Madam Speaker, I think those guys killed the Progressive Conservatives. They do not seem to be evident in that party at all.
The Tlicho government will have a very defined range of law-making powers. Those are clearly spelled out in the agreement. The primacy as to who has the authority over what matters has been very carefully laid out and thought out by others in the 10-year-long agonizing process, while this group of people negotiated their way out from under the Indian Act.
Ultimately, we should be all work toward the elimination of the Indian Act. It is unworthy of any western democracy. It is an international embarrassment that we still have the Minister of Indian Affairs in complete control over the lives of first nations people, the aboriginal people of the country, without agreements such as this.
I do not know if the hon. member is aware. People cannot avail themselves of the resources on their traditional territory or on their reserve. The Indian Act spells out what things first nations people can use for economic development, such as sand, gravel, mud, moss and a few things. It does not say anything about gold, oil, gas, ores of any kind, molybdenum. None of those things are cited.
Until an agreement like this is put into force, first nations people have no hope of being able to develop their way out of the third world conditions in which they find themselves, on reserves they were placed on by virtue of the Indian Act.
This is why agreements like this are so heartening and give hope and optimism to generations of aboriginal people. There are other outstanding claims grinding their way through in an agonizingly slow process. We are critical of the federal government for not opening the tables and being more generous at the tables in view of Supreme Court rulings as they pertain to aboriginal title and use of resources, et cetera. In fact the government is not paying any attention to Delgamuukw, Sparrow, Corbiere and any number of recent rulings. The government is bound by policy directives that date from the 1970s when it is at the bargaining table on comprehensive land claims.
When one actually gets to this point, it is almost a miracle if it gets here in spite of all the obstacles thrown in its way, not the least of which is the wholesale opposition to the idea of self-government articulated by the Reform Party, by the Canadian Alliance Party and by some members of the current Conservative Party. They seem to feel that by setting up independent first nations and self-governance, that sets up a third order of government that will somehow compete or have primacy over the legislative authorities of the House of Commons, or provincial legislatures or even municipal by-laws. That is simply not true.
This is tantamount to fearmongering to imply that by passing this bill it will somehow pass something that has primacy over the House of Commons and elected representatives here. We still have all the power, so there is nothing to worry about ultimately. We have afforded this group of aboriginal people to develop their own traditional land and traditional territory and to get out from under the oppression of the Indian Act.