Mr. Speaker, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples missed a golden opportunity to start Canadian Indians on a different course. Instead, the commission's recommendations amount to nothing more than forcing natives to become permanent wards of the government.
The net result would simply enlarge by $2 billion a year what already exists. This would include a bigger bureaucracy, bigger undemocratic associations, more and higher paid lawyers and consultants; in short, a much enlarged Indian industry.
Current unemployment levels on reserves are pegged at 47 per cent. More money means even less incentive which will result in greater dependency on the state. Unemployment on reserves would soar even higher if these recommendations were accepted.
The recommendations divide Canadians on the basis of race. They call for the setting up of an aboriginal house of Parliament. The more we examine the report, the more it looks like a 1950s South Africa document. When is this lunacy going to stop?