To support what the chief and the interim director general have said, the Government of Canada has two unfulfilled agreements, one it signed in 1991, a trilateral agreement with Canada, Quebec, and Barriere Lake. It was an alternative to the comprehensive land claims policy. It was to develop a resource management plan for over 10,000 square kilometres of the territory because it was on a very small, overcrowded reserve.
Quebec is still at the negotiation table. Clifford Lincoln, the former environment minister of Quebec and former member of Parliament, is the negotiator for Barriere Lake with the Government of Quebec, but Canada is still in breach of that 1991 agreement, and the 1997 agreement to rebuild the community.
The reason why the agreement was signed was that Canada tried to take out the custom chief, and for 18 months in 1996 and 1997, the community went without services, jobs, and everything. Part of that agreement was to compensate Barriere Lake, I believe, $2 million to cover some of the losses it incurred over that 18 months.
Canada never fulfilled that. It was Robert Nault who walked away from the agreements in 2001 under Prime Minister Chrétien. They were basically in a state of arrested development. They had actually started building roads on the reserve as part of that agreement to build new houses and expand, to enlarge the land base and stuff. Those roads are growing back in now because in 2001 they walked away from everything.
There have been no houses built. There is no land expansion. The diesel generators are operating at capacity, so they can't add any new houses onto it. The electrification and the expansion of the land base is all tied to any future development of the community.