Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you to Manny for coming back to present again.
Welcome to Shannon Cumming from the Northwest Territories.
I listened with interest to your presentation, Shannon. I think you covered all the bases, except I didn't hear you talk about some of the concerns I hear from other indigenous governments about the lack of availability of federal negotiators. They point to this as one of the major reasons the negotiations on land claims and self-government have taken so long. It's because there were so many cuts, historically, to the Department of Indian Affairs.
In some cases, we're down to maybe a day and a half of actual negotiations. The negotiators would travel from Ottawa and get as far as Yellowknife in one day. Then maybe they would get to the regional centre the next day and start negotiating on Wednesday. By Thursday at noon they're starting to pack up and head back south.
I want to ask if you could talk a little bit about whether that's an issue with the NWT Métis Nation.