Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There was no consultation with the AFN with respect to this bill, and zero consultation is simply not legitimate.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  As I said before.... Maybe I'll just step back a bit. Consultation, in the question that you raise, is certainly a question of degrees and a question of the relationship that we have between and among ourselves as first nations and with other governments. To speculate about whether or not something took place with the national chief, honestly, you'd have to ask him that.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There are provisions, some problematic provisions in the legislation, certainly, that our nations are seeking to remove themselves from by exercising self-government or creating self-government. One example would be wills and estates. There are provisions contained in there that restrict trade and barter of produce.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. In British Columbia, as I said, we have 32 bylaws around intoxicants. I know the number surpasses 250 across the country. If this bill is passed in its current form, that would render those bylaws essentially of no force and effect or invalid.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Of course, the duty of consultation, as I said, comes in many different forms, and the requirement for consultation has a range. In terms of fundamental aspects impacting upon first nations from bills such as this that are imposed upon our first nations, the requirement for consultation is extremely high and deep, as they call it.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I would submit that it's not sufficient simply to consult with representative organizations; however, representative organizations, as is expressed within an article in the United Nations declaration, have a role to play. Certainly I recognize, as a leader myself who has been elected by a significant majority of first nations in my province, that I have the opportunity and the responsibility to provide my first nations with information that is out there.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I think that was The Empire Strikes Back. I don't know what that means about your question, sir, but....

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  To your point, and I recognize the importance of the question, the first nations ability to create laws and determine how they do that should also, and do, provide the means or the mechanism for which those laws are published. They could be on the Internet, and for a lot of first nations that is the medium that is used.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you for the question. This is a fairly complicated area of law which first nations have considered over years and decades. The complication arises in imposing the transfer of jurisdiction or authority from the federal government to the provincial government. While that may be a decision that a first nation makes, imposing it creates tremendous challenges, in that to isolate a specific jurisdiction, such as wills and estates, does exactly that: it isolates it from the important matters that first nations have also considered and that must be considered together, involving their laws over land and how they deal with non-members on their reserve lands and how land is held and transferred.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  To a certain degree I have, yes, and I have read the analysis by CBA. Quite rightly they point out many of the challenges contained within these provisions or that will result when this bill comes into law. Questions around customary adoptions and this particular area of jurisdiction really highlight the reality that first nations are unique, in spite of our commonality of approaches and of viewing ways forward.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  No. I think the provision dealing with wills and estates simply transfers that ability to another level of government, without the consent of first nations, and invokes section 88 of the Indian Act to referentially incorporate provincial law. That may be the choice of a first nation, but the first nation must be provided with the options to decide.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  If Bill C-428 were passed, first nations would have to publish their laws in the local newspaper, on the Internet, and in what is called the First Nations Gazette. As I stated, publishing bylaws or laws, which could be 10 to 20 pages long, in a newspaper is simply not practical.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm not sure of the context of that comment that the national chief spoke about. It could have been in many contexts, whether in terms of first nations developing financial transparency and accountability, which we have committed to do and are doing through the development of financial administration laws, or otherwise.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you for the question. Again, I recognize there is quite a significant level of prescription contained within this bill, in terms of very substantial and fundamentally complicated areas of law that our nations have considered over the course of decades. As I said, and you reiterated, it is tinkering.