Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I appreciate this being brought forward. I'm leaning towards supporting it.
I think these are very important things being added, especially with recruitment and retention. I understand what Mr. Battiste is saying, where you don't want to be too prescriptive. You want to ensure that first nations have the opportunity to guide their destinies. I don't know any first nations that would not want to retain water operators. I suppose if there was an individual who....
Before I go further, let me ask the officials something.
In my understanding of the comments by Mr. Battiste, it seemed that his concern was that—and he can correct me if I'm wrong—if there's a water operator who is perhaps not doing a good job or if the community does not want to retain that individual, then they would be forced to retain that individual. Correct me if I'm wrong, but is that the case?
When I read this, I don't think that this is specifying any specific individual but, just broadly, that it would be the hope for the first nations, if that makes sense.