Mr. Speaker, at the request of my colleague, the member for Saint-Jean and Bloc Quebecois critic on native affairs, I am pleased to rise to speak to Bill C-56 entitled An Act respecting an agreement with the Norway House Cree Nation for the settlement of matters arising from the flooding of land, and respecting the establishment of certain reserves in the province of Manitoba.
This bill has two parts. The first concerns the agreement reached with the Norway House Cree Nation on the settlement of matters arising from the flooding of land. The second provides for measures to facilitate the settlement of claims by the creation of reserves in Manitoba or by the addition of lands to existing reserves. Let us discuss the first part.
This part concerns the main agreement on implementation signed in 1997 by Canada, Manitoba and the Norway House Cree Nation. In the early 1970s, the latter was affected by a flood caused by the construction of a hydroelectric dam on the Nelson and Churchill rivers and by changes to Lake Winnipeg.
The 1997 agreement settles the obligations of the federal government under the 1977 Manitoba Northern Flood Agreement between the federal and Manitoba governments, Manitoba Hydro and the northern flood committee, on behalf of the first nations of Cross Lake, York Factory and Nelson House, and the Norway House and Split Lake Cree nations.
The 1997 agreement terminates the Norway House Cree Nation's claims regarding obligations unfulfilled by certain parties to the Manitoba Northern Flood Agreement.
The flood agreement signed in 1977 was designed to remedy the adverse effects of the Lake Winnipeg development and Churchill River diversion projects, which had resulted in approximately 12,000 acres of first nations' reserve land in northern Manitoba being flooded, as well as another 525,000 acres of non-reserve land that was used by the first nations affected.
In other words, the purpose of the agreement was to compensate the first nations affected by Manitoba Hydro work. While nicely described by then Indian affairs minister Warren Allmand as a charter of rights and benefits for those affected, the fact remains that the agreement was a precondition to any work.
Indeed, people's lives cannot be disrupted without at least compensating the communities for the significant changes imposed on them by hydroelectric projects. The extensive damage caused by the Lake Winnipeg development and Churchill River diversion projects completely changed the traditional way of life of the bordering communities.
We must bear in mind that more than 1,200 Cree people who lived alongside or near the affected areas were faced with an entirely new environment overnight. The Norway House Cree had always hunted and fished. They had to learn new ways and adjust to a totally different way of life. In particular, because of excessive water pollution, there were serious problems with fishing and with drinking water.
Members can imagine what an odd “charter of rights and benefits” this is for the Norway House Cree.
As well, although the Manitoba Northern Flood Agreement called for programs and compensation to make up for unfavourable outcomes, the roles and responsibilities of the parties still had to be clearly defined. Because of this, there were delays in the project and in the meeting of common obligations, such as adding land to the reserves, as well as arrangements to promote employment opportunities for the communities and environmental monitoring.
Implementation was not making any progress, and the parties could not reach agreement. In short, the spirit of co-operation was very much absent. More than 20 years passed without any clear definition of the mechanisms. For far too long, all sorts of dispute resolution approaches were resorted to, rather than giving preference to a co-operative and co-ordinated approach.
The four parties, in a desire to enhance the efficiency and reduce the costs of this undertaking, resumed negotiations in order to settle the claims and better define the obligations.
The four parties therefore negotiated a basic proposal to settle the outstanding land claims and the unfulfilled obligations. This proposal served as a starting point for negotiations with each first nation.
With the help of this proposal, negotiations were successful with four of the five first nations. As a result, the minister of Indian affairs signed implementation agreements with the Split Lake Cree First Nation in June 1992, the York Factory First Nation in January 1996, the Nelson House First Nation in March 1996, and the Norway House First Nation in December 1997.
A law is now required to provide for the comprehensive implementation of the provisions of the main Norway House Cree Nation agreement.
The first part of Bill C-56 will permit the lands provided within the framework of this agreement to be exempt from the provisions of the Indian Act. This will also permit the Norway House Cree Nation to use them for economic development purposes without administrative intervention by the minister of Indian affairs.
Under Bill C-56, the money due under the implementation agreement will be administered by a first nation's trust and not by the crown under the meaning of the Indian Act. Bill C-56 provides that all claims may be processed under the 1997 agreement exclusively.
Finally, this legislation provides recourse to Manitoba arbitration legislation in the event of a dispute between the parties to the implementation agreement.
In the first part, we consider these elements satisfactory and necessary to the implementation of the agreement.
We will now discuss the second part of Bill C-56, which concerns the federal government's commitments in the Framework Agreement, Treaty Land Entitlement, Manitoba. This part has broader scope than that of the framework agreement or of the first part of the bill. It will facilitate the implementation of all territorial claim settlements in Manitoba in which the government agrees to expand the size of a first nation reserve with, of course, the agreement of the first nation.
Under Bill C-56, the minister of Indian affairs may set aside lands as a reserve and the first nations will be able to create or accept the interests of third parties earlier in the reserve creation process than is currently possible.
This type of agreement is not new. There are in fact already a number of agreements in existence to settle claims in Manitoba providing for the expansion of first nation reserves.
The first, and most significant, is the one that concerns treaty land entitlement, which the federal government has not fully honoured. In other words, it has not granted enough land.
This is a major issue for the Manitoba first nations that signed or approved Treaties Nos. 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 10 between 1871 and 1910. Each of these treaties provided that reserve land would be allotted to first nations by the federal government according to the size of each family.
While the majority of first nations in Manitoba were assigned the land they were entitled to under these treaties, 26 nations were not assigned land.
In most cases, the problem arises from an inaccurate enumeration of members of the first nation or from insufficient land allocation. Efforts made to remedy this problem in the 1970s and 1980s were hampered by disputes on issues such as the availability, size and suitability of unused crown land.
The province's public interest requirements regarding new reserve land and the applicable area assessment method now required to meet the obligations set out in the treaties also hamper the settlement of claims.
Seven of the Manitoba first nations affected, who conducted separate negotiations, reached specific settlements regarding their land entitlements arising from treaties signed with Canada between 1994 and 1996. As a result, the federal government is required to add more than 170,000 acres to existing reserve land. It must also pay in excess of $51 million in financial compensation to the first nations affected.
As for Manitoba, its main obligation is to set aside 100,000 acres of unused public land—out of a total of 170,000 acres—as reserve land, which represents some $9 million.
On May 29, 1997, Canada, Manitoba and the Treaty Land and Entitlement Committee representing 19 other Manitoba first nations from among the 26 first nations that did not obtain lands under treaties, signed the framework agreement on land rights arising out of those treaties. These 19 first nations obtained reserves in excess of 1 million acres in all, but this still represents less than 1% of all of the land base in Manitoba.
For the federal government, the total cost of this settlement and implementation of the framework agreement relating to the 19 first nations is in the order of $98.8 million over 15 years, starting with the date of signature, May 29, 1997.
Other settlements in Manitoba which could come under this bill are the agreements with the Brokenhead and Sapotaweyak first nations, to whom the federal government must pay total compensation of $404,883 and provide lands with a total area of close to 213 acres for expansion of their reserves.
The Bloc Quebecois, via its aboriginal affairs critic, did not oppose the bill on the Split Lake first nation settlement, which was given royal assent on December 15, 1994. Nor did the Bloc Quebecois oppose the agreements with the York Factory and Nelson House first nations, which were both given royal assent in April 1997.
The Bloc Quebecois is, therefore, in favour of the underlying principles behind this bill. So, at first glance, we see no litigious or confusing clauses.
However, the Bloc Quebecois has serious reservations about the process the Norway House Cree Nation will follow in approving this agreement. In the Globe and Mail of January 30, we learned that the federal government had approved a second referendum on this agreement, a referendum we consider undemocratic, to say the least. Let me explain.
After the initial referendum on the matter of the Norway House agreement failed to pass by five votes on July 29, 1997, the Minister of Indian Affairs agreed to another referendum but changed the rules beforehand. First, a problem with the voters' list was cited. This was reviewed, because native people living off the reserve had apparently voted in the first referendum.
Under the new rules, only native people living on the reserve could vote. The voting system had been developed by the federal government and published in a guide book.
For the second vote on the matter, the federal government also offered $1,000 to each voter supporting the agreement. We can understand that the approximately 5,000 native persons living at Norway House, who have a hard time making ends meet, were not going to spit on this money. On the contrary, it was manna from heaven just before the holidays. It seems that the federal government simply bought votes.
I would point out to this House that the second referendum, with the vote buying scandal, was held, believe it or not, at the very moment the federal government was asking the Supreme Court to decide on the legality of Quebec's unilateral separation from Canada. Rather ironic, is it not?
Obviously this sort of practice raises some questions. For example, what is the relationship between the federal government and the native peoples? Is vote buying common practice? Is this how the Minister of Indian Affairs consults the native peoples in this country?
How can we trust the federal government in the future, when we know that the Department of Indian Affairs supported such an unjust operation?
In the light of the role of the federal government in this obviously undemocratic referendum process, how can it then turn around and try to give Quebec lessons on the democratic consultation of its people and the interpretation of the results?
Whatever the case, while the Bloc Quebecois does not oppose this bill in principle, rest assured that our native affairs critic will be questioning the witnesses appearing before the standing committee on this highly irregular event sullying Bill C-56.