Mr. Speaker, at the outset let me say that the Reform Party believes in the self-reliance of natives in the Yukon. The difficulties that we have with this bill are on the generosity aspect.
To begin with, I am concerned with the general direction of this bill because it sets a precedent and, along with other bills such as the Nunavut deal that was brought in by the Conservatives, C-16, the Sahtu, these are overly generous settlements to small numbers of people.
If you look at the Canadian map, you start to see the jigsaw puzzle that is put together, individual bits and pieces. However, if put all together it is very clear that the area in Canada north of 60 is very quickly being set aside in land claims. There is little regard for the implications on non-native Canadians because these agreements have implications for both native and non-native Canadians. We have to look at it from that aspect.
It appears that this government may be sleepwalking toward a disaster with this overly generous land settlement plan. The generosity of this agreement is somewhat ridiculous because it has no basis in fact and no basis in law.
We do not state that there should not be a settlement. That is not the point. We are saying that the size of this settlement is clearly overly generous. In fact we could say that this settlement is far too liberal. It is the kind of agreement that will drive a wedge between native and non-native Canadians.
To give some statistics, this agreement gives 17,275 square kilometres or 6,670 square miles to these four Yukon native groups. Out of this area, 12,000 square kilometres or nearly 5,000 square miles includes the mining and mineral rights. That is 6,670 square miles for 2,457 individuals or each individual getting about 3 square miles of land.
This settlement deals with only four of the bands out of 14. There are still 10 more claims to be negotiated. If these groups are to realize similar agreements then I have to ask this government where the land will come from. Certainly to grant similar agreements to the 10 remaining groups will cover the entire Yukon Territory and possibly more.
I will go back to my jigsaw puzzle because it is starting to appear that each piece is falling into place, only the whole northern top end of Canada is being taken up.
What about the land rights of non-native Canadians here? When will this government look at the developments that are going on in the rest of the world? The policy that we are talking about here today is based on race. The rest of the world is going toward equality. We see it all over the world. I have to question why this bill and the self-government bill are going against that when the rest of the world is going for, the equality of all its citizens.
What about the non-native Canadians who spent their lives in the Yukon? Where do they fit in? That is unclear. What will happen if some of these people are in an area where the land claims go through the area? What if they are displaced? Will they be compensated? Have they been consulted?
On the consultation process the government has said, yes, it has consulted with the people. However, my understanding is that it is a fairly broad consultation on very fuzzy ideas like: Are you in favour of native self-government? Yes. Are you in favour of settling the land claims? Yes.
The detail of these settlements has not been made public to my understanding. What will happen to the current landholders? If you own a house, a ranch, a trapline or whatever and it is covered by a land claim, whose law do you answer to? Is it the Canadian law? Is it native law? Is it a combination of both? I can see a nightmare of bureaucracy running through this whole situation.
There are not only native land claims. There are numerous more land claims that have to be settled. This precedent setting legislation that we are looking at is exceedingly dangerous in that each band will look at this as an agreement and say: "We want at least as much if not more". We are on the tracks heading to an area where we are going to have some huge disagreements.
Some of the areas that I have talked about before like the Nunavut deal that covered the eastern Arctic, the Inuvialuit deal that was the western Arctic, the Gwich'in agreement in the Mackenzie River delta, are all parts of this puzzle that are
falling into place. Again it appears that this government's goal is to blanket the Canadian north with these settlement agreements.
Let us go back in time because Canada is a nation of immigrants. We are all immigrants whether we arrived here first, second, third or just recently landed. Every one of us including natives has come to this country from somewhere else. Some of us have come for economic reasons. Some have come to join loved ones and some of us have had the good fortune to be born here.
Many immigrants have come here because they were persecuted somewhere else and Canada has opened its doors. What are we offering? We are offering equality for everyone. That is where we should be going today with these settlements. The first people in this country should not have any more rights or any fewer rights than other Canadians.
Moreover I do not think that the government is really aware of the extent of this settlement. According to the final umbrella agreement, $242.6 million in cash compensation will be divided among the 14 native groups to be paid over 15 years. That results in about $30,000 per individual. Thirty thousand dollars is a nice lump sum when one's house is paid for and the government is still continuing to pay the other bills.
How is this money going to be divided? When I talked earlier on the self-government bill, it became clear that the charter does not apply. We have huge sums of money and huge tracts of land that are going to be looked at and overseen by groups of people.
One of the biggest concerns that people had with the old Indian affairs act was that a native on a reserve did not own the land. He could not go to the bank and say: "I own this chunk of land". It is going to be the same thing as I understand it with these deals.
What about an individual native owning the land that he is on. This is where we start to get self-esteem. If it is owned by the band, if it is owned by an umbrella group, again we run into difficulties because it is not covered in the charter.
Does this government know the potential of the mining rights that are given in this deal? I made some phone calls to some mining people to find out and they are unclear where it is going. They do not know the potential of the mining claims in the Yukon. Because of uncertainty, a lot of the claims have been basically set back. Exploration has been set back.
The government does not know the value of what it is deeding away. Included in these four agreements is the option to acquire up to 25 per cent of the royalties held by the Yukon government, its agencies or corporations in future non-renewable resource development and hydro projects in the traditional territories.
Again, can the government tell the Canadian people what the values of these royalties are? I rather doubt it. We do not know what kind of money we are talking about here. One of the agreements, the Champagne agreement, provides for economic development agreements within the federal government to provide technical and financial assistance for economic development purposes.
How much assistance are we talking about? Does this mean unlimited loans? What are the guidelines? Again, where is the equality here? There should be the same rights and privileges for natives as for non-natives in the area.
I question if this government had any idea of the actual proportion of transfer payments involved. In fact, I wonder if anyone knows. I fail to see how this government can justify the royalties to this House and to the Canadian people. We know it is going to be asked by the Canadian people to justify it.
In addition the federal government will continue to support all the present and future programs. Again how are we getting to self-sufficiency? Getting the land, getting the money, yet the programs continue to be ongoing. This does not bode well for getting self-sufficiency of individual natives.
The minister states that these agreements give aboriginal beneficiaries the means to become self-reliant, to regain a measure of control over their lives. My colleagues and I are in complete support of such an end. We recognize the need for all Canadians to become self-reliant and to gain control over their lives.
We would support such an agreement that would actually fulfil such a goal that is beneficial to natives and non-natives alike. However, this agreement moves in a very different direction. The granting of all this money, all the land or continuing to provide the same programs and benefits will nurture dependency and in no way fosters any measure of independence. Rather it would seem that by giving out these huge sums of money and land this agreement removes the incentive.
The agreement takes away the motivation for these people to gain their own self-respect and self-worth as individuals. This agreement does not allow the natives to make their own way and to succeed on their own. It is the old Indian act again.
There is no indication anywhere in this agreement of any intention to phase out financial assistance and government native programs if the terms of the agreement prove it successful.
For all the money that this agreement deals with there is no justification to state why this money is being awarded. What is the rationale? It concerns me that this agreement sets a very bad
precedent for fiscal responsibility in future government negotiations for many, many more land claim deals and agreements with natives.
There are many concerns about the management of both the funds and land base, concerns raised by natives themselves because settlement dollars and land title are not vested in the individuals. They are vested in the organizations as I said earlier.
This huge conveyance is far too generous and the entire deal should be re-examined to bring the agreement into reality. I stress again it is the size of this agreement that we are concerned with.
What are the rights of the non-natives in this agreement? That needs to be spelled out. Some of these agreements are providing for exclusive harvesting rights in the parks and in the territories. Where do the non-natives come into this? What are their rights?
Natives are granted guaranteed participation in commercial fresh water salmon fishery and sports fishing, adventure travel, forestry, outfitting and campsite operations in the traditional territories. Does this mean that they have exclusive rights? That is unclear. Once again the rights are given out on the basis of race. When the world is moving toward equality of all its citizens this government seems to want to move away from that direction and go on to a basis of creating two nations with the nation of Canada.
I am particularly concerned about the backlash from non-native Canadians. This government with this agreement is going to drive a wedge between these two peoples. What was supposed to be a program to assist natives in B.C. in the aboriginal fisheries strategy is a good example. It is native fishermen and non-native fishermen. Twenty-five per cent of the fishery is native. They worked together for generations and did just fine until the aboriginal fisheries strategy came in. It drove a wedge between those two groups of people who got along for years and years. This is the same type of thinking I see in this agreement.
I will be very surprised if this government can provide all of the answers here. Hopefully when it is addressed in committee a number of these issues will be brought forth and will be addressed rather than rubber-stamped.
There is tremendous concern on the part of all Canadians who are not opposed to this settlement in principle but they do not like the generous deals. This agreement has to be re-examined in committee, it has to be re-examined here, the whole thinking process has to be looked at again.