming out.
But the community court ideapassed on to now that we have
(44:00):
First Nations court, where theFirst Nations court, people come
in, first Nations come in, theysit with the judge and they sit
with an elder and they talkabout what's going on with you,
jimmy, oh well.
And they say, okay, well, let'swork on that.
Let's you know you're havingtrouble with drinking, let's see
(44:20):
if we can help you with that.
And so the whole idea behindcommunity court is to do exactly
what the car system is notdesigned to do.
You know, I as a judge I meanwhen I was sitting on the bench
anyway Native people would comein front of me right and say to
(44:46):
them well, I could get a GLADUreport and that would probably
take six months, but I'm goingto stand on right now.
I went in the back and I phonedup to Chihayla.
I said do you guys have a bedfor us also?
Yeah, we do.
Go back in the court.
You're going to go toChihayla's, I mean, and then I'm
going to call you back in sixmonths after you finish the
(45:08):
program to see how you did.
Okay, judge and then goes offto jail, comes back after the
program.
How did you do?
I've been dry since they wentup and I'm seeing my family
again and working on getting myjob back.
All that right.
And the justice system can doother things, but it's not its
(45:32):
inclination, it's not the reasonit was created, and so it's
just.
It's not well equipped to dealwith young offenders, for
example.
It's not well equipped to dealwith drug addicts or homeless
people or people who've gotschizophrenia or should be
taking their medication, whodon't all that sort of stuff.
(45:56):
In society.
We keep recycling our peopleinto justice system that should
be getting help somewhere elseand should be getting services
somewhere else, because we'renot a health center.
We're not a health center,we're not a place to dry out.
(46:20):
But the justice system isdesigned to protect people's
property.
That's what it's designed to domostly.
It came from England for thatpurpose.
So who gets tangled up in it?
(46:40):
People that don't have.
There's the haves and have-nots, and most poor people and
indigenous people are have-nots,and so they get tangled up in
that system.
Once you get tangled up into itit's hard to get out of it,
it's hard to get untangled, andso you see these few folks I
used to get when I was a lawyer.
(47:00):
I'd file somebody as a youngoffender and they would be 13 or
14 years old.
Then they become adults andthen I got to file for them as
an adult.
And then they get married andthen I got a file for them as an
adult.
And then they get married andthen I have a file for them
because they're in family courtand my file's getting fatter and
(47:21):
fatter and fatter.
And all that time nobody'sasked them about whether you're
living in a good place or not,or have you got help with your
drug addiction, or do you needcounseling to get into school,
or you know nothing like that.
They come to us for a verynarrow reason, and that's what
we deal with.
Aaron Pete (47:43):
So I have a few statistics here.
In 2021, indigenous individualscomprised approximately 32% of
the federal prison population Inprovinces.
Indigenous adults accounted for30% of admissions into
provincial and territorialcorrectional services.
Indigenous youth made up 46% ofadmissions to correctional
(48:07):
services in 2016 and 2017, whileonly representing 8% of the
population.
Indigenous women only represent4% of the population in Canada,
but account for 50% of femalefederal inmate population.
We've seen and I spoke to NikkiSharma about this we've seen the
Native court workers, who haveexisted for 50 years and have
(48:28):
done, in my opinion, importantwork, but we're not making
significant progress on theseissues.
And what are your thoughts?
Is there a silver bullet?
Or is this just poverty mixedwith addictions that it's very
hard to untangle this problem?
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't need First
(48:51):
Nations?
I know a lot of people areexcited about First Nations
Court.
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't need First
Nations?
I know a lot of people areexcited about First Nations
court.
How do we get to the pointwhere we don't want or need that
, that there's no opportunitiesfor that to be a service, where
there is no need for a Nativecourt worker, where there is no
need for further culturalservices in prisons Because
they're not a highrepresentative or Gladue reports
, are an obsolete piece of thepast.
(49:12):
It feels more and more likethere's less and less hope on
addressing these issues.
Steven Point (49:18):
Oh yeah, Well, I don't think there is any one
answer that comes to mind.
Right comes to mind right.
The truth is, this system isimposed on Native people.
(49:40):
We never agreed to it.
We never.
I mean, these people came hereand set up governments, set up
courts and started arresting usas Native people.
We know that.
We know that this isn't, thatthese are not our laws, right,
(50:01):
and that's a problem.
Creating a social contract withpeople, though, would go a long
way to, I think, helping peopleunderstand their place in
society.
Right Right now, we're on theoutside, looking in the Canadian
society, and we've becomevictims of that society through
their justice system.
(50:22):
I think the other thing is,it's clear and I talk to people
in Vancouver through the onesociety that's working with
homeless people society'spriorities is not around sharing
(50:43):
the wealth of society otherthan through taxation.
The truth about housing in anycity is that if you took the
homeless population and just putthem into decent, clean housing
, provided them enough food toeat, it would be cheaper than
(51:06):
what we're doing now.
The cost that we have for thejustice system, the cost that we
have for health care, right,the cost that we bring up for
all of the addictions and allthe work that we're doing in
those areas, All the money beingspent a million dollars a day
in East Vancouver to help people.
(51:29):
It's cheaper just to build thembrand new houses and units.
It's cheaper to get them toschool for free, as they're
doing in Finland.
It's cheaper to make sure theyhave enough to eat, right.
But society isn't about doingthat.
(51:51):
They're not wanting to providethat sort of socialist
perspective, right?
I think society takes a viewthat this is their fault, that
they created that themselves andthey should pull up their socks
(52:11):
and make a better life forthemselves the way I did, sort
of thing.
So that's the other thing.
I think society's prioritiesisn't really around applying
resources that would actuallychange the lives of these folks.
That would actually change thelives of these folks.
(52:34):
The other thing, I think, isthat a lot of indigenous people
that end up in the cities theydon't start in the cities.
They're not born there.
They're coming from reservesand communities where life is
(52:57):
also very bad and and they'refacing social issues that need
to be addressed in thecommunities from where the
they're coming from young girlswho are running away from bad
family situations, and we're notspending enough time and energy
on helping communities dealwith their social issues right,
(53:21):
and when we apprehend children,for example.
Children are being apprehendedhere when the family has had the
crisis.
The crisis, though, is way backhere.
Dad lost his job and momstarted drinking again.
Whatever happened was thecrisis.
It ended up in a situationwhere someone had to intervene
(53:44):
now and take the children away.
It's only at the time when theylook at taking the children
away that they say, well, howcan we provide family services
to the family?
Well, they needed the servicesway back there.
Right, they needed the help wayback then.
And you know what Teachers,when you get kids walking into a
(54:04):
school, they know when thechild is in danger, they know
something's happening,something's changed.
When the child is in danger,they know something's happening,
something's changed, and weneed to pay attention to that
and apply resources early forfamilies, but we don't.
We spend the time and moneyonly to protect and apprehend
(54:29):
the child, and then it's toolate.
It's really too late, and it'sthe same with someone getting
arrested right.
By the time the kid is out, theadult is out running and
they're being arrested right,they're being arrested five, ten
(54:52):
years after things startedgoing bad in the home.
A long time before that, thingswere going awry.
Right Now, they're beingarrested and they're saying how
can we help the family?
Well, it's five or 10 years toolate, right, and so they need
(55:12):
to look at actually helping thefamilies earlier.
One of the things I tried to dowhen I was working with my wife
and I took 17 children with usto Europe.
We raised the money to attend acultural festival and we had a
(55:36):
dance troupe and we'd get thekids dressed up and they would
perform for other people.
And these kids you could seethem blossom as little young
people.
They're just amazed and theyhave this experience outside of
their community.
And I often think we need to domore with our youth before they
(56:03):
get angry, before they getsoured by how bad things are.
To get them, and I startedbringing them to Victoria to do
leadership training with themand kids in elementary school
not elementary, but early highschool they're great kids,
they're just.
They're so open to suggestiontoo.
(56:23):
You can do this, you can becomethis, and we need to take the
young people out of their milieuand into an environment in
which they can make up their ownmind about what they can do and
what they can't do.
The real change has to happenbefore they get arrested, before
(56:47):
the children go and be takenaway.
It has to happen early, and youknow our young people.
Of course it used to be at atime you had a child when you
(57:09):
were young, nobody thoughtanything, that was not a bad
thing.
But now we think it's a badthing.
Our morals have changed and wekick the children out when
they're a certain age to lookafter yourself now.
But in the old days you livedin a longhouse, everybody looked
(57:29):
after the children, everybodywent hunting and fishing
together and the young peoplegot married whenever they wanted
to get married when they wereyoung.
But it was the grandparentsthat actually raised the
children.
Because the grandparents saidthose kids are too young, they
don't know what they're sayingyet.
But nowadays we tell the kids,you made them, you look after
(57:51):
them, whereas even today, underthe current CFCSA I mean,
grandparents aren't givenstanding to talk in court, even
though they should be.
They should be turning to thegrandparents saying how do we
fix this?
Because the grandparents, ifthey all take the children, all
look after them, because that'sour traditional job anyway as
(58:21):
grandparents.
So there's things that they cando in society that I think
society is not willing to do orsociety's not aware enough to do
it.
Aaron Pete (58:26):
So I'd like to talk a little bit about your work.
Being a provincial court judge,I've had the privilege of
working with many and it's areally unique position and the
piece that stands out to me isthe impact you can have on a
person who was abused I thinkprobably her whole life and it
(58:54):
was just a very humanizingmoment when the judge
acknowledged that and held spaceand said I understand why your
circumstance is the way it is.
I've heard your story.
Gladue played a huge role inthe judge being able to hear
that piece of her story, thatshe was just never given a
chance and to have somebodysitting in a chair like that and
(59:18):
be able to kind of acknowledgeyou've been through something I
couldn't imagine and I wouldn'tever let my children go through.
You've been through that and soI hold space for that and
ultimately I want you to take adifferent direction in your life
.
Space for that and ultimately Iwant you to take a different
direction in your life to beable to sit in that seat on a
regular basis is, I imagine, alot of responsibility but I also
(59:38):
imagine, a huge privilege.
Steven Point (59:39):
Can you just reflect on your work and oh yeah
, well, the um my time on thebench was, um, it was a
combination of of stressfulbeing stressed out because of
the amount of work that you havegot to do, the amount of
reading that you've got to doand, in many cases, the writing
(01:00:02):
that you've got to do for cases.
But I never had an issue withsitting in court and talking to
people.
I never had an issue withsitting in court and talking to
people.
Kids used to walk by my courtwhen I was in Prince George,
(01:00:24):
waving at me because they knew Iwas the judge.
And this one guy come in, thislittle guy with wrong glasses I
forget his name now, but I usedto call him Bobby.
I think, bobby, what are youdoing?
And he goes hi, john, he says Igot arrested again and he was
only like 13 or 14.
And a little redheaded face andI just, oh man.
(01:00:46):
And one thing that I neverwanted to judge people the way
they feel like they're beingjudged right, like looking down
their nose at them for what'sgone on in their life.
And certainly, as a judge, yougot to sentence people for their
(01:01:11):
behavior.
But my own attitude was likeeverybody's a person, everybody
has a story, everybody has somevalue and there's still some
hope to help this person.
And the only one time I lost mytemper, I think in court, and
(01:01:32):
that was at a prosecutor.
But most of the time I try tounderstand where the people are
coming from, what's happeningwith them in their lives, and to
express empathy and compassionis not inconsistent with
providing justice.
(01:01:54):
It's, I think, necessary to dothat and to be respectful to
them, regardless of what theymay be charged with.
Aaron Pete (01:02:08):
To treat them as a human being.
Steven Point (01:02:10):
I think that if you treat people in a certain
way, they will live up to yourexpectation right.
Aaron Pete (01:02:17):
That sounds like what your mom had done for you
during that period is that sheheld that space for you and
treated you like a person, andthat that was passed on.
I also wanted to ask you becameat age 56, you became the
lieutenant governor of BritishColumbia.
What did that role involve?
Steven Point (01:02:37):
Well, quite honestly, when they asked me to
do this, I was given fairwarning that the prime minister
was going to call me.
And so Gwen and I looked it upon the internet what is the
left-hand guy?
Because we didn't know what itwas.
And she says doesn't he have ahouse to live in?
(01:02:59):
I go, let's find out.
And he does.
I said, yeah, there is a housein Victoria.
We didn't know that either.
And so when I got the job, ofcourse I was rebuilding an old
green 77 GMC truck and my owncar was.
(01:03:24):
We only had one other car.
Gwen needed it for her to work.
I said I'll just go over in mytruck.
I said the first day I wasgoing over and I was sitting in
my truck and waiting to get on aferry and a guy walks by.
He says he comes up to thewindow and he says you work for
the government now.
And I go yeah, it's his firstday.
(01:03:45):
He goes ah, he says come withme.
He says where are we going?
He says come with me.
I said where are we going?
He says come on.
I was way in the back of theline behind my old truck and he
started bringing me up to thefront of the line and all those
people were looking at me whatthe heck is that guy going in?
They brought me to the front ofthe line and I got to go on the
ferry before everybody, wow.
(01:04:07):
And they put the flag up thatthe left-hand governor was on
the ferry.
And then he brought me to aroom and they said this is your
room, sir, you can sit here,we'll bring you some lunch.
And I go holy moly and I gotinto the house there late that
night and nobody was there whenI got there, just security.
(01:04:29):
And the next morning I realizedhey, I didn't have any socks.
I forgot socks.
I better go to the store andget some socks.
So I caught the bus downtownbecause I didn't want to drive
my old truck down there, becauseI didn't know what the parking
was going to be like.
This is a city bus, you mightas well just catch a bus.
So I went down there and gotdown.
(01:04:50):
His husband's bay was closedalready.
This is a city bus, you mightas well just catch a bus.
So I went down there and gotdown.
It was Hudson's Bay.
It was closed.
Really it was not open until9.30, so I thought I'll go have
breakfast, got some eggs andbacon and finally at 10 o'clock
they were open.
So I went in and got my socksand I was coming back on the bus
and I said to the bus driver Isaid I know the address, it's
(01:05:12):
1410, rockland.
He goes, oh, he goes, you haveto wait for this bus, he said.
So I got on the bus that hetold me to get on.
The bus driver says no, youwalk that way, sir.
When you see the stone wall,that's where you're going.
Okay, so I took off and Iwalked.
(01:05:34):
I got off the bus at a certainspot and I walked down the road
and there was the gate, the IronGate.
I recognized it.
I walked in and all of a suddenthe secretary and staff are
running towards me.
They grabbed me by the arms.
I had a radio.
We found him.
He's right here.
It's just secretary.
(01:05:54):
This is my first day in the job,but we lost the left hand
governor.
I was just what are you guysworried about?
I was just getting socks, youknow.
But everything you do, Irealized, is you're followed
around and they know everythingthat you say.
I realized is you're followedaround and they know everything
(01:06:14):
that you say.
And we got up one morning andThomas stuck his head in the
door.
He says your Honor, he says,tell your wife to quit making
the beds.
That's my job.
Gwen looked at me.
He's the one making the beds.
It was a total shift.
(01:06:36):
You have a chef there, you havea car and a driver and then
they take you down to parliamentand you walk in and there's
guns going off and there wasdemonstrators in the front of
the parliament.
My brother was in theredemonstrating against government
(01:06:57):
.
They all put their signs on orwaving at me.
Is that what it is?
But I mean, we were raised withvery little and everything I
made in my life I earned thatright to sit down and have that
piece of bacon or whatever I'meating.
But to be brought into a placelike that where you know there's
(01:07:22):
a swimming pool we never had aswimming pool.
There's a whole room down therejust to hang your coat up, and
17 bedrooms, and that wasamazing.
I, I, we finally figured outthat the government can't run
(01:07:43):
without the queen'srepresentative, because the
crown is the sovereign head ofbritish columbia and can, and
they need to pass laws.
They need the Queen's consentor the King's consent.
Now they can't even pass amoney bill on their own.
They can't even introduce amoney bill.
(01:08:03):
It's the left-hand governorthat actually has to introduce
money bills in the parliament.
Wow, and if the premier, forwhatever reason reason, gets
sick or maybe gets arrested orsomething, you have to fire that
person and hire a differentpremier.
It's called a constitutionalcrisis, right, and you really
(01:08:25):
are the queen's representative,and but nobody knows that,
nobody understands that.
I went to school after and theyall say to me are you the
governor general?
No, I'm the lieutenant governor.
What do you do?
And all that.
Aaron Pete (01:08:38):
And it's actually lieutenant governor right.
It's not lieutenant right.
Steven Point (01:08:41):
It's lieutenant.
Yeah, lieutenant is what theysay in the United States, yeah,
yeah, and even teachers.
They would ask you what doesthat job mean and where do you
work at?
They don't know.
People don't understand theconstitutional nature of our
governance in Canada.
Aaron Pete (01:08:56):
Are you allowed to say no in those circumstances,
like if you need to introduce amoney bill?
Are you able to say not today,I don't want to.
Steven Point (01:09:04):
Yeah, I could have , but it's not done.
Oh yeah, there were times whenthe left-hand governor actually
in Alberta apparently refused topass an act and they cut his
water off his house.
He didn't have a house for along time.
I think they have one now.
(01:09:30):
But I mean, constitutionallyyou're allowed to, but just as a
matter of fact, it's never doneso.
My last question that I justwant to get to um, you don't do
this alone and you've mentionedgwen a few times and I'm
wondering if you can justreflect on the partnership, the
relationship that you have andthe work you've been able to
accomplish together.
Well, gwen and I have beentogether 53 years now.
(01:09:53):
I always say her and I grew uptogether.
She went to school.
When I went to school she was ahairdresser.
She started out.
She didn't finish high school.
She finished high school, thenshe went on to get her
bachelor's degree in education,then her master's of education,
then her PhD in education.
(01:10:14):
She's an intelligent person,but we've been partners now for
a long time and we do everythingpretty much together cultural
work, the healing work all ofthat we do together.
So I don't know.
(01:10:39):
Honestly, she's been my teacheras well over the years, you
know, and I honestly don't thinkI would have gotten this far
but for the fact that I've hadstrong support from her and
she's been there.
She still washes my clothes,she still looks after me and you
(01:11:03):
know, it's just been a great.
I've been very fortunate, Ican't.
I've been very lucky to havehad her all these years.
Aaron Pete (01:11:10):
Is there anything you want to leave listeners with
a reflection advice?
Steven Point (01:11:17):
Well, you know, my granddaughter said to me, and
my grandson said to me one day.
He says you know, well, allthis is about Papa.
He was only about eight yearsold.
I said what he said it's aboutliving.
It's about living your life.
And that's what mygranddaughter said to me one
time.
Aaron Pete (01:11:37):
She says Papa you should just live your life.
Steven Point (01:11:40):
You know what you want to buy that old car, go
ahead.
And I thought to myself wow,how is she able to see this
inside in me, right, to see thisinside in me, right?
And I think that people in thismodern day and age are afraid,
(01:12:02):
there's too much fear, andthat's how we're controlled by
people who want to control us.
And they say that we need to dothis out of fear, and we
conform, we listen out of fear,and I think we need to try to
(01:12:27):
exercise our own personalsovereignty, make up our own
mind, try to exercise our ownpersonal sovereignty, make up
our own mind, because sometimesthe people telling us what is
real and what is not realthey're not right.
It's not right.
And right now we're being tolda lot of things and it's too
(01:12:53):
easy, I think, just to allowsomeone else to do our thinking
for us.
We need to sit down and groundourself and center ourself and
really come to our own view andour own perspective about what
is true and what is not true.
Governments aren't always right, teachers aren't always right,
(01:13:28):
judges aren't always right.
And when we can listen with ourheart to that good voice
sometimes that we hear in ourbrain and help us to do what is
right and I think that's a hardthing to do sometimes is to
really think about what is rightand what is not right and then
(01:13:54):
to act on it.
It's not easy to do.
Look what happened in the SecondWorld War.
How many people six millionJews were killed because one man
said it was the right thing todo.
And now we've got one mantelling us all kinds of things.
(01:14:16):
He's the ruler of the world.
He thinks, and I think we needto pause and sit down and ask
ourselves is this right, what isright?
Sit down and ask ourselves isthis right, what is right?
(01:14:38):
Otherwise, history tends torepeat itself over and over and
over again.
We can bring about change.
We can bring about positivechange.
We only have to have the desireand the courage to do it.
That's all.
Aaron Pete (01:14:58):
Grand Chief, thank you so much for sharing your
time today.
It's been an absolute honor,thank you for having me over.
Steven Point (01:15:04):
It's an honor to meet you Well.
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