Bill C-28 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Cree-Naskapi (of Quebec) Act

This enactment amends the Cree-Naskapi (of Quebec) Act, in respect of Cree bands and Category IA land,
(a) to provide the Cree Regional Authority with additional responsibilities and powers, including by-law making powers; and
(b) to recognize the Crees of Oujé-Bougoumou as a separate band and a local government under that Act.

Cree-Naskapi (of Quebec) Act

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would first like to thank my colleague for his analysis of the bill and his eloquent, lively and, I would even say, moving speech, which comes from his very lengthy experience with first nations communities on the Ontario side of James Bay.

I have had the opportunity to visit and get to know the same communities on the Quebec side, and I am aware of the differences he referred to, because the James Bay and Northern Quebec agreements came out of the Malouf decision in the early 1970s, which imposed an injunction that interrupted work on one of the largest construction projects in North American history because laws had been broken. Talented people, people with vision, capable people like John Ciaccia took charge of the issue and said they would resolve it.

I believe that models may exist. But I was sad to hear what he said about the schools, and that is what I would like to ask him about.

Could he tell us about some of the problems? We were all disappointed yesterday by the mediocre responses from the Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs. We can see that he does not really care about this issue. He would do better to look after the plumbing elsewhere in the government.

Could my colleague from Timmins—James Bay give us some examples of cases where young people are being deprived of the resources they need to grow and develop and communities in turn are being deprived of their right to sustainable development, which means taking care of future generations?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Attawapiskat sits on the largest diesel contamination site in North American history. This is where the children go to school. The building has been abandoned for 30 years. The government's solution in Attawapiskat was to tear the building down. There is no other jurisdiction I know of that would tear down a building as a school solution. When the government tore that building down, it promised the community it would have medical teams on hand because it knew the risks to those children. Therefore, community agreed to having it torn down. We do not make a promise of medical teams for demolition unless we know how serious it is. Guess what? There were no medical teams present. Health Canada told the community to send their kids back to school in the middle of the demolition.

We have documented reports of teachers getting sick, children throwing up. We had a teaching crew from the Toronto school board at the time, and the teachers were horrified. Kids had nosebleeds and some passed out in the classrooms. Anywhere else there would be an outcry that would lead to people being charged, people being fired and heads would roll.

We have heard the minister say that he is not aware of any health and safety problems whatsoever and he has told us to prove it. We are talking about children who have been left at risk. A promise was made to have medical teams available to ensure the children would not get sick. Again, it is the lack of good faith from the government. It makes agreements and it walks away, leaving children at risk. That is simply unacceptable in a country like Canada in the 21st century.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, although the bill is not controversial and should get the support of the House at third reading, the subject matter seems to have drifted to the obligations of the Government of Canada with regard to first nation issues.

I want to ask the member about the minister's opinion on the actions taken by his ministry with regard to Bill C-8 and the representations he made in his speech to this place, that he consulted widely and had taken all the necessary steps to engage first nation communities. In fact, I refer to statements about the fact that the Supreme Court of Canada recognized the federal government was required to consult, accommodate and obtain first nations' consent when it contemplated action that could affect first nation, aboriginal or treaty rights.

Even some of the questions that we have seen at question period, again, seem to deny the fact that there was no consultation in the form that was required, that informed consent was not there, that the accommodation was not there.

What assurances or what comfort level does the member have that the government in fact has appropriately consulted with these communities with regard to the important changes to the act under Bill C-28?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the obligation to consult has been defined in court decision after court decision. It is the obligation of the federal government to work with first nations.

Again, if we are going to move forward, it is the prerequisite for developing legislation, where we start to move away from treating first nations as somehow children or wards of the state who can be treated in an arbitrary fashion.

Bill C-8 looks to address some of the existing issues on how first nation laws are enacted. However, clearly we did not see a pattern of consultation. The government needs to understand that until it does consultations, until it works collaboratively, first, with the first nations and then with its partners in the House of Commons, it will be unable to force legislation through. It will also be unable to attack its opponents and say that we are against human rights and so on. The government can do it all it wants, but it will not get the legislation it needs.

I hope the minister would learn from this and reflect on it. Why waste the time of Parliament and why waste the time of Canadians? If he does not do the groundwork and consult, the bills will eventually fail. It is the obligation of members of the opposition to push back in those cases because without consultation, there is no legitimacy for developing first nation law.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, given the member's long track record of working with aboriginal people in northern Ontario and in Quebec before he arrived here in 2004, how could the model that has been used to put this bill together so successfully be used in the very real challenge that he himself faces in his riding in both Attawapiskat and Kashechewan?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, when I worked for the Algonquin nation in Quebec, it always called the Cree the “big brothers” because the grand council of the Cree had set the standards. It set the standards by being tough and by laying down some really hard lines in the push back against the original James Bay development. Out of that came a framework for agreements that has established a whole series of agreements, which have helped move these communities forward.

The problem is other communities do not have that strength and they rely on the federal government to represent them and the federal government has failed.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, Arts and Culture; the hon. member for Madawaska—Restigouche, Unemployment; the hon. member for Pickering—Scarborough East, Financial Institutions.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to use my whole time slot because there is cooperation on the bill. I want to use my time as a springboard to talk about some of the items the previous member talked about and to get points on the record about land claims implementation and improving or amending land claims.

There are two types of land claims. There are comprehensive claims that deal with everything. It is a complete treaty that deals with the entire land, resources, and sometimes self-governance agreements that are attached. That is called a comprehensive claim.

Then there is a specific claim. If there is a treaty in place but the treaty has not been followed specifically, there is a claim that an item in the treaty has not been followed and there is a grievance.

Regarding specific claims, which I will deal with first because they are the easiest, the government brought forward a good initiative, which all parties agreed with, to get specific claims into a tribunal and get them out of the old system. Basically two adversaries made a claim that something was done or not done. The judge, in essence, was one of those parties, and obviously that did not make any sense.

The new system for specific claims is very good. It has an independent arbiter get arguments from the two parties and then make a decision. That is a very good improvement, and it's a big step forward. It deals with thousands of those little specific annoyances. Many of the claims are small, but some of them have been backlogged for years and years. All parties agree that this should speed it up and deal with the problem.

With regard to the comprehensive claims, which are in lineups for years and years, a number of them are under negotiation. Once again, we have to make sure there is a fair system to deal with them that does not have them lost in the other business of the department, that there are enough resources that people are not waiting another generation to have their land claim and self-governance dealt with, that it is done in a fair manner and that there is some type of independent arbiter who actually makes the ultimate decision. Hopefully, we can move forward in that respect.

The last area is when there is a treaty, especially a modern treaty, and how we deal with the provisions to implement that. Having a land claim and a self-government agreement is not really the end of the road, as some people might think. It is actually the beginning of a great journey of governments together: the Canadian government; first nations governments; all aboriginal governments, Inuit and Métis. It is a starting point for a new government-to-government relationship. It is a living type of relationship; it is not set in stone. It has to evolve and unfold in good faith and in the spirit those agreements were signed so they can work and progress.

It does not matter how much legalese there is, nothing will work if the will is not there to make it work. To make it work changes have to be made, with modifications and provision of the resources and the good will to make them work.

In regard to some of the modern treaties that have been signed, there are a number of problems. The Auditor General has pointed them out. It is so significant that the first nations with modern treaties, many of them north of 60, have formed a land claims coalition, because their grievances are falling between the cracks. People think an agreement is signed and that is the end of it. Organizations and governments have other things on their plate and they forget that with these modern treaties the implementation process is not smooth, it is not financed, it is not finished. There is a lot of evolving to do and a lot of work to be done on the implementation.

It is pretty bad when so many hundreds of first nations people have to have an organization and conferences to try to bring their points and grievances to us. They need to be dealt with in good faith.

The funding amounts for these claims are not necessarily known on the first day the claim is signed. As an example, the negotiators in the Yukon claims, very wisely, put in a nine-year review period. They will go back after nine years and see that the money being transferred under the program services transfer agreements to each first nations government to run a program that was formerly run by the federal government is enough.

It was very wise that there would be a nine-year review. Unfortunately, just to use this as an example, we are now in the thirteenth year of the nine-year review. It should not take that long. They have done baseline studies, with both governments having officials involved, to study the gross expenditure base and exactly how much it takes to run those programs. It is time to get to the table to get those amounts resolved. As the member has said, the federal government has to provide a negotiator who will negotiate in good faith.

The point made to us is that over these many years, more years than it took to fight the first world war, the negotiators have constantly changed on the federal side and they came without a mandate from cabinet. These things are not going to make for progress.

Hopefully government officials have received that message over the last few weeks from the coalition and from our committee hearings, where we have dealt with this to some extent. I compliment the committee for bringing that topic up. I forget which member actually brought it up, but I commend that member for bringing it to all the members' attention.

Another example is that these particular modern agreements allow a first nations government to take on certain powers. That makes eminent sense. We have some great success stories of first nations delivering their own programs. Unfortunately, they seem to be endlessly roadblocked in taking on the powers that have been legislatively assigned to them.

We have one first nation that has been working on a particular power, and I do not want to point any fingers, for nine years now. The two world wars basically could have been fought in that time. That is to take on a simple power that is legislatively their right. Nothing should take that long. Maybe people have problems with the agreements, but we should have thought of that when we signed the agreements.

The agreements are laws. In fact they are stronger than the ordinary laws of the land, because they are constitutionally protected. The land claims, and in some cases the self-government agreements, are constitutionally protected, although not the Yukon agreements.

We have signed these agreements in good faith with the honour of the Crown. We should be implementing them in good faith. We should sit down, provide negotiators, hopefully with consistency, and with enough mandate and resources to come to an agreement so that first nations can take on these programs. I think we would all be pleasantly surprised, and we would benefit from the success stories that would evolve.

Some of these things in our history have not gone well. These new models obviously cannot be worse, and they could be great success stories for the country. There could actually be resource savings, for a lot of reasons I will not get into. Obviously it would save of a lot of human failure and lack of success stories. We would have new models that might work in those communities, if we simply put some spirit, some effort and some resources into the implementation of these claims.

I have had one member from my community suggest that we set up an independent commission, like the specific claims commission, to deal with some of these implementation problems, as opposed to having these negotiations go on forever. In fact it is funny that there would be a negotiation over something that is a right by law. Why do we not just have an independent decision and get on with it so these agreements can continue?

The bill we are talking about today is a good example of making a correction, but of course it took far too long. I know there are more grievances. A number of times in committee some administrative corrections were requested. I compliment the federal government. It seems to have committed that within a year the other details will be taken care of. We did not want to move forward until we got the assurance from the department that these other administrative improvements that need to be made in this area are going to be made.

The last point I want to make is that sometimes various departments of the federal government do not seem to be aware that when there is a relationship with another government of equal stature in certain areas, it is not just the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. These agreements are signed by Canada and a first nation. All the departments within the first nation have to abide by these agreements, but so do all the departments in the federal government.

If there is a responsibility to consult, as the last member spoke very eloquently about, it is not just the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development; it is the Government of Canada and all the departments. The Government of Canada has 50 or 60 departments and agencies. It is not only the department that can do things that could affect the rights of first nations, Inuit or Métis.

And just as a sideline, I hope the minister will give attention to the Yukon Métis association that met on the weekend and is looking for funding.

It is not just the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development that has to respect the responsibility to consult, because any other department or agency could do something that would impinge on the rights of aboriginal people. They have to be very aware that these modern treaties, which include a government-to-government relationship and a duty to consult, apply to all federal departments and agencies. I hope the officials who are listening from other departments will remember this and get up to speed.

It is a very complicated task, because there are a variety of agreements across the country that are all different. That is a benefit, because individuals and communities are different, but it also makes it complicated for administrators to know the responsibilities of the federal government and to deal in the honour of the Crown with each individual government and community.

It is a big task, but the progress being made in this bill is an example that the job can be done if everyone works together. For that reason I will be supporting this, and I will be looking for progress. Hopefully we will continue, as we do with specific claims in areas that still need to be dealt with, on comprehensive claims and the implementation of modern treaties.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for my hon. colleague, who has done a tremendous amount of work with first nations communities.

The Senate is doing a review of the Indian Act in Manitoba and other parts of Canada right now. It is going to first nations communities and asking the question of whether the Indian Act impedes their ability to build their communities to become economically self-sufficient and viable.

My personal view is that the Indian Act should be scrapped and that consultations should take place with first nations communities to determine how a structure can take place in order to create a relationship that is going to be mutually beneficial and productive. Certainly the status quo actually hamstrings the ability of first nations communities to develop.

I know that with first nations in my riding of Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, chiefs and councils have a terrible time with development. In fact, they have four to five times the amount of red tape as non-aboriginal communities and people who want to develop their land.

I would like to ask my friend whether he thinks a good route forward is to consult with first nations communities and remove the shackles that impede the ability of first nations to develop their lands.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very interesting question about whether the Indian Act should stay or not. I will give two answers to it.

First, last week we had an interesting speaker in the parliamentary restaurant, a professor from the University of Ottawa, and I asked her specifically about the Indian Act. She said that there were a lot of bad things in it but that there also were a lot of dependencies, that it was a government department that actually came through with certain items for first nations and that it was their contact in government. She had sort of a mixed view. The point is that it would be a very complex task but it should be looked at.

The second answer relates to the land claims that we have had in Yukon. Once one has been through a modern treaty, a land claim and a self-government agreement, the Indian Act no longer applies. My personal opinion is that the evidence of that is like night and day as to the results of the success stories. I used to go around to these first nations bands and find a cabin, may or may not find a shack and may or may not find a band administrator and that was about it.

Now that those bands have self-government agreements and land claims, they have modernized buildings, a modernized bureaucracy and they are delivering their own programs. All governments are receiving less complaints about the programs because they are being delivered right there in their villages. Many of their people are no longer unemployed because they are the bureaucrats delivering the programs to their own people.

It is a long road but it is like night and day and a great success story, which is the reason I say we should get on with comprehensive claims with all the first nations that would like to do it.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to engage the member in a dialogue around this bill in the context of the upcoming anniversary of the annual day of reconciliation on June 11.

In Manitoba, we just held a day of healing and reconciliation this past Saturday where a clear message was sent to me and others that this place needs to offer more than an apology to the aboriginal people of Canada for the trauma of the residential school experience, and that we really need to be acting very specifically and concretely on initiatives that will deal with the hurt and the systemic inequalities that now exist in the first nations, aboriginal and Métis communities.

I would like to know from the member how he sees this bill fulfilling that promise and what else we need to do in this place to actually show we are serious about national healing and reconciliation.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, the member made the excellent point that the apology was not really the end. It is like signing a land claim; it is actually the beginning. It is the beginning of recognition by every member of Parliament that there was a grievous mistake and grievous ramifications and effects not only to generation that went through it but to their progeny.

If we recognized that problem in the great ceremony we had here, then we also need to recognize that we need to deal with that problem. For instance, we cannot allow the healing fund to expire as if everyone is healed just because the apology was made. We cannot allow the reconciliation process, when it gets started, to be a sounding board and not have any action. The purpose of the reconciliation hearings will be to give us an idea of not only the effect it has had on people but what their ideas are of what we can do to mitigate those effects and help them get on with life.

The member certainly would have been moved by the ceremony we had in my riding a couple of weeks ago where they tore down an old residential school. What moved me was that virtually all the speakers talked about their chance for a new beginning, that, as the member said, if we give them the tools and the resources then they can leave the hurt in the past. It will never be gone but they can now get on with a new life. They are looking forward a new bright future, like all Canadians should have.

If we put that commitment into it, I think all of our citizens will move ahead to the benefit of all of us.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the member for Yukon, who I have known very well for many years, on the exceptional work he does on behalf of first nations. The member is always here and yet always gets home to see his family in Yukon on the weekends. I do not know where he gets his energy but it is much appreciated by the House that he is here to help with this important legislation.

My question for the member has to do with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. My understanding is that Canada is not a signatory. This came up in our discussions on Bill C-8 on matrimonial real property. The declaration includes such items as the rights of indigenous peoples to self-determination; to maintain and strengthen their distinct political, legal, economic, social and cultural institutions; to not be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of their culture; and, without discrimination, to the improvement of their economic and social conditions. The list goes on.

Those, to me, seem to be values that Canada should embrace and they should be reflective in legislation that we bring before this place as it relates to our first nations.

Does the member know why Canada is not a signatory to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and does he know whether or not the bill before us now, at least in spirit, reflects the principles underlying that declaration?

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, the member makes a very good point. I will not speculate on the technical reasons that the government has not signed it, but he talked about the values that are there.

As I said earlier in my response to the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, if one follows those values that occur in the self-government and land claims agreements in the modern treaties, such as the social values and the ability of first nations, maybe there is another answer. Maybe they have ways of running their own local justice system, as they have successfully for thousands of years. Maybe they have a different way of self-determination. Maybe they have different matrimonial property rights. Maybe they have a different way of looking at governance, where everything is not the individual, but one has collective rights.

One of their biggest arguments against Bill C-8 as it is written is that it does not recognize collective rights as a way of governing another people. The United Nations declaration points out all these points. As the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca said, our pilot projects in Canada in the modern treaties that got certain first nations away from the Indian Act have been very successful.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Is the House ready for the question?