Madam Speaker, it is a great pleasure to rise on behalf of the New Democratic Party to speak to Bill C-14. I am especially pleased to represent my party in voicing our views on the bill because it deals with a fundamental issue that is very dear to my heart, and that is the eventual emancipation of the aboriginal people.
The bill would give force and effect to an agreement that was laboriously negotiated among the parties to deal with the self-governance and land claims of the Tlicho people in the Northwest Territories. I am heartened today to hear the views of my colleague from the Bloc Quebecois and the views shared by my colleagues in the Liberal Party as they speak in favour of the bill and in favour of the House of Commons recognizing the legitimate aspirations and goals of freedom and self-governance of these people.
Let there be no doubt that the Tlicho people meet all the tests of being recognized, not only as a nation but as a people. They have a language, a rich culture, heritage and tradition. They had and have land and a land base that pre-dates Confederation and pre-dates European contact on this continent by not only hundreds of years but by millenniums.
I am pleased to voice the views of the New Democratic Party that the bill should have speedy passage through the House of Commons at this stage and be sent to committee where I hope it also gets favourable treatment.
However I was disappointed to hear some of the views and criticisms put forward by the representative of the official opposition, the member for Calgary Centre-North. I feel like I am having déjà vu because one of the proudest moments of my career as a member of Parliament to date was being able to advocate and speak on behalf of the Nisga'a deal, which was the only other contemporary or modern day treaty signed in recent history that dealt with self-governance and a land base.
It was our pleasure to see that bill through. It was one of the proudest moments of my career to stand and vote in favour of that bill but we also had to stand 472 extra times because the Reform Party of the day opposed self-governance for aboriginal people. The Reform Party of the day opposed the right to self-determination for aboriginal people. The Reform Party and later the Alliance Party did everything it could to block the Nisga'a deal, mostly using political mischief by moving 472 amendments to the bill which were clearly designed to block, delay and stall.
I am disappointed to see a repeat of this in that we are getting opposition to what should be a unanimously accepted bill. I am not convinced that we as members of the House of Commons should even have a right, frankly, to interfere with the passage of the bill. The bill was negotiated between the Tlicho people, the Government of the Northwest Territories and federal government representatives, and the agreement has been struck.
The bill we are passing today would simply give force and effect to an agreement that has already been made. Therefore it would be an extension of the paternalism that has plagued aboriginal people for any of us here today to start cracking open this agreement to say that we should not be allowing Indians this much land or this much money. That is not our place. It is not for a bunch of white guys in suits to make those rulings.
This has been a long process of very sensitive and delicate negotiations. Agreements were ratified in a laborious and comprehensive way of all the four communities within the traditional area of the Tlicho people. At this point in time they simply need the recognition and the enabling legislation for that agreement to be manifest in full force and effect in the traditional territory of the Tlicho people
It seems to me that Tom Flanagan is still writing aboriginal policy for the Canadian Alliance Party. Progressive Conservatives must be rolling over in their collective graves, if that party is in fact dead, to hear the opposition being put toward the bill today. It is sad.
The mindset among those who are opposed to the emancipation of aboriginal people is a mindset that is found in the title of the book by Mel Smith, a senior advisor on aboriginal affairs for the Canadian Alliance, called Our Home or Native Land . In the book he challenges the whole idea of any kind of a land claim by stating that it would create a third order of government that would somehow have primacy over federal government laws. That is complete fearmongering and we heard 20 minutes of that fearmongering today.
The Canadian Alliance would have us believe that somehow this modern day treaty would have primacy on international affairs, that this new first nation would actually be out there representing themselves and having primacy over the federal government. All of that is carefully pointed out in the bill, if anyone would take the time to read the actual contents. There is no question which order of government has primacy. There is no question what relatively minor local bylaws and things the Tlicho people will have authority over.
The taxation rights that are within the bill are what is possibly the most meaningful financial component of the bill. Because taxation is a spending matter, the bill has to be preceded by a ways and means motion. That is parliamentary procedure. There is nothing sinister about a ways and means motion introduced by a minister to precede spending matters. That is the way this place works.
I have had to sit here for seven years now and listen to some pretty extreme views from the Reform Party, then the Canadian Alliance Party, and now we are seeing fairly extreme views in opposition to the bill from the new incarnation, the Conservative Party. I remember the terrible view shared by the aboriginal affairs critic when I first arrived here, who said that living on an Indian reserve was like living on a south sea island being supported by a rich uncle. That was the enlightened viewpoint of the Canadian Alliance of that time.
Other people have said that just because we did not have Indian wars in this country does not mean that they are not a vanquished people, otherwise why would they live on those Godforsaken reserves we have put them on. We can look that up in Hansard . Those were the views shared by the Alliance members then and their views do not seem to be much more enlightened today.
I do not think anyone should be standing in the way of a self-government agreement that would actually see a people come out from underneath the tyranny of the Indian Act. We should be celebrating this in the House of Commons today, not finding ways to throw obstacles and barriers in the way.
I do not need to tell anyone that the Indian Act is outdated and paternalistic legislation that is unworthy of any modern democracy. Any time a group of people, such as the Tlicho and the Dogrib Treaty 11 territory, can find their way to come out from under that oppressive document, we should be celebrating that fact.
Those who are not steeped in the issue of aboriginal affairs probably are not aware that the Indian Act essentially strips people's rights away. I heard the hon. member for Calgary Centre-North say that we do not want to put in place a race based set of privileges, as if the Tlicho people will now have extra privileges that other white Canadians do not have. In actual fact, the obnoxious race based issue is the fact that the Indian Act is still dominating and controlling the lives of a million Canadians in the year 2004. That is the real tragedy and that is the race based issue that must be addressed.
We are satisfied that there has been a thorough and comprehensive education and then ratification process of all the parties involved in the land claim and self-government agreement. I know it was an exhaustive tour throughout the territory to reach every last resident within that territory for, first, education, then consultation and finally, ratification of the agreement as we see it today.
Let us not kid ourselves. There was a great deal of give and take in that negotiation process. I do not believe anybody got all that they wanted out of this package, such as is the nature of negotiations. There was a lot of compromise and cooperation.
The only thing we need to know is that all the players, all the people directly affected by this agreement, are comfortable with it. That includes the government of the Northwest Territories, the diamond mines that are resident in that area, owners of the resource properties there, the federal government negotiators and, most important, the representatives the Dogrib Treaty 11 Council.
We find no fault in the bill. We feel it is our duty and our obligation to take that information from the authorities who are directly affected by it and do everything we can to see speedy passage.
We have a window of opportunity here. This could be a very brief minority government. It would be an injustice and terribly unfair if we let this issue slide or if we somehow ground it to a halt to where it could not pass within the timeframe. We might be back in election as early as February or March of next year, God forbid. This is what we are told. That gives us very few sitting days to see Bill C-14 get through this stage in the House of Commons, committee, third reading, Senate, et cetera. We all know that whole process is fraught with pitfalls when there is political mischief afoot.
We are happy that the Nisga'a people saw social justice within their time. That was a century-long negotiating process where the Nisga'a people first took their grievances down to the parliament buildings in Victoria in a dugout canoe and were turned away at the door of the legislature.
It was a very emotional process, for me at least, as we went through the steps in this House. They were welcomed into the House of Commons by most of the political parties here. The whole process was welcomed and the final treaty was in fact ratified.
These modern-day treaties are difficult to put together because they contain two components, as has been rightfully pointed out. It is not just a land claim. It is a self-governance agreement. With that comes the richness of the idea of self-determination and a recognition of a whole people, the language and culture, the right to make laws and to chart their own destiny. That is what is really exciting and really heartening about this whole process.
Without going into a great deal of technical details, I do not think it is necessary to know what the intentions of the NDP caucus will be in association with the bill. We are satisfied that it meets the tests for which we would look. It is a deal that has been driven by the people it affects and there has been natural justice involved in the consultation and the ratification process. The people have spoken and I believe it is up to us to honour the message they send to us. This is an idea whose time has come and we want to see it recognized and implemented in this session of Parliament.
The bill has the support of the NDP caucus.