Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and good afternoon to the honourable members of this standing committee.
I want to bring greetings on behalf of the Saskatchewan first nations chiefs, council members, our senators, our first nations veterans, and our membership.
I'll give you an overview of who we are and what we are. We are probably the oldest and longest-together organization in Canada. This year we are celebrating 61 years of existence as an organization. Call it an advocacy group, if you wish, but it's a treaty organization.
In Saskatchewan, 75 first nations were united in this effort to support Bill C-30. The approximate population of first nations status people is 122,000. I might add also that we do have a very young membership in our first nations population. Our average age is 23.
Some of these things that the Government of Canada is doing are fairly urgent. I'm very pleased to report to the committee that Saskatchewan first nations chiefs are certainly very supportive. We have attached a resolution, dated the middle of February, that fully endorses this and supports the work that was done by the joint task force.
I was very privileged, to say the least, to be part of that task force. One of our technicians, Jayme Benson, was also a member of one of those committees. I was privileged to serve along with our Assembly of First Nations colleagues on the legislation drafting committee.
I might just leave it at that for now, Mr. Chairman, and go to the nitty-gritty, if you wish. You do have copies of our presentation. It is a very short presentation.
I will say to you up front that I personally have served in the government for 30 years and also as a chief for 10 years, and I have never seen this high-level type of commitment from government to actually do something jointly with first nations in a very strategic and structured way. I applaud that. Certainly the political accord that was signed also gives us great hope that there will be work done, futuristic work done, based on mutual respect.
I just wanted to say those words as an opener, Mr. Chairman. If my colleagues here want to say something, I guess this would be the time to do it, with your permission.