Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Nov. 19th, 2009

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

In percentage terms, approximately how many are successful?

[Fred Koe]

I believe it's 70% to 80%. That's a real rough estimate.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

That is a far better success rate than we see back home. When venture capital is involved, the success rate back home is 35% or 36%. I encourage you to keep up the good work.

[Fred Koe]

It might be a little high, but we know our customers.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

With an 80% success rate, it's not a question of venture capital, but rather of guaranteed capital.

Mr. Beaulieu—

[Fred Koe]

You don't have enough of it. That's the problem with it.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

I want to commend you, Mr. Beaulieu, because your company is 100% owned and operated by aboriginals. What are your company assets? Have many employees are on the payroll?

[Darrell Beaulieu]

Our core office has about six or seven people, but we do have subsidiaries where we own a majority, such as Shehtah Nabors Drilling. We have four drilling rigs, four service rigs, and one other rig. When we're fully going we could have well over 100 to 200 employees. But as you know, the oil and gas industry has been low, so we have a couple of rigs going, and we're probably down to about 30 employees.

We have the art store, and we do service 160 remote telecommunications sites from northern B.C., Yukon, NWT, and Nunavut. That doesn't take many employees, but it will go up to ten to a dozen.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

My next question is directed to the two chiefs.

You say that you control 51% of the GDP of the NWT, and that you are not receiving any mining royalties. Who is receiving these royalties?

[Chief Ted Tsetta]

What we're referring to is when you see $200 million a year profit and you get $1 million out of that $200 million. That's what we meant. We're not getting anything at all at the end. At the same time, we are left with the social impact at home, here in the Yellowknife area, in the smaller communities. The impacts that are left behind from these diamond mines are so humongous. It's very, very hard to explain the impacts that are involved with these mines. That's what I was referring to.

I hope I'm clear with that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you.

Chief Nitah, you wanted to add something there. Please go ahead.

[Chief Steve Nitah]

Thank you.

To answer the question, the majority of the royalties are collected by the federal government, and a small percentage that's collected is shared with the signatories to the comprehensive land claim agreements outside of the Inuvialuit agreement.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Merci, Monsieur Gaudet.

Chiefs, I appreciate it.

I have two quick questions, one from Mr. Clarke, followed by Mr. Bevington.

Mr. Clarke.

[Rob Clarke, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, witnesses, for being here today.

You made an important comment there, Darrell. It's not a handout; you just want a hand up. My chief in Muskeg Lake, which is in Saskatchewan...my riding basically comes right up to and touches your territory.

Fred, you made some comments here. You said $12 million to 200 individuals since the term.... You currently have 60 clients. Now, you mentioned a mentoring job sharing program. Does that deal with just trades, or are we looking at individual trades such as electrical, plumbing, finishing, carpentry, all the way up to individual projects in the mines--the diamond mines, the gold mines? In effect, is that mentoring program in all aspects across the territory?

[Fred Koe]

I'm referring to mentoring for small businesses. The trades and the mines have their own programs for training skilled workers. My comment was regarding small businesses. What happens, as we all know, is we get a professional tradesman who is very good at whatever he or she does and who wants to go into business. Pretty soon you're doing contracts, and pretty soon you can't work your trade because you're too busy filling out forms for various government agencies. The cycle goes on and then your business collapses because you can't do the work. That's where we need help.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Clarke.

Mr. Bevington, you'll have the last question tonight.

Go ahead, Mr. Bevington, a short question, two minutes maximum.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Sure, really short.

We've gone through the process with three diamond mines, three major corporations. The federal government, to my mind, handed them the resource on a silver platter, and certainly we did manage to get some jobs and business opportunities out of it. But that's basically it for the Northwest Territories. Just like everyone in the Northwest Territories, we didn't do all that well from it.

Now, in the Akaitcho territory, you're setting up mineral exploration guidelines. You're entering into discussions as well with other mining opportunities there. Do you sense that the industry itself is willing to listen to what you're saying? Do you get the sense that you're getting some response at least from the industry on this?

To my mind, the federal government has been missing the boat on this for the whole time that we've seen the development of the Slave Geological Province.

[Chief Steve Nitah]

Thank you for that question, Mr. Bevington.

Yes, we certainly have seen positive reaction from the majority of the industries that are interested in the Akaitcho territory. Being a former MLA, a current chief, and a former employee of Diavik Diamond Mines and some exploration companies, I have a pretty clear understanding of the needs of industry and the needs of the people I represent.

Both sides want clarity and certainty. Through our development tools, such as the exploration agreements, we at Akaitcho are providing that certainty and clarity. We find that the industry is responding quite well to that. That's what they want. They want the landowners to make decisions they can live with. Right now, what they see in the federal bureaucracy and policies is a boondoggle of uncertainty, and they don't know who they're talking to and what they're going to be asking and so on. By being positive and proactive, we find that the relationship with the industry is pretty positive.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Merci.

Thank you very much, Mr. Bevington.

That will finish up our meeting. I must say to all of you that we appreciate your coming here tonight.

Chiefs, we really want to wish you well in your travels. I understand you have some travels in front of you yet tonight, and I want to wish you well for your continued deliberations at your meetings this evening. This was a very informative panel for us. We'll appreciate receiving and going through the materials you've presented here. We'll get them translated and then properly distributed to each of the members. But the points you raised here this evening are very important and will be given a very careful look in the weeks and months ahead as we continue with our study, which will take us well into the early part of 2010.

We bid you well in your work ahead and hope that our paths will cross in the near future as well.

Mr. Beaulieu, you had another point.

[Darrell Beaulieu]

Yes. I just wanted to share something, just a quick little blurb here. Thirty-nine years ago there was a Minister of Indian Affairs who stood in front of the Standing Committee on Finance in the Government of Canada. You probably all know him. His name was Prime Minister Chrétien, and he made a statement to the Standing Committee on Finance about the Northwest Territories, saying that if there's any benefit from any of the resources that are extracted from the Northwest Territories, it should first go to benefit the residents of the Northwest Territories. That's 39 years ago, and for 39 years we've heard comments from each aboriginal leader, etc., continually saying we need to benefit from this.

I just wanted to reiterate that: 39 years later it's still an issue.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

That's either a great way of saying just how patient we have become, you have become...but it really does underscore the importance of the work we're all engaged in, and we really do appreciate the time you've given us. We'll take great interest in what you've given us here tonight.

Thank you very much.

Just before I bang the gavel and adjourn, there are a couple of administrative notices.

Members, you'll know that tomorrow we're getting the bus outside the hotel here at 8 o'clock. Our first site visit is at Aurora College at 8:15, and breakfast will be at Aurora College.

Thank you, Mr. Russell, for reminding me, so no need to go out and have a full score, five-course breakfast before we head to Aurora College. I think they will feed us well.

Pardon, monsieur Gaudet.

[Roger Gaudet, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Chair, I want to apologize in advance for tomorrow. My colleague Mr. Lévesque and I will be unable to accompany you. I'm very disappointed, but I do want to thank the interpreters, the analysts, the technicians, the clerk and the logistics crew for their hard work. I think we've spent a fine week together. I will see you next Monday.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

I'm delighted that you said that, as a matter of fact. It occurred to me over the last few days that the work--Mr. Russell's wanting me to bang the gavel here, but we're still talking--we've done here just could not happen without this tremendous team that we have with us from the House of Commons. These are all people who work in the House of Commons when we're not out travelling on the road. They include our sound and logistics people, our interpreters, our clerk here, and Mr. Gauthier here, who is from the Library of Parliament. It takes in fact a team about the same size as the number of MPs. And I don't know what that says about the MPs when you have one assistant for each and every one of us, but as I'm sure you know as well in your organizations, it takes a tremendous group of people to achieve success.

So I thank you, Mr. Gaudet, for pointing that out, good for you, and we owe them all a great compliment as well.

Chief Nitah.

[Chief Steve Nitah]

Thank you. I just wanted to make an observation.

One staffer per MP--it's almost like one bureaucrat for every person in the Northwest Territories.

[Some hon members]

Oh, oh!