Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-14. I was involved earlier in the agreements that derived from the Manitoba flooding of the 1970s. In the last parliament we had Bill C-36 dealing with the Split Lake Band, Bill C-39 dealing with the York Factory Band, and Bill C-40 dealing with the Nelson House Band. This is now the fourth bill dealing with five bands. We only have the Cross Lake Band that is currently not addressed by new legislation and is still subject to the Manitoba northern flood agreement of 1977.
Specifically Bill C-14 deals with Norway House. I had the experience of going to Norway House in the summer of 1995 as part of my party's task force on aboriginal affairs. We were trying to develop policy at that time.
I well remember the charter flight from Winnipeg to the airport at Norway House. We had made arrangements previously with some women from the Norway House community to meet us at the airport. There were several members of parliament from my caucus. The first words that came out of one of their mouths was “Congratulations, you have now been at Norway House one more time than our chief has this year”. That was actually the forerunner and the first clear example in my mind of the way in which aboriginal women were making decisions. When they are dissatisfied with the way their community is being run, they will do something about it. That is one memory that is etched in my mind.
The 1977 Manitoba flood agreement was laced with problems. It did not become a very good document to implement a lot of the necessary things to address the huge displacement of community lands. There were new hazards for residents of the communities because of the change in the waters and water levels. Resources were displaced. A whole new way of life had to be put in place because the flooded lands had changed the way the water oriented communities had operated up until that time. Clearly no one could reasonably argue that compensation is not an important part of this whole agreement.
We have supported all of the compensation agreements. We have been very consistent in doing that in Bill C-36, Bill C-39, Bill C-40 and once again today we are supporting Bill C-14. We have actually debated this since June 1994. That was the first set of debates.
I will just give an idea of what happened when the flooding occurred on the Nelson and Churchill rivers along with the Lake Winnipeg regulations project. Almost 5,000 hectares of reserve land belonging to these five first nations were flooded as well as over 200,000 hectares of non-reserve land that was traditionally used for hunting and trapping.
In the 1970s when the flood agreement was put together, it was very loosely worded. With these agreements now, not only is implementation better served, but we have clearer questions of how liability will be addressed. The project proponent, Manitoba Hydro, now essentially has the ongoing and unanticipated future liability. I think everyone would agree that is just and proper as it is the major proponent for the project.
There are some interesting elements to these agreements. In many ways we should be looking at these as enlightened things that we can build into future agreements.
The fee simple lands that are being transferred are not necessarily being transferred into typical reserve status. This will give the bands a lot more flexibility and opportunity to deal with those lands in a way that will not necessarily involve all the bureaucracy of the department of Indian affairs.
On the transfer of moneys, the compensation package, the moneys are going into a trust arrangement that will necessarily have an accountability function built in which I think is highly appropriate. We know for example that under the Liberal government the accumulated deficit of native bands across Canada has gone from $130 million to over $300 million. That lack of accountability is something to be avoided. This arrangement avoids that lack of accountability.
Those are the main points I wanted to get across. A couple of other things are worth pointing out.
The fee simple lands held by the respective native corporations are held outside the normal encumbrances of the Indian Act. They are also subject to property taxation. Any business originating from these lands is also taxable. In addition, individual band members may appeal under the Manitoba arbitration act if they are unsatisfied with band decisions which affect them personally.
We have some new thinking here that is worth putting under a microscope a few years down the road to see what real changes it has brought about. My suspicion is that this will lead to some good changes in the way governance is applied within these communities.
I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.