No, I don't think it can. I think that ultimately federal politicians definitely have a role to play in helping to bring about positive change for first nations people in Canada, but I don't believe that the role is to dictate what is to take place in first nations and other indigenous communities.
Rather, once first nations have a model and a system that's based in their culture and that is applicable in the contemporary realities of funding agreements and bylaws and things like that, once we have a system like that, then I think the role of federal politicians is to support those things to figure out what sort of allocation of resources makes sense and to figure out this idea that I mentioned of an interface between Canadian law and indigenous law.
I think that the contemporary role for federal politicians, if we want to get the relationship right, is to collaborate and not to dictate. It's to identify where things are going right, to see who is actually taking concrete steps towards improving their communities and to work with them. If we're going to continue to have a one-directional conversation, then that does not represent a step forward in the relationship; rather, it's a continuation of the relationship that has been the norm in Canada for the past 140 or so years.