No one has a copy of the document I'm going to read, so we'll take our time to try to make sure that we get all our points across.
First, I would thank to thank you, Madam Chair and committee members, for the invitation to speak to the standing committee on making amendments to Bill C-69.
My name is Chief Harry St-Denis, and I'm from the Wolf Lake First Nation. I'm here today with Chief Lance Haymond from the Kebaowek first nation. Today we represent two Algonquin first nations in Quebec.
We have provided a written brief as per the deadline, as I mentioned, with a number of recommendations and amendments for your review. I understand you haven't had time to read our brief due to the rushed timeline surrounding this push towards legislation, and as such, I will provide you with some background.
The Algonquin nation is made up of 11 distinct communities recognized as Indian Act bands. Nine are located in Quebec, and two are in Ontario. The Algonquin nation has never given up the aboriginal title to our traditional territory. This includes all the lands and waters within the Ottawa River watershed on both the Ontario and Quebec borders. Aboriginal title is held at the community level within the Algonquin nation. Our two first nations, along with the Timiskaming first nation, assert un-extinguished aboriginal rights, including title under section 65 of the Canadian Constitution.
Inherently, our lands and waters are part of the Anishinaabe Aki, a vast territory surrounded by the Great Lakes in North America. For centuries we have relied on our lands and waterways for our ability to exercise our inherent rights under our own system of customary law and governments known as Ona'ken'age'win. This law is based on our mobility on the landscape, the freedom to hunt, gather, and control the sustainable use of our lands and waterways for future generations.
That is how Europeans discovered us, as a well-established society in control of the Ottawa River watershed. We had a vast trade network supported by our own economy that included levying tolls on canoe flotillas that descended the Ottawa River from Morrison Island. We were not only the gateway to the continent but the technology provider of the only craft that could navigate the rivers ahead. In no other part of the world have water and the canoe had such a huge influence on both Algonquin culture and the development of its history post-European contact.
What we once knew and shared on our territories under treaties of peace and friendship with Europeans has been abused. Our ancestors never contemplated our territories to be industrial, nor has government legislation ever adequately protected us from industrial development. We continue to regard ourselves as keepers of our lands and waterways, with seven generations' worth of responsibilities for livelihood, security, cultural identity, territoriality, and biodiversity. This sentiment has been expressed by many other first nations to your committee.
These responsibilities stem from a history of traditional knowledge and governance on the land that provided our Anishinaabe identity as opposed to how we have been recreated by crown governments through such legislation as the Canadian Indian Act.
In response to your task of gathering information for Bill C-69 that ensures that environmental assessment legislation is amended to enhance our consultation, engagement, and participatory capacity in protecting our lands and waterways, one of our guiding recommendations is for your committee to look beyond the act itself and take into account other pieces of legislation and policy that further weaken aboriginal peoples' capacity to participate in the resource development review process, including and not limited to the federal comprehensive claims policy.
I am concerned here that various pieces of legislation, including this current proposal to combine previous legislation under an impact assessment act, will come together as an assault on indigenous sovereignty and protection of our land, air, and water. This cumulative policy effect could intentionally strip environmental protections across the country as resource development proceeds and colonialism completes itself.
Therefore, our nations are here today to seek a different but joint legislative approach with your government that provides a strong foundation for recognition, protection, and reconciliation of our inherent and constitutional rights and interests that is consistent with the articles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, now adopted by your government.
Today, in our presentation, Chief Haymond and I intend to give you a quick profile of our communities and our experiences related to environmental legislation on our territory, and briefly outline the problems we still have regarding Bill C-69. Specifically, we are asking the committee to make amendments to Bill C-69 concerning the following items: reconciliation; implementing indigenous institutions and a nation-to-nation relationship; troubleshooting provincial environmental legislation rather than simply relying on it; strengthening protection over our traditional waterways; and implementing indigenous knowledge and impact assessment.
Chief Haymond will now speak on three items, and then I will conclude.