Meegwetch, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon. Kwe kwe.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify with regard to this important but awkward discussion.
I do this on behalf of Chief Lance Haymond and the rest of my council members of Kebaowek First Nation.
First of all, the Crown representatives and Canada need to find ways to discuss these matters on a nation-to-nation basis. It is awkward not to have that existing relationship to inform the Crown of how it may impact Kebaowek on matters such as this. To be clear, we would have a problem with any discussion of Métis rights and Métis nation recognition in any part of our unceded territory.
We intervene today to draw attention to the fundamental importance of the glacial pace of Crown reconciliation related to title and rights. There are multiple unfulfilled obligations that those rights impose on the Crown, which we continually bring to the attention of governments, the public and our citizens. If we finally had the attention we deserve, we would not be nearly as busy intervening in parliamentary processes, and we would be focused on the governance and developments in front of us in our territory.
It's the lack of true recognition of title and rights that brings us here today. There is a lack of true recognition of our self-determination and our rights to decide for ourselves who the Algonquin Anishinabe of our nations and our territories are. The new-found expression of settler citizens claiming the right to indigenous lands and title through self-identification is a sharp contrast to our governance systems, which have accountability, kinship and relatedness built into our understanding of who we are and who our relatives are.
In Canada, the federal Indian Act has caused confusion and has misinformed generations of non-status Indians about how to keep their ancestral connections to territories. The Indian Act has disconnected them from their true Anishinabe governance systems. Yes, the problem here with Bill C-53 has been the century and a half of the Indian Act and ignoring the indigenous human right to self-determination, or running roughshod over this right through subsections 6(1) and 6(2) of the Indian Act. This is a deliberate strategy to disrupt our connections and practices of living on our territories, and we address that in our communities through restoring ourselves and our relationships.
The issue of the recognition and protection of inherent rights is, or should be, paramount to any Crown government regarding sovereign indigenous peoples and their relationship with us. Unfortunately, we have to say that there are still many flaws in our relationship with the Crown, as well as continued colonial and unilateral policy that would contradict the principles found in Bill C-53.
Let me remind you that the British Crown, and later the Canadian government, took our lands by force, without our consent, without compensation. Our people suffered greatly as a result. Ignoring these historic injustices is unacceptable.
This is still going on. We have several concurrent battles to wage because of our unrecognized title, which hampers our capacity to govern our territory. This means that we must, in a piecemeal fashion, commit to challenging Crown decisions that will lead to impacts on our titles and rights.
That is why we felt it important to come today to shed light on a pressing issue that weighs heavily on our hearts: the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission's pursuit of licensing for the permanent NSDF—near surface disposal facility—on the Chalk River, Ontario, site, along with many other nuclear files.
This proposal is causing deep concern within our communities. We are concerned about the health of the river, the animals and all life that depends on the great Kichi Zībī, the Ottawa River. The proposed handling and storage of nuclear waste in such close proximity to our sacred river, the Kichi Zībī, is a risk that cannot be taken lightly. This river holds immense spiritual and cultural importance for the Algonquin nation and the communities that will be directly impacted by environmental issues. This will disconnect us in two ways from the lifeblood of our ancestral lands. First, it will have impacts on the environment itself. Second, it will, through generational knowledge of the fact that nuclear poisoning has been allowed to occur, result in our citizens' being cautiously proactive by staying away from a potential source of harm to their human health. This will result in a severing of this key spiritual relationship between our people and the Kichi Zībī itself.
Our utmost concern is the lack of proper consideration for fundamental self-determination, a human right to free, prior and informed consent, a right safeguarded by both Canadian and international laws. We understand that Canada is consulting a group with no recognized section 35 rights about this project. This is the danger of recognizing a corporate body such as the Métis Nation of Ontario. It has no historic relationship, and certainly no pre-existing legal order or relationship, with the great Kichi Zībī. That relationship rests with the Algonquin nation and the 11 recognized communities.
We implore the Government of Canada to comply with its obligations to recognize and protect our rights, and to voice its opposition to this endeavour to recognize a group of people who have not yet proven that they are section 35 rights holders. To be clear, this legislation must be withdrawn, and real consultations with the rights and title holders have to occur.
Thank you. Meegwetch.