Evidence of meeting #37 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was tourism.
Conservative
LaVar Payne Conservative Medicine Hat, AB
So there are still a number of others, I take it, that are under question?
Conservative
LaVar Payne Conservative Medicine Hat, AB
Okay. Thank you for that.
Ruth Massie, I was quite interested in your comments about the communities. How many communities would be affected by this Alaska pipeline?
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
Altogether it would be nine, although today, with the aboriginal coalition, we only represent five self-governing first nations. The other first nations prefer to do their own work, although we do share all of our information and our research with them and we answer as many questions as we possibly can. And we also have a newsletter and a website that provides a lot of information for them.
Conservative
LaVar Payne Conservative Medicine Hat, AB
Okay. I'm kind of a logical type of thinker, and I'm certainly not familiar with the communities or the culture. However, the view I would take is that each community should be having its representative and talking with the proponents of the pipeline. Then potentially those members of those communities, whether they're on their council or just however that's worked, would certainly be able to share freely with the other communities.
The other thought I would have around that whole process is that these communities should be putting the onus on the potential developers of the pipeline to get that information or not to bother talking to them. I don't know if that's even feasible or not.
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
Yes, you're correct with the communities being unique to each other. For the APC, we only provide information and research. We do not negotiate for the communities; they do their own. We just prepare the information for them, so they can get themselves prepared for any type of negotiation that they would have with industry or other governments.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Thank you, Mr. Payne.
Mr. Bevington, do you have another question? You're up next on the roster here, although you didn't put your hand up. If you want some time, please go ahead.
NDP
Dennis Bevington NDP Western Arctic, NT
I'm always grateful for the time you give me, Mr. Chair.
I have one question for Ms. Massie. How much negotiation has taken place with any of the nine communities or any of the first nations with either of these pipeline companies?
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
Some of the communities are talking to industry. I don't believe there's any negotiation happening right now. APC has provided information in the guidelines project on some of the proponents within the agreements that industry is wanting to negotiate, but our communities are just learning about this industry and the components of negotiations preparedness, so there aren't any negotiations. I do believe the Kaskas are preparing. South of Whitehorse they're a little bit more advanced than the other communities with the oil and gas industry. But each community will eventually do its own, unless they ask APC to assist them in preparing some of that.
What we've done is prepare a guidelines project to show them the components of the process. That's as far as they are right now.
NDP
Dennis Bevington NDP Western Arctic, NT
If I look back on the experience that I've seen with the Mackenzie Valley pipeline, I think you'd be in a really good position. I think the companies could probably support that too, because you would be creating a knowledge base that would be uniform between the communities. The understanding of how that would work would be accessible to the companies as well.
To me, it seems like a good thing to invest in at this time, to simplify things. I went through quite a bit of the pipeline process early on, before we had a proponent. Although there was a favoured group, the sense of interplay in the communities was not healthy, between the different proponents for the pipeline. So I'd say that what you're suggesting has a lot of merit, moving forward.
NDP
Dennis Bevington NDP Western Arctic, NT
Ms. Byram, you really don't have competition for the money that the United States government provides for the Alaska Highway. What about the sections within Alaska? Have you built on those sections?
Vice-President, Pelly Construction Ltd.
Oh, no, we do have competition for the Alaskan money. It's just not the Alaskans who have come over but of course there are a number.... It would be the same people who bid on the work this summer, brought out by YTG. I think there were probably eight or ten bidders, some from the Yukon, some from B.C. So all along the highway, there would be lots of bidders.
NDP
Dennis Bevington NDP Western Arctic, NT
Going back to the Northwest Territories, we have a number of companies within the Northwest Territories that are working right now from other provinces on major infrastructure programs. The relationship they strike in order to do that is something I think you might examine.
Vice-President, Pelly Construction Ltd.
Yes, we were over there, and it was a pretty brutal experience for us. I can't see us going back. Maybe if we could get some good partnerships, perhaps.
Vice-President, Pelly Construction Ltd.
Yes, yes, a good place for the Porcupine aboriginal company to go.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Thank you very much, Mr. Bevington.
I'll take one of the government spots here, if I may. I want to come back to some questions, actually to Ms. Massie, in regard to your organization. The basic question that you posed was when is the Government of Canada going to consult and begin to take the potential development of this highway pipeline project more seriously and get engaged with you?
In the course of answering some of your questions, I think you did allow that there is some activity going on. So I wanted to ask you.... Your organization looks like a bit of an information clearing house that supports the individual eleven communities that are along this proposed route. Do you currently then get supported by the Government of the Yukon and the first nations? Where do you get your income to sustain what you currently have?
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
Right now we only have three staff members. Pearl is one. Then we have someone who does our communications and research for us, and an office manager. We do receive support from the Yukon government by an annual contribution of $200,000. We have written proposals to some of the INAC programming, and we did receive $104,000 for a guidelines project that was information for our communities going forward. They also support printing of our newsletter, which we do annually, and of course they support our website, and we try to get as much information on the industry and the proponents of the industry and provide that.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Who are the two companies? Are you at liberty to divulge the two proponents you mentioned?
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
Yes. One is TransCanada. It is at the pre-application stage. The other is Denali. TransCanada is a well-known pipeline company that builds pipelines across this country and around the world. The other proponent, Denali, is actually the producers group that owns the gas.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
You probably know more about this than we do, but so we understand, are these two organizations more or less competing at this point for proposals, or are they doing it jointly? How would you describe that?
Chair, Alaska Highway Aboriginal Pipeline Coalition
They are both competing in a filing application process, and they are going through the regulatory process and the application process. Governments will decide through FERC, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in the United States, which is the federal environmental regulation commission. In Canada, the Government of Canada will determine who is awarded this project. There are two Canadian agencies that are also involved. One is CEAA, which is the regulatory process for TransCanada, and the other one is Northern Pipeline Agency. And there is the National Energy Board.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Have you done any forecast projections? Presumably this project is moving along. There does seem to be some progress. At some point in the future this could become reality. Have you looked ahead to see what potential economic benefit that project would bring to this region?