In the case of both first nations, since June of 2007 the federal government has acted unilaterally and arbitrarily by changing the agreed upon approach to resolve our members' claims, without consultation and without our consent.
For Wolf Lake, this has meant removing them from the claims commission process and shutting down the commission, leaving us with no forum if Bill C-30 does not pass. For Timiskaming, this involves the apparent breach of a signed agreement that had been mandated by band council resolution. In both cases, these actions by the federal government have set back our members' efforts to have their claims resolved and have shaken our confidence in the process.
There is a lack of accountability and transparency in the way these things have been done. We cannot get answers or justification from SCB's actions. Without satisfactory answers, we consider SCB's conduct to be in bad faith. This kind of behaviour is of concern, and we ask if the committee can do anything to assist us in this regard, either by making appropriate inquiries or by mentioning these cases in your report.
All of this is in contrast to our experience with Bill C-6, which, for the record, we opposed. At that time, federal officials consulted with our members and provided assurances that the first nation claimant would decide whether to proceed under the new proposed legislation or stick with the process they were already in. We have seen no such effort to constructively engage our members this time around.
Since June of 2007, the Department of Indian Affairs could have used its dealings with first nations claimants to build support for its new approach by showing us how the changes will actually benefit our members. We would welcome the opportunity to work cooperatively with SCB in any way. Unfortunately, this has not happened, and instead, by its actions, SCB has done the opposite.
We agree that there is an urgent need to improve the existing policy and process. Certainly Bill C-30 is an improvement over Bill C-6, but many of the key unresolved issues have been put off to the political accord, and the commitments contained in that political accord remain as vague today as they were when they were announced in November 2007. We heard the federal government saying “trust us”, but this is a difficult proposition, given our most recent experience.
Once adopted, the bill will become law, but there is nothing to compel implementation of the political accord. We are not against reform of specific claims, but we do have legitimate concerns and questions, which have yet to be answered in a satisfactory way. If the bill does proceed, perhaps Parliament or this committee could play some kind of oversight role to monitor the federal government's handling of the transition, paying special attention to the front end of the process where the federal conflict of interest will remain alive and well.
One other important point is that whether Bill C-30 becomes law or not, the lack of resources within the federal government and on the first nations side must be addressed. Under the current framework, there are simply not enough resources to get rid of the backlog and support increased activity and negotiations. By the same token, the large agenda proposed by the federal government in connection with Bill C-30 cannot succeed without significant additional resources for both federal and first nations sides.
I would just like to comment briefly on one specific section of the bill as it applies directly to the Wolf Lake First Nation. Section 14 of the bill gives a definition of a specific claim. Paragraph 14(1)(c) says a claim may be filed with the tribunal for
a breach of a legal obligation arising from the Crown’s provision of reserve lands, including unilateral undertakings that give rise to a fiduciary obligation at law....
The Wolf Lake First Nation is one of five historic first nations in Quebec that do not have reserve lands set aside under the Indian Act for their use and benefit. So in our case, there was no provision of reserve lands. The wording in that section does not take our fact situation into account. This should be corrected by an amendment such as the one that was already proposed by the AFNQL in their submission, and it could read “referring to provision of or failure to provide reserve lands” instead of it just saying “or the provision of reserve lands”.
That's it.