Evidence of meeting #65 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 consultation.
A recording is available from Parliament.
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
Yes, but this is not the be-all and end-all, here right now. My understanding is that it's still going to have to go to the Senate, and at that point there will be opportunity for more consultations.
Liberal
Carolyn Bennett Liberal St. Paul's, ON
You seem much more comfortable with the piecemeal approach than many other commentators. Would you rather have a full undertaking by the Prime Minister to replace the Indian Act with the fiduciary responsibility of the crown?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
As I've said, we've been down that road before under JMAC, which was excellent, the governance bill, Bill C-7, under Minister Nault at the time. God love him, he tried because he saw what the act was doing to us. Unfortunately, when you have various aboriginal peoples, not unlike Canadian society, we all have our different opinions and our different approaches to issues. This seems to be the only way that we're going to be able to deal with this: start targeting the little pieces right now, and then hopefully the treaty consultations that are occurring in processes across Canada will at some point overtake these and move us out from underneath this Indian Act.
Conservative
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
Thank you for the information you gave in some of your opening remarks and some of your responses to the questions. I found them to be very informative.
I want to talk a little bit about the question we keep hearing today about duty to consult and consultation. I take it that you would consider that your organization was consulted with respect to this particular piece of legislation?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
As I said, as soon as I found out about the bill, I contacted Mr. Clarke. I set up a meeting with him and his staff, along with my staff, to find out first of all what he was attempting to do. Then I went back, relayed the information to my board, gave them a full briefing, and asked them whether they wanted to go forth or what, and I was instructed accordingly. Mr. Clarke was invited to our annual general meeting and he was given free rein in the room, which included all my board, plus their boards and grassroots people who were there from the communities, to talk to them. From what I understand, he's been contacted and requested to go out, and has met with some of our communities.
These changes weren't a big shock to us because, as I said, we've already been through the governance act, C-7 under Minister Nault, and we were sitting on the JMAC committee drafting the changes to the Indian Act. So these aren't...
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
Were there some things that you wanted to see? Did you request that certain things be in this bill of Mr. Clarke's?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
I just told everybody today what I wanted to see. The last piece I'd like to see in there is not just reporting on the progress of amendments to the Indian Act, but also treaty updates. How are the treaty tables across Canada going? That's it.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
You said something that I found informative, that there are 633 federal Indian Act bands. I've never heard that description before, but it's useful in my mind. I knew the number. But you said “73 first nations”, and so—
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
—historical first nations.
You mentioned, for example, that in New Brunswick there are, I think you said, five reserves.
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
There are five Maliseet; the other ten are Mi'kmaq. Then we have our little friend down in the southern corner, close to the Maine border, called Passamaquoddy.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
If I wanted to consult—let's say I wanted to bring a private member's bill.... Everyone can exhale; I don't have a private member's bill on any of this. But if I did and I wanted to consult, would I have to consult with all five reserves?
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
So it wouldn't be just having consultations with 73 first nations. Are you suggesting that it would be with 633 federal Indian Act bands; that I'd have to have a consultation with each and every one of them?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
Currently, under the law that's what would be required, if they wanted to push it and challenge it, until we get our treaties back in place with our 73 historical nations. That would change the whole concept of consultation; then it would be with the nation.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
Did Mr. Clarke ask you for some input on this bill? When you met with him—when he came out to your organization—did you have particular suggestions for him?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
No, I didn't. I didn't speak to him that night, except to say hello and here is the room and thank you for coming. I invited Dr. Bennett and Ms. Crowder; they were also at the function. I left it for my board members and the members of the organization who were there to approach Mr. Clarke on their own.
I don't run interference, so if he was going to get it that night, he was on his own.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Brampton West, ON
Mr. Clarke seems to be open to input and changes to the bill. Do you believe that's true, and do you have any other suggestions for this particular piece of legislation?
National Chief Betty Ann Lavallée
The one I have put forth, at this point, is about reporting on the treaties. I think it's very important for aboriginal peoples across Canada to know what point various treaty tables have reached, because many of us, in particular those of us who live off-reserve, have been totally left out of the process. There have been no consultations whatsoever.
Right now there's a treaty table happening in New Brunswick, and I have not been involved in it whatsoever. Neither has the off-reserve population there; we've been totally left out, and so we have no idea. Even some of the people on reserve don't know what's going on with these tables. We're hoping that adding this will give us a general idea of where these things are going.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Chris Warkentin
Thank you, Mr. Seeback.
We'll turn to Ms. Hughes now for five minutes.
Carol Hughes NDP Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON
Thank you very much for appearing and for your input on this. I'm glad you were able to meet with Mr. Clarke, because that's not the case for everybody.
I have a chief who took the initiative to write to Mr. Clarke and Mr. Rickford with respect to a meeting on this. Although they were invited to their community, which is Whitefish River First Nation, what the chief got back was “Thank you for your letter” and no indication of whether or not they would attend the meeting to discuss this particular piece of legislation. Neither was there an invitation for him to come to Ottawa. I'm hoping he'll have an opportunity to come here to voice his concerns with respect to this type of legislation.
The other thing is this. As you indicated, you aren't a parliamentarian, but given the position you have, I guess you can say that you are political in some sense, because you have to take some stands on issues.
You also talked about the consultation piece and the treaty piece. In the past there have been two major attempts to remove the Indian Act. The first was the white paper authored by Jean Chrétien in 1969 that sought to assimilate first nations into mainstream Canadian society by scrapping the Indian Act and reserves.
Interestingly, Harold Cardinal and other first nation leaders published the red paper called “Citizens Plus”, which outlined the reply:
It is neither possible nor desirable to eliminate the Indian Act. It is essential to review it, but not before the question of treaties is settled.
And as you indicated, those treaty issues are still not settled.
The fact is that there are some problematical aspects of this bill. You talked about consultations. I'm trying to get some sense of this. You said that you had a meeting and relayed some information to your board; then you had a meeting, and I'm sure that not all of your membership was able to attend, given how vast Canada is. Isn't that right?
What percentage of your membership was able to attend this meeting to provide input?