Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on May 1st, 2023

[Allan Claxton]

As a chief, I bought into the fiscal management tools. I was one of the earlier bands to implement property tax, and that brings own-source revenues to the first nation.

Then I was on a plane to Ottawa to talk to Health Canada. They said, “Chief, what do you want?” I said that we needed a health facility. They said, “Okay, if you include a gymnasium, then we'll move you from way up here to number one.” I quickly shook their hands and—

[Michael McLeod, Liberal, Northwest Territories, NT]

I have a point of order, Madam Chair.

The witness is speaking too far away from his mike. I can't make out what he's saying.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jenica Atwin]

Sure. Thank you very much for flagging that.

[Allan Claxton]

I shook their hands and accepted the deal, but then on the plane coming home, I was thinking about how I was going to pay for this gymnasium. I got a hold of Manny, and he referred me to Fiscal Realities and brought in the team. We worked on our own sales tax to take over the GST, so that gymnasium's almost paid off now.

We also just now implemented the property transfer tax. I believe you have to be part of the fiscal team, but you also have to use the tools that are available at your fingertips. If you don't use them, it's just like not using your muscles.

You have to establish good relationships with your members and also the neighbours who live in your community, because it involves everybody in the community.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

What I see as the difference is that it puts you in a position to be in the driver's seat. You're able to decide what infrastructure you want to do. You can go to the community, and it can decide what.... I think someone on the panel mentioned that the community decides what infrastructure you want to build in your own communities as opposed to the previous, where I'd say it's hat in hand, asking if the minister would be so nice as to do what you wish the minister to do.

It's life-changing for first nations communities. I applaud Manny and Harold and many of you who are sitting here today for your tireless work on this.

Manny, you mentioned in 2003.... I was here in 2011, hearing Harold and the pitch saying how good this is going to be for first nations communities. I applaud you that you've gotten it this far. It just needs to get a little further.

Jason, since I have the chance to ask you a question.... We talked about this in previous committees, about economic reconciliation. We've heard it a few times today. I know, from speaking to Harold and others, how important it is to first nations communities. It's a very key pillar to reconciliation.

Can you speak to that for the next couple of minutes, about how important economic reconciliation is to first nations communities?

[Jason Calla]

That's a great question.

Thinking back to when the bill was first passed, it was thought there was maybe a handful of communities that really had an ability to generate their own revenue. We really see communities all across the country with opportunities to assert their jurisdiction over their lands to attract investment and to develop projects that can support employment opportunities in their communities, but also to generate the revenue they can use for infrastructure projects that many of their membership say they would like to see in their communities, whether it's a rec centre, multi-purpose facility, a health centre or a school.

I think the ability to have more control over your life—to self-determine, to identify projects that are important for the community—is really part of economic reconciliation.

These amendments certainly put more tools in the tool box for communities to determine the paths they're going to go down. I think it's really important for economic reconciliation to see these amendments move ahead.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jenica Atwin]

Thank you very much.

We'll now move to Mr. Battiste for five minutes.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I want to start off by thanking all the members who are here presenting today.

As a first nation who lives in a first nations community, you're doing a lot of the hard work that is allowing us to view things in a different way and to make progress in the way first nations want to do it, in a self-determining, optional way.

I frequently go to powwows where I'll see a popular shirt that says “Burn sage, sweetgrass and the Indian Act”. It's popular out there, but I don't think a lot of communities know that there is the ability to move away from the Indian Act.

What we're trying to do, in a lot of ways, is move away from the Indian Act. There are some participating communities that have decided to do this optionally. Can you explain which parts of this proposed legislation would change that and give your quick pitch—as part of this board—to the communities out there that are listening as to why they should be doing this for their communities?

I'll start off with Manny and then maybe turn it to Ernie.

[Clarence T. (Manny) Jules]

The simple answer is that it makes decision-making easier at the local level. It corresponds with what their hopes and aspirations are. You can have the right of self-determination, but if you don't have the fiscal means to be able to do it, that hampers your vision. What the institutions do is make it easier to make that leap. It isn't just a leap of faith anymore. We've created the institutional support to be able to do that.

[Ernie Daniels]

The legislation itself is meant to work around the Indian Act in particular.

For me, that's really key because it allows the first nation.... Mr. Zimmer mentioned that it puts you in the driver's seat. I think that's the really empowering thing about the act and the amendments that are going forward. It does put that decision-making in the first nations' hands so that they determine when they are going to do things on their own time as long as they have the revenues to support these kinds of things.

Revenue sharing has to be another part of the equation from the federal government that needs to be discussed at some point in time. I think that's really important.

Thank you.

[Jaime Battiste, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Manny, you said in your closing statement that what your father passed down to you was that we must be able to move at the speed of business. Can you expand on that and why that is important for first nations communities?

[Clarence T. (Manny) Jules]

I learned a lot from my dad. I was mentored by him. When I was about 11 years old, he was chief of my community, and I wondered what he did that was so important that people would want to visit him and talk to him about it.

It was because of his vision that he created Mount Paul Industrial Park, which is still our economic engine in our community. It was at that time, during the 1968 consultations to amend the Indian Act, when he coined the phrase “move at the speed of business”.

He said that we had to sometimes wait two years to get a lease done in Ottawa. We wanted to be able to have the lease, but somebody in Ottawa says, “No, you can't have the land.” He said that's why we have to be able to have this local decision-making. The monies that are raised in our community should stay within our community. Even to this day, for every dollar we raise in terms of taxation, the federal and provincial governments get seven.

Those ultimately mean that the system has to change and that we have to be able to move at the speed of business, because if we don't, that opportunity is gone. As one other chief told me a long time ago, opportunity knocks softly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jenica Atwin]

Thank you, Mr. Battiste.

Before I move on to our third round, I will remind committee members to be as succinct in their questions as possible so that we can get those fulsome answers. I hate cutting off our witnesses. Also, if you could direct your question to someone, it certainly makes it a lot easier.

We will go to our third round now.

We're going to have Mr. Morrison, whose name I will not forget, and Mr. Vidal to split the time for five minutes.

[Rob Morrison, Conservative, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm really interested. I would like maybe a few people to answer if they want to. We were talking about moving at the speed of business. We talked about how it has been seven years to get to this point, but what I'm understanding by listening to some of what you have had to do in the meantime—and that's really talking about your pilot projects, about your transfer of knowledge quickly and about shared services because of our remote communities—is that you have taken it upon yourselves to try to go out and figure out what works best and learn from that. That's what I think the best thing is: when you can learn. You then can say, this worked really well, but that didn't work at all so we're going to stop and not do that again.

You're really ready to go when Bill C-45 is signed off on, and it's because of some of the work you have done historically in trying to get there. Really, what I would like to hear are some of your stories of what you've done, the challenges you've had and how you have moved this forward, because I think a real-life story means so much more than some communication on a piece of paper.

I will open that up.

[Harold Calla]

If I might, I want to talk about those communities that were in default management. Many of them were in third party management for as long as 20 or 25 years. They got involved with the financial management board. We entered into a pilot program with the department.

We had some pilot project firms or communities that got themselves certified by the financial management board. They regained their confidence. They weren't losing the money that they were losing previously to a third party manager. They were investing in their communities. One of those communities I think is now eligible to borrow from the First Nations Finance Authority.

More importantly, what it did is that it allowed that community to regain the dignity and respect it needed to have for itself. I think that's because we weren't punitive in our approach. We went in there to help. We requested and the government agreed that they would not be disqualified for discretionary funding, that the third party management fees would be paid from somewhere else and that all of those people would report to a first nation institution called the First Nation Financial Management Board, and not the department. Those were big steps that I think really helped to bring communities along and to have in sight a line to opportunity.

One of the biggest challenges we face is that everything we do probably requires a change in policy or procedure somewhere in government. We can do all of these things, but if we're not prepared to change the core of the problem, then it's really handicapping us. We will recover some of those things, but I think we have to realize that we're looking at systemic change going forward.

[Ernie Daniels]

I could give you an example. It was finding a way to get seven communities together to invest into one of the major projects and one of the major organizations in North America, which was Clearwater seafood. Having the capital and having the ability for the institutions to work together so that would allow seven communities to buy 50% of this major investment, I think, is a true success.

It is economic development, as well as really helping the communities be in a better position of managing wealth rather than managing poverty.

[Gary Vidal, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Thank you.

I'll make my question very quick. I'll come back to Mr. Daniels again.

One reason I'm interested in the amendments is the change in the definition of a “borrowing member”, as Mr. Daniels talked about. He referred to the ability for tribal councils to now be involved in this process. The Meadow Lake Tribal Council had an interest in borrowing from the FNFA to fund the development of a new OSB mill that would have created like 500 jobs in my riding over the last couple of years. That opportunity has not been granted because of the limitations of the act.

Mr. Daniels, could you talk quickly about that change of “borrowing member” and how the facilitation or utilization by tribal councils would be very significant to the investments in economic opportunities in communities?

[Ernie Daniels]

I think this portion of the amendment will have a definite positive impact on tribal councils coming together to do economic ventures.

I think the flip side of it is that the FNFA has access to the capital markets where we can get really cost-effective financing, which really makes a difference when the communities are looking at economic development projects, in terms of making a profit. I think that's really key.

Based on the experience of working with the Clearwater example that I gave earlier, I think this allows us to work with a group of first nations together. Of course, we have to go through the regulation process to get that in place, as well as some of the standards that FMB will have to develop in terms of getting not-for-profits and tribal councils in.

I think it's going to be a major difference for these tribal councils as they look at and pursue economic activity.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jenica Atwin]

Thank you very much.

We'll move on to Ms. Dzerowicz for five minutes.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you so much. Thank you for welcoming me here today.

I come from downtown Toronto and it's my first time on this committee, so it's a real pleasure to listen to everyone. I think this is a really important conversation.

I have three questions.

You know, first nations in Canada are always the first to be impacted by climate change. How does this bill—this fiscal management act—allow first nations to adapt and make better decisions around how to prepare for climate change?

[Jason Calla]

That's a great question.

One of the studies that was referenced earlier, which was done by the AFN measuring the infrastructure gap, actually did a lot of good work around thinking about climate adaptation. Of course, in British Columbia we've seen really awful impacts in the communities from flooding and forest fires.

Thinking about it again, it sounds a bit boring to come back to the planning assumptions, but I think that in the planning assumptions of the project and the development of the business case, having more local knowledge and local control over setting those assumptions and plans in place to take into account climate adaptation strategies is part of what's possible under the proposed amendments, certainly if nations wanted to be working on projects with FNII. That's certainly something we've thought about.

In the couple of pilot projects we were talking about—one with a community in Ontario, which was Kettle and Stony Point, and one with the community in Atlantic Canada, which was Paqtnkek Mi'kmaw Nation—we have water and wastewater systems. Thinking about the environmental constraints and about the planning issues that go into it, to the extent that you can take more control of those things locally, we think that's a good thing.

[Clarence T. (Manny) Jules]

To add, we had, as Jason was saying, about 50°C temperatures. My uncle's family had their entire homes all burnt down in Lytton. When we start talking about the infrastructure institute, that's going to mean that we're going to have to adapt. We're going to have to have fire-hardened communities. In the last couple of years, since my community was just about evacuated, we've had six fires within our reserve lands.

None of the provincial fire folks could come on to the reserve because they were busy fighting other fires. Capacity development is going to be important so that we will have fire-ready institutions to help them. Some of the communities in the interior, as a result of the atmospheric rain, were just about completely flooded out, losing most of their land. They have little bits of land left. We're going to be able to play an important role in helping rebuild communities, helping them prepare for climate change as it happens and develop because we'll have our own institutional capacity to develop new strategies that are first nations'.

One of the things that I've been saying quite a bit lately is that the world needs indigenous knowledge now.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

I was going to mention that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jenica Atwin]

Mr. Daniels would like to respond as well.

[Ernie Daniels]

This is not part of the legislation, but this is an example of what the institutions can do. We're working on an insurance project, because, with climate change, all of those insurance costs are going up. They're going to go up all across the board right across all countries, all nations, everything. We're trying to find a more economical way to insure our assets, to insure our businesses and to insure our homes across our nation. That's one of the things that we're working on. I thought I would add that in.