text: Thank you Ms. Clarkson for this thoughtful column. As the child of immigrants from Scotland after the war we had the advantage of the language and my father had training in the Royal Navy as an engineer. He upgraded at our cities technical college in the evenings (during the day his job was tearing up trolley car tracks for the railway). Like many if not most Canadians, I have sympathy for the plight of the indigenous people. Driving through the core of our city I sometimes see toddlers of aboriginal descent out on the sidewalks by themselves and not properly clothed for our climate. I've often thought to myself, what chance do they have? They haven't chosen to live in these circumstances. Yet when I see reports of life on isolated reserves with suicide and substance dependence issues I wonder if this is the way our country should be continuing. I also think that there are some in the indigenous community who have a stake in the continuity of this system. Maybe it's time for change.