Mr. Speaker, I believe I have four minutes remaining and then the customary 10 minute question and answer period. I was looking forward to finishing my thoughts on this speech.
When I left off at the end of the day, I was about to say that some of the most draconian measures of Bill C-23 are designed to prop up the credit worthiness of the authority that is created by the bill, apparently almost at any cost.
One of the things that I caution is a gross surrender of sovereignty by first nations that get attracted to and caught up by this scheme. This was the whole point in my speech. For instance, a single missed payment can trigger the takeover of the local financial affairs of this newly created management board. I refer the House to clause 84, for anyone who finds fault with that thought. Once involved in this newly created financial authority, this borrowing club, the first nation can never leave without the consent of all the other borrowing members of the authority. It is locked in.
One elected band chief and council may decide to sign on to this new financial authority, but then they can never get out without the unanimous consent of all the other signatories to the authority. They have forfeited their sovereignty or their sovereign right to set up a different system perhaps or join some other alliance with other bands that may wish to join forces to get a better bond rating or borrowing and lending rates.
This is the caution that we bring to the debate on this subject. A first nation member of this newly created authority can never obtain any long term financing secured by property tax revenue except from the authority. Therefore, they forfeit their right to look at other options.
I am not sure that those who are the boosters of this bill are even aware of these cautionary notes that we bring to the table today. These unfortunate first nations that get seduced into this deal will be cut off from access to normal commercial financing available to all other Canadians because they are now bound by this very narrow prescriptive model.
This monopolistic practice we argue will stifle competition for financing and perversely may even lend to higher lending costs. If the original idea was uniting together as a group to share liability and thus get preferable lending rates, this may have the perverse effect, the opposite effect.
I have pointed out a number of issues. It is very difficult when I am interrupted in my flow of thought to jump back into where we were. The principal constitutional inherent right problem with the bill is the sweeping authority over local first nations laws delegated by federal statute to the federally appointed tax commission and management board.
Bill C-23 stands for the offensive proposition that in the year 2004 the constitutionally protected inherent right of self-government does not include jurisdiction to pass local laws on property taxation and financial management. In fact Bill C-23 asserts that such intimate local laws can only be approved by these federally appointed institutions. It speaks to the inherent right to self-government. We either support that concept as contemplated in the Canadian Constitution Act, 1982 or we do not.
The bill tells me that the government does not embrace the concept of the inherent right to self-government. Incrementally, bit by bit, it is stripping that away even before the courts have finished ruling on the subject and even before Parliament has given true meaning and definition to section 35 of the Constitution.
This prehistoric conception of the inherent right, which has been enshrined in federal statute now, prejudices all first nations whether they are scheduled or unscheduled. This has been our point all along. This is not a bill that will affect only those first nations that choose to put their names on some schedule. The bill will impact all first nations whether they sign on or not.
The optionality of the bill is a myth. I pointed out the last time I spoke on the this that the bill is optional in the same way a driver's licence is optional. It is optional until we want to drive a car and then all of a sudden we need one.
Therefore, if any first nation applicant goes to the government and says that it wants to exercise its right to fiduciary obligations, et cetera, the government would be able to simply tell the applicant to go sign on to the new fiscal institutions because that is the avenue of recourse. The government will be able to tell the applicant not to look for money from the government but to borrow the money on the open market by signing on to the agreement.
There is no optionality at all. I challenge that argument and I challenge anyone who says that it is.