Thank you.
First of all, for any witnesses from the first panel and for those who are on the second, my comments will be brief, but I would like to begin by apologizing for this diatribe that we've all been subjected to by the lack-of-common-courtesy Conservatives. It is astounding that, every time we have credible witnesses here, this is the type of filibustering that we are subjected to.
I would like to make a few comments on the content of the motion. I would point out, first of all, that our government, the Liberal government, is intent on advancing reconciliation and supporting indigenous peoples in participating in and benefiting from natural resource projects, especially those on indigenous territories, and this remains a top priority for our government.
We believe that it is fully important to move forward with the full engagement of indigenous communities, including meaningful consultation. I'm very concerned that the Conservatives are trying to advance this motion. I'm curious about what kind of consultation went into it. At the committee here, we have not had any sort of study on this matter that's part of the motion being dropped on us. We've had no witnesses. There's been no report produced by this committee.
Reconciliation is an important issue that deserves fulsome and meaningful consultation and discussion with those directly impacted. In this case, it's with indigenous communities across Canada.
I would note that the first nations resource charge is not defined, and that's a problem. There's no mention of Inuit or Métis communities, so it's concerning that the Conservatives would omit those very important groups from this motion.
I find it also very concerning that this filibustering on a very important study comes the first day back after we had the first round of debate in the House on the first nations clean water act. We had a Saskatchewan Conservative MP, Kevin Waugh, who made extremely offensive comments and allegations during his party's first intervention on that legislation that first nations were burning down their own water treatment plants and that they weren't educated enough to operate them.
This is a completely baseless and offensive claim, but it's not surprising, because the leader of the official opposition himself has said that residential school survivors need a stronger work ethic. I'm not surprised that the Conservatives will resort to these kinds of baseless claims and use whatever straws they can reach to try to stall Bill C-49.
I find it particularly offensive that first nations are being used as pawns in this filibuster today by the Conservatives.
I would like to point out that the Conservatives had the opportunity to demonstrate through actions that they were meaningful supporters of indigenous issues in Canada, but they voted against $4 billion in indigenous housing. They voted against UNDRIP legislation. They voted against the indigenous loan guarantee program. They voted against first nations water and infrastructure funding. They voted against equity investment funds for indigenous governments. It's very concerning that these are the kinds of actions we see, although it's frankly quite unsurprising that these are their actions.
I really do believe that we have important discussions that we'd like to have today, so at this point I would like to move to adjourn debate.