Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, my name is Pat Marcel, elder and former chief of the ACFN. I address you today because of my grave concern, and the concern of my first nation, about the effects of industrial development, primarily oil sands development, on the woodland caribou and the wood bison habitat within the traditional lands of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation and the neighbouring first nations in the region. For your records, we have provided the committee with a paper on woodland caribou by Dr. Cormack Gates, written in the western scientific framework.
I'm here to talk to you as a traditional scientist about my knowledge of how we are losing the woodland caribou and the bison in our traditional lands. I'm also here to advise you there has already been significant impact on our first nation from oil sands mining, yet very little, if any, crown consultation has been initiated by the Government of Canada on these impacts.
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak to you today, because I feel the federal government is not living up to its responsibilities to consult on important matters such as the loss of bison and woodland caribou. These animals were a large part of our traditional livelihood and they were promised protection under our treaty rights.
Mr. Chairman, I was born and raised on the land. Ever since I can remember our people were nomadic and travelled after the herds wherever they moved. Until I started school I lived with my grandfather, who taught me a lot of the things I still cherish today. When I look at the woodland caribou, the perception is that every opportunity we get we are there to harvest. In the last 30 or 40 years, we knew there was a big decline in the woodland caribou, because the harvesters were reporting to the chief. We have not harvested any woodland caribou, as far as I know, for the last 40 years, yet the herd is disappearing. The impact of development that's completely wiping out their habitat is the reason.
The woodland caribou, according to some of the scientists, will not be in the boreal forest in northeastern Alberta within 100 years. That's pretty scary stuff. Even though we were not harvesting, it doesn't mean we weren't still protecting that herd. To put a herd like that to great risk in the name of development is something I cannot understand.
The Grand Chief alluded to all this development we're talking about being done without consultation. The Government of Alberta has the power to go ahead and cut down many trees, clear-cut everything, in northeastern Alberta.
Yet if I come to a body such as this, what kind of recommendations am I going to see? Am I going to go back and tell the chief and council that we are going to be part of something that's going to be developed in the future? We think right now it's not very good to be in the situation we're in, with absolutely no voice. The only voice we can have is threats to go to court and so on.
Now, when you talk about consultation, consultation is between two nations with equal representation, working with trust and belief in each other. If we don't have that, then we will really be lost.
The caribou is important, but the loss of habitat that is causing the great loss of all these animals is the reason for it. I'm sure most of you have seen Fort McMurray. I've seen you there, and in Fort Chipewyan as well. You know what I'm talking about when you see the total devastation of the oil sands mines and of SAGD into every corner of northeastern Alberta. We're now squeezed onto our reservations. What claim we had to traditional lands, Alberta says, no, you do not have access or claim to traditional lands. But that's not what it says in the treaty. That will be for another day of battle, I am sure.
On the importance of bison, that is really for me a tricky thing to deal with, because you have a national park, Wood Buffalo National Park, that has a herd of 5,000 bison. Anytime any animals escapes from that park, anybody is allowed to kill or harvest those bison. From my own travels in that area, I've seen helicopters being used to harvest bison and to haul them to the roads. It's not a very traditional way of doing business, or hunting.
The thing I really bring to this committee is that there's a herd that is close to one of our reserves that is being threatened right now by development. A couple of SAGD companies are there, and they admit that the bison are there on their leases. What is going to happen is that this herd will be completely harvested or cleaned out one way or another if you put roads in there. The only thing that's saving the bison right now is there is no way to get to them, and because they've been hunted to an extent where they're very spooked, they'll run at any sound.
But they have no protection whatsoever. Alberta refuses to say that they should be doing something about that herd. They say they belong to Wood Buffalo National Park, but that's not the case. That herd has been there for thousands of years outside of Wood Buffalo National Park.
I bring it up to the parks people and say, “Do a DNA test. Do something.” But it's nobody's intent to do anything. It is, again, first nations raising a concern, beating our heads against the wall. I don't know what it takes to get some help, for people to come not only to the rescue of these animals, but to protect some habitat, because the bison and the woodland caribou are so threatened. What has to happen? Is there going to be a habitat established where these two species can exist in the future? I certainly hope for this.
In summary, I would like to repeat that we are losing or have lost these two important species from our traditional livelihood. Yet despite numerous requests and demands from our first nation, there has been no crown consultation on this and other important issues.
Thank you for your time.