Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on April 13th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We're right at time. Thanks, Mr. Viersen.

We'll go to Mr. van Koeverden, our last speaker, for five minutes.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I really appreciate everybody being here. Thank you for your leadership. Thank you for your guidance. Thanks for your recommendations. I'm quite in awe of the work you've all done.

To my colleague MP Gazan, on your comment regarding disagreeing, I find myself sitting here and agreeing with you all the time. I hope it's mutual. I pretty much agree with you on this issue and most others almost all the time.

That said, there are some things that I've disagreed with and that I think a lot of us have disagreed with. I'm hoping that you can emphasize some of the mischaracterizations or a little bit of the co-opting of ambiguities that I don't think really exist.

My question is perhaps for Madam Turpel-Lafond—I could tell she was anxious to answer the previous one, so I'll just give her the floor there—or really for whomever would like to take it. The question is about two things. That's the co-opting or sort of mischaracterization of an indigenous perspective as somehow unanimous, and the continual mis-characterization of FPIC as being a veto or a roadblock in the way of progress.

I'll let you take it from there.

[Dr. Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond]

Sure. I'm happy to just say that it is fearmongering to suggest that somehow the rights of indigenous people will make the Canadian economy not work. To point to British Columbia and say that is particularly laughable and inaccurate. I'm in British Columbia, and I've worked very closely on the implementation of the declaration. An unprecedented number of mining permits went forward with the support of first nations. In fact, the implementation of the declaration has clarified the rules and operationalized the rules in a new, respectful sort of structure. We're seeing a lot of good work emerge. That's absolutely the case.

Your other point was about the tokenism and the suggestion that a single indigenous person who may be opposed or whatever to something represents all indigenous people. Of course, you as a committee will hear from not only the chiefs and leaders of the Assembly of First Nations but also from other organizations. You will hear from the representatives of the indigenous governments.

Fundamentally, this bill is about changing how the Government of Canada works so that the Government of Canada and Parliament can get their relationships lined up in the post-colonial structure not based on these Indian Act and other concepts that have constrained us. We need to keep the focus on what's happening here. This bill is an important piece of Canadian legislation that can help restructure things so that many of the disputes we're talking about that are roadblocks will be removed and will usher in a new era. No single bill will be perfect, but let's be really clear about what the bill does. It certainly doesn't deserve the kind of fearmongering that certainly we've heard about free, prior and informed consent.

[National Chief Perry Bellegarde]

I would add that before governments try to build anything, they must first build the respectful relationship with the rights and title holders. That will prevent blockades and legal challenges. You'll find sustainable development projects going forward once that happens. That's the key: Joint decision-making, full involvement and inclusion of the rights and title holders, that's what this speaks to.

To me, that creates economic certainty. It creates provinces and territories that are ripe for investment. That's really good for the economy, and that's what we want to do, because first nations, again, are starting to strengthen equity ownership in major projects. They are moving beyond the impact benefit agreements and revenue-sharing things. We're looking at equity ownership, but in sustainable development, going forward. As long as the rights and title holders are fully involved with the different levels of government and industry, you'll find that good, sweet common ground. That's really what that speaks to.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, and we'll make sure the comments are in bold in the report.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

I want to thank all of our witnesses today. This has been a really valuable exercise, and we have a lot to think about. We also appreciate the documents, as I mentioned earlier, provided by Chief Bellegarde. Submitting those, and having them in front of us, will help us as we make our deliberations.

We will suspend briefly to arrange our next panel.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

We'll resume now as we have quorum.

By video conference, from the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, we have President Natan Obed, accompanied by Tania Monaghan, senior legal adviser.

President Obed, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Natan Obed, President, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami]

Thank you so much, Chair.

It is very good to be here with you all this morning for such an important topic. I believe you have the submission we sent along yesterday.

I am the president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the national representational organization for Canada's 65,000 Inuit. We live primarily in Inuit Nunangat. Our homeland spans approximately 35% of Canada's land mass and approximately 75% to 80% of Canada's coastline. We have been instrumental in protecting Canada's sovereignty in the Canadian Arctic. We have signed modern treaties, or land claim agreements, with the Government of Canada, and we do not fall under the Indian Act.

We have had many colonial experiences that are consistent with the treatment of first nations and Métis. We have many things that are unique about our relationship with Canada and our relationship with the provinces and territories in the ongoing colonization and, now, in the ongoing reconciliation process in this country.

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami welcomes Bill C-15 as a promising opportunity to close legislative and policy gaps that contribute to human rights violations against the Inuit, as well as for preventing discrimination and providing recourse and remedy for human rights violations experienced by our people.

ITK worked positively and constructively with the federal government on the development of Bill C-15 within a relatively short time frame for legislative development and within the parameters of the government's legislative mandate. Recognizing these limiting factors, Bill C-15 should be further strengthened by amending it to include provisions that enable the creation of an independent indigenous human rights commission. We liken this to having something that is very good and making it even better. The amendments that we have tabled are improvements upon our already positive support for Bill C-15, as we had already provided support for it upon first reading it.

Federal legislation is necessary to implement the UN declaration in Canada. While many articles of the UN declaration are already recognized as binding rules of customary international law, affirmation of the UN declaration in domestic statutes provides additional guidance on the legal effort of the rights affirmed by the UN declaration. In the absence of legislation, indigenous peoples are likely to continue to seek implementation of the UN declaration in courts and in administrative tribunals.

The UN declaration fills the gap that previously existed in the international human rights regime as an instrument that promotes and protects the distinct status and rights of indigenous peoples. The adoption of the UN declaration by the UN General Assembly curbed attempts by traditional international law to subsume indigenous peoples and entrench a colonial view of indigenous nations, peoples and communities. After 25 years of dialogue and negotiation between indigenous peoples and member states, the international community managed to finalize every article affirmed in the UN declaration.

Human rights experts associated with the UN recognized this gap in the human rights regime. Indigenous peoples worked to create political pressure to respond to the alarming and urgent human rights violations facing Inuit in the Arctic and indigenous peoples elsewhere in the world.

In this regard, it must be noted that Inuit representatives prioritized this work through the Inuit Circumpolar Council. Representatives of the Inuit Circumpolar Council worked, from 1982 until the UN declaration in 2007, as leaders in a global indigenous movement for the UN to consider and ultimately adopt the UN declaration. We were motivated by the need to develop a human rights framework that safeguards our people and the integrity of our communities.

It's important to note that the rights affirmed in the UN declaration are not new rights; rather, they are rights that have been recognized in domestic law in numerous countries across the globe and in international law. The outcome of the UN declaration provides the distinct cultural context of indigenous peoples, both as individuals and as collectives, with important economic, social, cultural, spiritual, gendered and political rights that are responsive to our distinct status and rights as indigenous peoples.

Bill C-15, as you see before you, is very focused on two particular concepts: one, the alignment of laws and policies within this country with the UN declaration; and two, the creation of an action plan. We do hope we can focus this conversation and ensure that everyone who's reviewing it and everyone who considers it sees this as filling a gap in our human rights review, in the Canadian domestic human rights regime. Indigenous peoples' rights are human rights. This is a class of human rights that needs this particular legislation, and we do hope that Canadians accept the rights of indigenous peoples as human rights in this country.

Nakurmiik. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you very much, Mr. Obed.

The first round of six-minute questions goes to Mr. Viersen, Mr. van Koeverden, Ms. Gill and Ms. Gazan.

Mr. Viersen.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to Mr. Obed for appearing today. We appreciate it when he shows up.

The crux of the bill is part four, the purpose of the act. There are two parts to that. It talks about affirming the declaration as a universal human rights instrument with application in Canadian law. The second is providing a framework for the Canadian government to implement that declaration. The Conservatives have no issue with the implementation of the declaration as a framework, as an aspirational document. We have an issue with the introduction into Canadian law of new concepts and new words that have not been tested by our courts.

As somebody who's worked on several private members' bills, I know the difference between the way I say things and the fact that, often, when the legislative drafters come back with it, I have to ask why they have used a certain word, and they say it's because that word has been tested by the courts. They know what it means. The words I wanted to use haven't been tested by the courts, particularly around the idea of free, prior and informed consent. That terminology sounds a lot like the duty to consult, but it is different terminology, and we haven't tested it in the courts.

I'm wondering, Mr. Obed, if you'd be interested in commenting on the application of the instrument in Canadian law. From my perspective, will that not introduce new terms and concepts that have not been tested in court and will lead to more court challenges and court decisions that will have to be hard fought and hard won in the future, particularly around large energy projects or large infrastructure projects?

[Natan Obed]

Thank you for the question. It's great to see you as well.

In our journey, Inuit have tried to work productively with Canada and with the provinces and territories where Inuit live since we were forced to. We have made many constructive arrangements with the Government of Canada through land claim agreements and other mechanisms that allow for our human rights to be respected, but that also allow for natural resource extraction, education or government administration to happen in a way that is consistent with the international human rights regime.

Yes, there is still a reckoning for Canada and this bill is a part of it. It's one of the main reasons this is so important. It's so that Canadians will understand and recognize that there is still work to do to respect indigenous peoples' human rights and that there are classes of Canadians who do not have the same access to recourse and remedy for violations of human rights as other Canadians.

There's been a lot of conversation back and forth around the risks associated with the adoption of this particular piece of legislation for particular sectors. I'll echo some of the statements that were made in previous sessions, where a stronger foundation of respect for indigenous peoples' human rights leads to a stronger economy and a stronger foundation. Any corporation that wishes to work with indigenous peoples or on indigenous peoples' lands will be in a place to be more prosperous, not less.

That said, Inuit, in relation to first nations and Métis, have much more clarity around a number of these foundational steps. Our land claim agreements should be upheld and seen as ways in which the rest of the country can work with first nations and Métis, especially in resource extraction, in governance or in relationships with government.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you.

Again, I'm tripping over the difference between free, prior and informed consent and the duty to consult. Those questions have been quite answered in Nunavut, for example. Would it not be more helpful to maybe have that in the clarification part of this bill, where we just say that, for greater clarity, free, prior and informed consent and duty to consult are equivalent terms?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

You have 30 seconds.

[Natan Obed]

Yes.

Again, the UN declaration is an amalgamation of existing human rights that indigenous peoples have. The interpretation of an international instrument is another thing. Whether Canada likes it or not, indigenous peoples globally have the right to free, prior and informed consent. I think that's the most important concept here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thank you very much, Mr. Obed.

We go to Mr. van Koeverden for six minutes.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Hi, Mr. Obed, and Ms. Monaghan. Thank you very much for joining us today. It's lovely to have you with us.

In place of an acknowledgement, I just want to acknowledge the tremendous impact the Inuit invention of the kayak had on my life. There's no single thing that has provided my life with more purpose. That's because the Inuit invented something that I've enjoyed for my whole life. Nakurmiik for that.

There are a couple of big, fundamental issues some members of this committee have really struggled with developing any sort of consensus around. In the previous hour, we heard from Chief Bellegarde and others about the lack of ambiguity between the terms “free, prior and informed consent” and “veto” and others. Another large stumbling block that my colleague indicated we seem to be tripping over is the acknowledgement of systemic racism, solutions for systemic racism and some of the things that systemic racism has led to.

In previous visits to this committee, Mr. Obed, you've talked about systemic racism having a significant impact on poverty and the injustice in Inuit Nunangat. I know this bill and the UNDRIP won't solve all of those problems, but I would love to hear from you on ways that you can imagine UNDRIP getting us a little bit closer to that mutual ambition of a far less racist Canada that will provide more economic and social mobility and greater human rights to all Inuit.

[Natan Obed]

Thank you for the question. It's great to see you as well, Adam.

I can't help but think right away about the link between free, prior and informed consent and education or language. It isn't just natural resource extraction that we're talking about and which indigenous peoples have the right to.

Think about how in this country there are places where there is a society with a dominant language that is not English or French, with land claim agreements and with relationships with the Government of Canada, but no recognition of Inuktitut, our language, as an official language of our homeland by the federal government. We're not talking about a few people here and there who have somehow managed to maintain an indigenous language. We're talking about entire regions of Inuit Nunangat whose dominant language is Inuktitut: the language on the streets, the language in the house.

This country still does not recognize and do what it has to in order to uphold our linguistic rights in the education context, the workplace context and the administration of services. These are the types of things that over time the UNDRIP legislation, hopefully, will allow us to address more substantially than we have in the past. We went through five years of indigenous language legislation conversations, and ultimately Canada could not find a way to figure out how to uphold our indigenous linguistic rights in our homeland.

This type of legislation will allow for a greater foundation to have those conversations and to demand, especially at the federal level, that the recognition of our existing human rights include the recognition of our rights to use our language in our communities and also in the way in which we interact with the federal government.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you.

Ms. Monaghan, would you care to comment at all on any of the legal matters that may be specific to Inuit Nunangat and Bill C-15 that we may have missed from the AFN? I'm not a lawyer, so I can't really ask you an appropriate question, but I would ask for your insight.

[Tania Monaghan, Senior Legal Advisor, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami]

Thanks for including me in the questioning.

I think what is an important point to make from an ITK perspective is that we've already looked towards what work we can do in terms of identifying Inuit priorities throughout the implementation of the UN declaration.

Seeing royal assent for this bill is a really critical step in advancing that work, but through the Inuit-Crown partnership committee, we've already prioritized the advancement of this work and the early identification of Inuit priorities in the information forming the action plan itself. We're also looking at how we can take article-by-article implementation moving forward should this bill advance and receive royal assent.

We're already looking forward to moving that work forward and hope to be able to see this work advance. Inuit priorities are a large part of the inclusion of the implementation, of course, in taking a distinctions-based approach.

Thank you.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

You're down to 10 seconds.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

I'll concede.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Bratina]

Thanks very much.

We move on to Madame Gill for six minutes.

[Marilène Gill, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to Mr. Obed and Ms. Monaghan for joining us today. We are very grateful to them.

In his remarks, Mr. Obed mentioned independent indigenous commissions. That is an amendment that the association has requested on a number of occasions.

Could you tell us more about it, please?

[Natan Obed]

Thank you for the question. I will start on a conceptual level and then I'll allow Tania to speak specifically to some of the considerations within the proposed amendment.

The legislation as it stands is quite broad. The creation of an action plan has great potential, but it also is so broad that it doesn't necessarily give us the confidence that an action plan alone will allow for recourse or allow for remedy to happen in places where indigenous peoples' human rights or classes of human rights for indigenous peoples have been violated in this country.

There's an existing human rights regime in this country, but I think we can all agree that historically it has done a very poor job of hearing, understanding and then ruling on indigenous peoples' human rights violations. The ability of this bill to change the landscape in this country for indigenous peoples is largely dependent upon the ability of an individual indigenous person or a group of indigenous peoples to find a way to have recourse for active violations of human rights. This particular commission that we have been lobbying for since 2017 would aid and abet that particular process to ensure that Canada actually does change and that there is a place where indigenous peoples can go other than the existing human rights tribunals that would have expertise within this particular area or field, and would allow for meaningful solutions to the outstanding challenges we have around human rights violations against indigenous peoples.

Tania, would you like to add any comments?