Mr. Speaker, despite the humour of the hon. member across the way whose stand-up comic routine I always appreciate, I do hope that I still have time to finish my remarks. I want to take up where I left off.
Could those members not find anything in this legislation that they oppose in order to show their constituents that they are listening to them, or are they like the Indian affairs minister and believe they are smarter than their constituents? My suggestion is that is for the electorate to decide and it will decide at the next election.
I would now like to discuss the two questions I posed at the outset of my remarks.
Will the average Nisga'a person be better off as a result of this legislation? Absolutely not. Aboriginal Canadians have been treated as second class citizens for hundreds of years. This legislation does nothing to remedy that.
I want to go out on a limb here. I hope it does not cost me my re-election, but I have to agree with the words of the current Prime Minister and his mentor Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Just listen to these quotes:
What we want, and the Indians are in agreement, is that they should become equal citizens of Canada.
That was the current Prime Minister when he was Indian affairs minister in 1968. Another quote:
There is a long term intention on the part of the government...to arrive eventually at a situation where the Indians will be treated like other Canadian citizens of the particular province in which they happen to be.
That was Prime Minister Trudeau in 1968.
Equality was the long term intention of the Liberal government's Indian policy. Why has it abandoned this policy? Do Liberals no longer believe in equality? It has been over 30 years since these statements were made. How long are their long term intentions? They have an opportunity to put the words of Pierre Trudeau into action. Carpe diem, seize the day. Withdraw the Nisga'a legislation so that the aboriginal people can take a step forward into the next century instead of passing into law the mistakes of the last 200 years.
This agreement does not grant the Nisga'a people the property rights that the rest of us enjoy. Nisga'a women are left unprotected by this legislation. The charter of rights takes a back seat to Nisga'a law. These are just a few examples of the shortcomings of this.
Mr. Speaker, you just signalled two minutes. I am sure that two minutes did not go by in that period of time.