In response to the question of first nations participating in those programs as well, I think that we also need to address the fact that currently there's not enough funding for the first nations to be adequately prepared to take advantage of those programs, so that's a huge challenge for the first nations.
In our budget submissions, identifying those programs and providing support to those first nations in order to be prepared to take advantage of any programs the federal government puts forward is very challenging, so I might not be able to adequately respond to you, but I think that the mechanism we need to put into place is more important than addressing a specific program.
The pre-budget submission process for the 634 first nations that the AFN advocates on behalf of is not adequate for us to be able to provide the rationale for why we're asking for these priorities to be funded. I think that it's not an investment or a funding request. It is asking Canada to uphold its fiduciary responsibility and, by doing that, our mechanisms that we propose would be a new fiscal relationship whereby Canada negotiates and discusses collectively and collaboratively with the first nations in order to have a different, distinct, first nation-led process for its budget request.
I think as well that, with your permission—thank you for having invited us to present here—maybe I could yield some time to the national chief to do her closing comments.