Mr. Speaker, for months we have been listening to the Reform Party thread together isolated incidents of problems on reserves. Reformers have been trying to thread those incidents into an overall package that aboriginal leadership is corrupt, inept or incapable of handling its own self-government. It is no coincidence that this kind of talk is escalating now as we get closer to the historic Nisga'a deal.
Throughout B.C. there has been a very organized campaign to try to stop the Nisga'a self-government deal. We have seen newspaper editors manipulating their stories in the press, those who are convinced they are against us. We have seen a former Reform Party researcher leave his job with the Reform Party, move to British Columbia and set up the B.C. chapter of FIRE, the anti-Indian organization from the United States. This is now the B.C. chapter of FIRE dedicated to holding aboriginal people back.
I have sat here and listened day after day to speaker after speaker trying to convince everyone that aboriginal people are corrupt, mismanage all their funds and some even wear expensive jewellery. I even heard allegations that aboriginal leaders are dressing too well, that they are rich and people on their reserves are poor.
To try to imply that it is some kind of national trend, that all aboriginal communities are corrupt, is absolutely intellectually dishonest. I have listened to it for about as long as I care to. I am sure we will hear more of it as the whole Nisga'a debate continues.
Some comments have been very revealing of the true attitudes. I heard the Reform member for Athabasca say “Just because we didn't kill the Indians and have Indian wars, that doesn't mean we didn't conquer these people. Isn't that why they allowed themselves to be herded into little reserves in the most isolated, desolate, worthless parts of the country?” Other Reform members likened Indians living on reserves to people living on a south sea island, courtesy of a rich uncle. Another member of the Reform Party accused native Indians of practising South African style apartheid because they want to set up their own aboriginal self-government and have control of their own communities, as if that is apartheid.
The first time that I heard of that position was on the front page of the Up Front magazine. Up Front is the publication of Heritage Front. That was the postulation of the president of Heritage Front, Wolfgang Droege, another former Reform Party member, two years ago. I have a copy of it if anyone would like to see it.
There is a disturbing connection between the extreme right winger in the country vehemently opposed to aboriginal self-government and the comments made by the Reform Party. It is being picked up in the mainstream media by other anti-Nisga'a campaigners like Gordon Gibson, the former leader of the Liberal Party in British Columbia, who is also involved with FIRE, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Equality.
These people believe that all people must be treated equally, whereas Judge Murray Sinclair, an aboriginal leader in Manitoba, pointed out clearly that to treat all people equally when they are in fact unequal is in itself a problem that compounds the problem.
I hear people laughing. To try to imply that we can allocate the same type of principles to all people equally is not recognizing the unequal situation that aboriginal people find themselves in now. Special circumstances are in order. That is why we as Canadians are willing to give special consideration to aboriginal self-government.
I guess I like the comments of the member of the Reform Party who spoke previously. Do you or do you not agree with the positions of the anti-Indian movement, FIRE, as chaired by a former federal Reform Party researcher, Greg Hollingsworth?