A good home, or Minosin Kikiwa in Cree, is the foundation of dignity in later life, according to the Indigenous seniors who spoke to us. Yet “every year the rent goes sky-high and it’s tough to be homeless,” an anonymous participant said.
As members of the Indigenous Seniors Research Committee, we came together in the fall of 2022 with the goal of examining the housing and care needs of older Indigenous adults in Winnipeg. In 2023-24, we spoke with 48 Indigenous older adults between the ages of 55 and 83 and nine knowledge keepers. What we found out, and compiled in our report Minosin Kikiwa – “A Good Home”: Indigenous Older Adults in Winnipeg, is critical to share.
It turns out that many Indigenous Elders are struggling to find affordable and safe homes to age with dignity after decades of contributing to their families and communities. The evidence we’ve collected suggests a housing crisis that is not only economic but also cultural.
Affordability at the breaking point
A little more than half of the older Indigenous participants rented their housing, and 21 per cent were precariously housed or homeless. Many relied on social or income assistance they found lacking.
One participant who used a walker described having to keep working to afford the $1,050 monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment. Another senior told us:
“[You] can’t move because [you] can’t afford it. You can’t afford it. You can’t even get a stinking room at the hotel [per month]. They’re charging over $650 for a bedbug-infested party room and people breaking in.”
Others described paying most of their fixed income for apartments with poor or unsafe conditions. One participant recalled living in a rooming house where individuals with questionable unsafe behaviours were allowed to move in. “My ex-landlady didn’t care who was in there…she was not maintaining the place.”
As committee co-chair Joanne Mason put it: “Getting a place to rent is impossible, and the ones that are for rent are dilapidated and often not well-kept at very high prices.”
Colonial legacies on housing
Indigenous older adults’ housing challenges cannot be separated from Canada’s history. Child welfare removals, residential schools and racism disrupted education, employment and the transfer of intergenerational wealth. As a result, many Indigenous older adults entered later life with mortgages or debts, and without personal savings.
As committee member Kathy Mallet explained: “The colonial system gave us (Indigenous Peoples) that legacy, and so now we’re paying for it.”
Cumulative poverty and other disadvantages compound this problem. As one participant shared, “You don’t raise four children and be wealthy when you retire.” Other low-income Indigenous participants told us they had no choice but to keep working in paid employment into their later years. Seventy-three per cent of our participants reported they either have “some difficulty” or “great difficulty” making ends meet.
These were no golden years of retirement.
Home is more than family
Housing is more than physical buildings, it is also about community and wellness.
Minosin Kikiwa for Indigenous older adults is defined as a safe, affordable and accessible space that fosters a holistic balance of physical, spiritual, mental and emotional well-being through deep connections to family, kin, community and culture.
Homes are places where one connects with family, passes on culture and finds rest. Yet restrictive housing policies frequently undermine this. One participant shared that overnight guests were forbidden in their building. “Visitors have to be out of the building by 10:30…that’s not a home.”
As Lucille Bruce, co-chair of the Indigenous Seniors Research Committee, explained: “They want to be within their communities where families can visit and where services are delivered in culturally relevant ways by Indigenous agencies.”
Intergenerational connections are disrupted when grandchildren and other family members are prevented from staying with renters due to these culturally insensitive policies, which worsens the isolation and cultural deprivation experienced by many.
When policy fails community
Winnipeg has one of the largest populations of urban Indigenous Peoples in Canada with 12.4 per cent of Winnipegers (90,990) identifying as Indigenous in 2021. The housing and later-life struggles of Indigenous older adults in the city reflect those faced by Indigenous older adults in urban settings across Canada.
Statistics Canada found that the life expectancy of an Indigenous person is about 7.8 years shorter than that of non-Indigenous Canadians. Other researchers have linked precarious housing to poor health, food insecurity and social isolation, all of which increase mortality.
Governments need to be accountable to Indigenous older adults. Public funds currently flow into dilapidated spaces and rooming houses that function as de facto “nursing homes” for low-income Indigenous older adults. As one participant stated, shelters and transitional housing too often become places “where our people come to die.”
Researchers note that government programs framed as reconciliation often amount to tokenistic gestures, with a lack of meaningful Indigenous leadership. Policy frameworks have failed to address deep-rooted challenges such as generational poverty, inadequate financial support that does not adjust for inflation, and the lack of safe, affordable and culturally representative housing options for urban Indigenous seniors.
Institutional systems, including the historical trauma of residential schools and restrictive modern housing policies (for example, prohibiting overnight guests), continue to displace Indigenous seniors from their families and communities, creating significant barriers to accessing necessary resources.
Moving toward dignity and justice
We believe that housing policy must prioritize Indigenous leadership in design, construction, ownership and governance. Housing programs should also be connected with stable and publicly funded supports for health, income and community well-being, shifting away from short-term or symbolic solutions toward lasting and transformative change.
In light of Minosin Kikiwa, we call for governments and housing providers to help ensure affordability while centring Indigenous values and leadership. Affordability should extend beyond just subsidies to building and sustaining safe, accessible and culturally relevant housing.
Housing for Indigenous older adults must transcend basic shelter to become a sanctuary of dignity and cultural sovereignty, a place where ceremonies, traditional foods and the passing of sacred knowledge are protected, not prohibited. This is no longer merely a policy suggestion, it is a fundamental requirement of reconciliation to ensure that aging in community is a right, not a privilege, for Indigenous seniors.
Hai Luo, Associate Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Manitoba; Laura Funk, Professor of Sociology, University of Manitoba, and Malcolm Disbrowe, Graduate Student, University of Manitoba
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.