Evidence of meeting #33 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was process.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
Thank you, Ms. Crowder.
Mr. Rickford, we'll turn to you for a short question.
May 1st, 2012 / 5:10 p.m.
Conservative
Greg Rickford Conservative Kenora, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the witnesses.
I think my residual questions after this great discussion are probably going to come up with the same result as my colleague Jean's and other questions that have been asked.
I'll go back to one thing, if I could, Warren. You were describing issues around third-party encumbrances. If I got my note down correctly here, you identified that a key issue is that most lands have third-party encumbrances. Many of them are not registered in any title process, for example, or certainly as government would go in terms of its roles at all levels. There may be other industries with some sort of bundle of rights or what have you, maybe even an individual person.
The trouble arises when there is no process to create or negotiate replacement agreements. I think you were probably more clear in using legal nomenclature; no instruments available, is what you said.
I can't help but think, based on your discussion today, that you might have a couple of solutions that are floating around in your work on the management public policy side. I know a couple of minutes won't do it justice, but I don't think I heard what some of them might be.
5:15 p.m.
President, New Road Strategies, As an Individual
There are two sides to this. The other problem for a lot of first nations that have difficulty, for example, with the designation process, or whatever they had to do in a pre-reserve designation to accept the third party...they won't select land with those interests on it because they know the difficulty they're going to have with the voting process and all that in their communities. So it's biasing the selections first nations have a right to under their claims agreements. They're trying to avoid those situations because there is no reasonable way of dealing with them. That's a point I would make.
The best idea I have heard is if first nations had available to them their own land-use planning bylaw and enforcement authorities, equivalent to any other municipality—we're not asking for anything special here, we're asking for the kind of stuff that any community in Canada has—if they had that, then if you have a potential land selection...I mean, take it to an extreme. So they have a settlement and they can now go and get x amount of land for reserve. They could mandate, through their land-use plan, the characteristics of this selection: we're willing to take land with third-party interests; we're looking for farm land; we're looking for residential development land in this area, or whatever it is. There is no reason why that—as it would be in any other municipal situation—couldn't be taken to be equivalent to the designation vote, and the land-use plan and the zoning be the instrumentation to replace the third-party interest.
If those instruments have legal standing, there's no legal risk to the existing third-party interest. So they're replaced. If I buy your land and there's an easement on it, I don't have to negotiate with the person with the easement; I only have to accept that easement. If the first nation had the authority to do the same thing, there would be no negotiation. Why are you negotiating the replacement of an interest? There's nothing to negotiate. You're simply replacing the instrument. You don't do it in any other jurisdiction. Why would you do it here?
These negotiations open all sorts of cans of worms. People are trying to say, now we can get something in this deal, and they drag on for a long time the first nation without the capacity to do it. I think you have an opportunity to get rid of much of that with decent authorities.
5:15 p.m.
Conservative
Greg Rickford Conservative Kenora, ON
I appreciate that.
I want to sneak in one final question more on the governance. So much of what we're talking about occurs in the context of specific claims, particularly in British Columbia.
I wonder if you could or would comment on some of the nuances and perhaps success stories coming out, particularly around additions to reserves, if there are any, in the context of specific claims, based on your experience, both in government and now on the management consulting side.
5:15 p.m.
President, New Road Strategies, As an Individual
I'm not sure what you're looking for here, but very early on, for example, in the TLE process in Saskatchewan, when the first urban reserves got created and the economic benefits to both communities became evident, there was some reticence at the beginning, and, let's face it, there's still a little bit of racism left out there.... When the economic benefits became evident from some of these early reserves, some of the major proponents and spokespeople for first nations urban reserve creation became the city planners and city councillors in Saskatchewan.
The more communication—
5:15 p.m.
Conservative
Greg Rickford Conservative Kenora, ON
The City of Prince Albert itself is what you're talking about.
5:15 p.m.
President, New Road Strategies, As an Individual
Yes, people like that.
At one point, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities had a committee that we worked through that was passing that good information around. Unfortunately, that doesn't exist.
The same thing happened to a number of first nations and to the provincial and municipal governments in the Atlantic when the Marshall funding was used to begin to help deal with the pitifully small size of the eastern reserves. The Quebec and Atlantic reserve sizes, relative to the west, are a shame. But when some money became available under the Marshall strategy to help deal with additions to reserve in the Atlantic, all of a sudden this became a major economic development issue for both the first nation and the communities they were participating with.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
Thank you, Mr. Johnson.
We'll turn to Ms. Hughes for a short question, if she has one.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
I think we've got some clarity on that, so thank you.
I would just ask...well, we've run out of time. Perhaps I shouldn't open another can of worms.
Ms. Bennett has a question.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal St. Paul's, ON
I was wondering if we could get Mr. Johnson a copy of the Library of Parliament questions for him to answer.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
We would happily accept answers from Mr. Johnson, but we have to recognize that Mr. Johnson isn't on our payroll, so we can't instruct him to do anything. However, if there are questions that you want to pass on to him, and if he were to then respond to the committee in writing, we would welcome that, but we certainly don't want to oblige anybody to do any additional work.
We're already thanking you for your time and for making your time available to us. It's already a very generous offer. Certainly, if there's something that you would like to provide in writing to—
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal St. Paul's, ON
I'll give him this and he can answer whichever ones he'd like.
5:20 p.m.
President, New Road Strategies, As an Individual
I can't say, not having seen the questions.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
Right, and certainly we wouldn't expect you to answer at this point in time as to whether or not you could do it, but we'd certainly be appreciative if you were to provide anything in writing.
5:20 p.m.
President, New Road Strategies, As an Individual
If it would be useful, it wasn't prepared as a brief, but my speaking notes had a fair amount of detail on some of the areas that were being questioned. They could be—
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
Yes, and I think we'd like to make that available. It's just an issue of making it available in two official languages, so that may take some time before we're able to do that.
In addition, of course, Mr. Johnson has a number of different reports that he has been involved in, so people should make those available to themselves. I know that working with your staff you can probably get a hold of that.
Ms. Hughes.
5:20 p.m.
NDP
Carol Hughes NDP Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
Briefly, and as a follow-up to the meeting we had last week, I was wondering if those communities got a heads up as to what we were going to talk about. I am wondering because while we were at the communities, it seemed that they didn't have a summary of what it was we wanted to talk to them about. That's the feeling I got.
If that wasn't done, I would suggest you do it for the next group, please.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
That was done, Ms. Hughes. I'm certain I didn't get that impression, but if that was your impression, just be assured that they were given full documentation as to what the committee was undertaking.
Thank you so much, Mr. Johnson and Vice-Chief. We want to thank you for your generous contribution to this committee's hearings. We certainly appreciate you making your time available and giving us the answers that you did. Thank you so much.
Committee members, we don't have committee business that we thought to entertain today, so that will be moved over to the next meeting. I believe there's some committee business that we want to undertake before we travel again, but that has not been prepared.
I'll adjourn the committee.