Thank you.
Thank you for that information about the discussion that will take place in a couple of weeks.
You hit the nail on the head. As treaty Indians in the north, the difficulty is that we're treated differently than the people in the south. It's primarily because, for most intents and purposes, we're not on reserve lands. The reality is that our rights are mobile across the country, but if it's a question of property rights, then let's deal with that. If it's a question of the Indian Act, then let's deal with that. We're the only people in the country who need a public government and are unable to govern ourselves.
The other thing is that there's an absence of an economic plan. There really is no economic plan in Canada that we can call a Canadian economic plan. There are none in the provinces or territories. We need to develop a plan, much like we need to develop an environmental plan. Everything's proposal driven. If you look at the tar sands, which is south of us, we're downstream from all that. It's all proposal driven and 100% of the proposals that have been submitted have been approved. There's no future planning. It's just proposals. We need a plan and that plan needs to include first nation economies. What are the economies of the first nations? In the early days, there was a huge reliance on the fur trade. There's a huge transition now, but we need to look at that and work together with these gentlemen here and the other people around the table. It's a small population in the north. We need to use the dollars, so that it reaches all of us.
Thank you.