[Witness speaks in Sm'algyax]
Thank you very kindly for the invitation to be here today.
I'm speaking on behalf of Eagle Spirit and the chiefs council. The chiefs council consists of about 35 communities, from Lax Kw'alaams up to Fort McMurray. I'll be speaking specifically in relation to Bill C-48, but I will have some comments on Bill C-69.
A meeting of all of our chiefs was held in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago. The chiefs council is completely opposed to Bill C-48. The general tenor of their concern is that they have constitutional rights over their traditional territory. They don't think anybody, particularly what they call “latte-slurping elitist environmentalists”, should be coming into their territory and trying to ram stuff down their throats. They look at that as being wholly inappropriate. There wasn't any consultation whatsoever.
You heard from John relating to the Lax Kw'alaams community. All of the communities along the route feel that their right to be able to determine what happens in their traditional territory is being infringed upon by this proposed legislation.
The chiefs council passed a resolution to quash Bill C-48 by legal and other means, so that will be proceeding forward. It may be unknown to this committee that there's now a National Coalition of Chiefs. It's a group of the chiefs across Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C., and will probably include the two northern territories. They are essentially fed up with this environmentalist agenda being rammed down their throats. They feel it's being done by American-financed environmental groups. There's plenty of evidence to support that.
They passed a similar resolution. There will probably be about 200 first nations opposed to both Bill C-48 and Bill C-69, and I'll explain that a little further. These resolutions have been included, and I have some other information for you.
The other thing our chiefs wonder about is how come this is being proposed, essentially to cut off half of B.C.'s coast to important commercial traffic, when tanker shipping of oil and petroleum fuels is happening everywhere else in Canada. There are about 4,000 inbound oil tankers each year to the east coast, 82 million tonnes of petroleum and fuel products, and 25 million tonnes of crude oil and petroleum products in and out of 39 ports. There is 89% of the shipments that go into Quebec City and Montreal. The question they ask is whether the federal government would consider imposing such a ban in Quebec or anywhere else.
We are from the north, and environmental concerns are at the top of the list of our concerns. That is why we got involved in this project. We feel that we have probably the highest, most robust environmental model in the world for the oceans protection plan that's been proposed by the federal government. We feel that's minimal. We will voluntarily comply with a much higher standard. The government keeps talking about $1.5 billion, I believe, for ocean protection, but what they don't explain is that is being applied to 14,000 kilometres of shoreline along the entire Canadian coast when you need that kind of money focused in one area.
We respect the rights of other indigenous people in their traditional territory to disagree with this position, and that's the position of our chiefs. At the same time, the protocol amongst first nations and the law is that you can have an opinion on somebody else's territory, but you don't have any rights to determine what happens in their territory.