Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'd love to go into the history of this. All I can say is it started as an opportunity that arose as a result of a court case, litigation between the Westbank First Nation--my community--and Canada over the revocation of land management authorities under the Indian Act. It then went into the realm of lands, revenues, and trust.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  If I may, Mr. Chairman, I want to say to the honourable members that if they give us a chance, we'll be there.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you very much for your question. First, I appreciate your comment about Westbank. We're very proud of that in my community, very proud, and we look forward to lots of development in communities across this country. What we see with the memorandum of understanding that we signed yesterday is more certainty.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Ms. Bennett, Mr. Chairman, if you allow, some of my colleagues are anxious to offer some comments. If Jody Wilson-Raybould could respond....

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. Maybe I'll deal with your first point, modernization and so forth. If what's being looked at is a transfer from reserve lands to fee simple lands, the answer and response is no, that's not what this process is about. This process is about section 91.24, it's about the Constitution.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Through the expertise we've been supported by, we have been connected to various universities and a lot of the curriculum that has been developed has been with direct access--

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. Accreditation is something that has been sought after. We are not in the position yet, because we don't have adequate funds to do that. I know my colleagues here have been working on this, and I'm sure we've got lots of thoughts. We can go into that further, if you wish.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  First nations have the opportunity--and it's one of the needs for this amendment--to pass environmental laws. Now, in the passage of those laws, the first nations are the jurisdiction, the decision-makers. But in doing so, each first nation across this country has to be mindful of existing environmental laws, either federal or provincial.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I can only offer this in response. I'm not sure exactly the depth of the land use modernization. I can tell you the depth of what we're talking about in lands and management of lands. We know that it's absolutely essential. The jurisdiction, the law-making, the decision-making is extremely important.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, Mr. Rickford. Part of the responsibility of our resource centre is that support role. The precedent documents are collected, the laws that have been passed by first nations are regularly available, and each first nation across this country readily shares that. In my community, at Westbank, for example, we've met with—I don't think I'm too far wrong—maybe close to 100 first nations and provided information, legal documents.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, and I think evidence of that was the historical signing of the memorandum document on funding yesterday. It took us ten years to have some conclusiveness, to say that at least for the next four years we're going to have funding. It's very much appreciated, but I can only stress that it accommodates a very limited number; it doesn't accommodate everyone.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm technically challenged, I'm afraid to say. This is evidence of it, obviously.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  No, I don't.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I think I now have it. It's channel 4.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you very much. I think I understand your question. You asked about the application of land codes, not just to the lands, but to the traditional lands. The way our law-making has developed is that we have law-making over our lands that might be termed as “reserve lands” with definitive boundaries.