Natural Resources Committee on Feb. 19th, 2019

[Ian Jacobsen]

Twenty-one.

[Channa Perera]

They've settled 21 grievances, out of 23 or so. That goes to show how much we have invested in developing good relations with these communities and ensuring that our projects are supported.

[David de Burgh Graham]

All right. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, James Maloney]

Thank you, Mr. Graham.

Mr. Falk, you can finish us off. You have about three minutes.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to all of our panellists here, our committee presenters.

In my home province of Manitoba, Manitoba Hydro, with its Keeyask dam project, its generating station there, has worked very well with four separate indigenous communities.

You talked about the diversity among indigenous communities, Mr. Perera. Mr. Newman has also mentioned that there's not the same cohesiveness as in the Sami community in Norway, from what we've learned about at the committee. I appreciate that.

I'm going to focus my questions on you, Mr. Newman. When you have all these different communities on a major project.... You're from Saskatchewan, where I think there are seven or eight indigenous communities involved as partners in a large mining operation there. Who makes these decisions? Does every community make them? Is it the individual chiefs? Is it the band members or council members? How is it determined that they come together to form partnerships?

[Prof. Dwight Newman]

Well, it ends up being a decision at the band council level to enter into agreements. Obviously, there's a democratic process within the community. This is a simpler context, perhaps, than some of those in British Columbia, where we've seen divisions between the Indian Act leadership and the hereditary leadership, which present additional challenges when there's a stronger division that way.

Within a community in Saskatchewan, there would end up being a decision, ultimately, at the band council level. In some instances, there's an economic development corporation that's at play as well, so things can be a little more complicated than this, too.

In terms of different communities coming together, they would choose to do that. That conversation might be initiated in various ways. If there is ultimately an impact on other communities, they're either going to need to be brought in, or there would need to be consultation with those communities. It's probably a better win-win scenario for everyone if all of the potentially affected communities can be brought in, as well as any communities that are interested in investing in the project and participating, even if they're not directly affected. It's like different communities that might collaborate together in a non-indigenous context as well.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Right. For indigenous communities, are the contact points through the chief or through the band councils? Obviously, the decision is typically made at the band council level, but would it be the chief or would it be people in the administrative office?

You also mentioned the economic development corporations. Many bands have those as well. We're looking for best practices for indigenous engagement, so who do people need to work with?

[Prof. Dwight Newman]

I would say that some first nations in Saskatchewan have issued consultation or engagement policies that specify how they want to be worked with. Certainly, these identify their preferred ways, and might be very helpful where they exist.

There's a huge diversity of communities within Saskatchewan in terms of size. Some of the larger communities such as the Lac La Ronge Indian Band and Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation are up in the range of 10,000 members. There are other communities in the province that have 200 or 300 members.

The larger communities will have a consultation office. They may have a consultation manager. That might be more of the contact point, as opposed to going directly through the chief. However, on a larger project, the chief is going to be involved and the band council will ultimately be involved. In a smaller community, it may be a more centralized function.

It's really a case of having to learn how each specific community's processes work. Certainly, there can be information available on that from the Government of Saskatchewan, for example, and industry can draw upon that.

[Ted Falk, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

I think I'm out of time.

Thank you, sir.

[The Chair, Liberal, James Maloney]

I want to thank you all very much for joining us today. That's all the time we have, unfortunately. We'll see everybody on Thursday.

The meeting is adjourned.