People in Winnipeg...? There you go. Everything can be made better. That was 2001. Who was the government then?
Anyway, moving on to my third.... In the 37th Parliament, second sitting, the aboriginal affairs committee studied Bill C-7. Thirty meetings, thirty, and we can't get any. They got 30. From March 17, 2003, to March 26, 2003, and March 31, 2003, they went to 30 meetings. They went to 18 cities. Which ones you ask? I knew somebody would ask me which ones.
So that would be Red Deer, Alberta, lovely place; Nanaimo, B.C., good committee; Prince Rupert, B.C.; Prince George, B.C.; Fort McMurray, Alberta—you'd think there'd be some appeal from the other side there, they'd want to hear from Albertans but I guess not—Slave Lake, Alberta; Prince Albert, Saskatchewan; North Battleford, Saskatchewan; Regina, Saskatchewan; Sudbury, Ontario; Thompson, Manitoba; Winnipeg, Manitoba; Thunder Bay, Ontario; Toronto, Ontario; Halifax, Nova Scotia; Fredericton, New Brunswick; Montreal, Quebec; and Val-d'Or, Quebec.
That is a serious consultation. It's also very relevant because if you look at those cities, they are either areas where there are first nations reserves and therefore first nations people, or they are communities, urban centres, where aboriginal Canadians are living, first nations people.
I'm sitting beside someone who is an expert compared to what I might know about this. However, the issues for first nations people on reserve and in cities, while there are some overlaps of concerns in terms of ID and some of the formula there, a lot of it has to do with their rights in two different geographical settings. If I live on the reserve, it's one set. If I leave the reserve and I live in an urban setting, the rules are very different. Certainly my society around me affects me in a different way.
So that's why they went there. They could have made the argument the government is making here and said it's aboriginal affairs but we can bring in Chief Atleo and we can bring in everybody else we need and get a video link. Why do we need to go there? Why? Funny, nobody made the...and if they did make an argument then it wasn't the prevailing thought. The majority of them said no, are you crazy? We have a bill here about aboriginal affairs. It makes all the sense in the world that we better go out and talk to the Canadians that this affects. That's what they did. My colleague says respect. I said that word earlier and that's what's missing. That committee showed respect to the Canadians they visited. The government right now is not showing any respect.
Am I done, you ask? No. There are more examples—and all need to be mentioned to support my motion—that go on to explain and hopefully convince my colleagues why there are times when it is good for democracy for committees to travel. This is one of them. Another one was in 2003, citizenship and immigration again studying Bill C-18 and they held 29 meetings. They visited a dozen cities.