Thank you for the question.
I'd like to tell you that, for many women in our communities, it means that their roles are much more significant. We come from a strong egalitarian society where women were a significant part of all of the things that we did. You can see that in the leadership that exists within the Métis nation and how many of our leaders are Métis women who are holding strong and pushing forward on Métis rights. We proudly stand with them and support them.
Métis women, more than anybody, know the sacrifices that were made when we became a part of the forgotten people. I know that most Métis women we've consulted with and engaged with are very supportive of this legislation.
I come from Alberta. There has been an extensive amount of consultation and engagement around the Constitution and what self-government means. I'm no longer a young person, but since I was a very young person and my mother took me to Métis meetings—I even went to Métis meetings with my grandmother—we have talked about self-government. People wanted self-governance. It has been decades for us to get to this point, and I think the important part is moving forward. We're not here to try to deny anybody else their rights, but I will tell you that we have not been engaged on other indigenous self-government legislation with other indigenous peoples. It wasn't a requirement.
I appreciate that there are a lot of processes involved within the Government of Canada in how legislation gets passed and what treaties do, but those are processes that the government controls. We have no control over any of those matters.