In this episode of APTN Face To Face: Growing up, Bernadette Smith never visited the Manitoba legislature.

Smith didn’t see the legislature as a place that reflected her as an Indigenous person. So, to be in her second term as the NDP MLA for the riding of Point Douglas is “very surreal.”

One of the first pieces of legislation Smith brought forward was an amendment to the province’s child welfare act. It was an effort to ensure children would not be taken away from their families out of poverty.