Evidence of meeting #11 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was nacosar.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Coordinator, National Aboriginal Council on Species at Risk (NACOSAR)
Personally, I'm not aware of how much was originally established. Basically this recommendation is from the appendix that is to be submitted later on.
Conservative
Scott Armstrong Conservative Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS
I'm assuming that during your selection as the coordinator you had to provide some sort of vision or plan or strategic idea of what next steps you were going to take. Could you give me a brief rundown of what you see over the next three to six months, what you need to do to get this organization up and running to be an effective organization to support your vision statement?
Coordinator, National Aboriginal Council on Species at Risk (NACOSAR)
As a NACOSAR coordinator, I do have some discretion, but my vision is where I want to see the council go.
One of the first steps we need to take is to establish quorum. We need to have the appointments from the minister announced as soon as possible. We also need to have a meeting as soon as possible. I think the council has recommended May 20 and 21 to finish up unfinished business that we've had outstanding for quite some time.
At that meeting and in the three months, there are a number of points, which I brought up in my speaking notes, that I think would assist the council in regaining solidarity and focus on what we're actually meant to do, and that is to provide advice on the administration of the act to the minister. In doing that, we will gain the respect of the individuals who have lost faith in NACOSAR, but we will also gain more visibility, and I believe that visibility and communication are very important parts of outreach and of actually having the ability to do our job.
Conservative
Scott Armstrong Conservative Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS
I agree with you, and my advice to you as you're starting out in this position is that you should ask the ministry to make the appointments, get your council together, have a meeting, and then request a meeting with the minister, because you haven't had one in a while. That will automatically give you credibility, if you've had a meeting with the minister and you have your council together, to start representing the people you're supposed to represent across the country. Then you could maybe move into a sort of second phase, where you could approach the idea of having longer terms for councillors and the multi-year funding you're looking at to make your organization very effective. And of course you need some sort of structured access to the minister. I think those were the three things you mentioned in your comments that you were looking for to establish yourself as being very effective.
I really appreciate you coming today. I know you're off to a fresh start. I encourage you to be assertive and aggressive, and I'm sure we will do whatever we can as a committee to support you.
Conservative
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Thanks, Chair. It would be very helpful, I think, for the members of the committee to get some more information from NACOSAR. For example, are there annual reports? Are there financials available? I don't recall, Chair, through you, when NACOSAR was actually first formally constituted, what year that was.
It would be very helpful for us to get an idea of how well it has been working or not working, through those reports or through the financials. Are we able to get those, Chair, through you?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
Yes, I would ask that our witnesses, if they can, forward to us for consideration their annual reports. You did bring up the report from Treasury Board in one of your recommendations, and I was going to ask for further clarification of information that you could provide to us on what that really was.
Policy and Planning, National Aboriginal Council on Species at Risk (NACOSAR)
NACOSAR actually did complete a 2006-07 annual report, and as far as I know, staff at Environment Canada have distributed that.
Liberal
Policy and Planning, National Aboriginal Council on Species at Risk (NACOSAR)
I believe it was right after the act, 2003.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
It was 2003-04. Okay.
I want to thank Mr. Holman and Ms. Antonius for coming to committee and presenting on behalf of NACOSAR under short notice. Knowing also that you just stepped into your role, we do appreciate your providing...I know the corporate knowledge isn't there, but I know you're very qualified for your position. Congratulations on moving into the coordinator's role and looking forward to hearing from you in the future as well.
With that, we're going to suspend. I'm going to ask the committee to stay in here. I would ask everybody who's not tied to a committee member to clear the room so we can get back to business and discuss the report.
[Proceedings continue in camera]