Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out as well the incredible work that the member for Calgary Centre-North has done as the senior critic for aboriginal affairs and northern development for first nations in this country. He has been an incredible advocate and is incredibly knowledgeable on this file.
He has worked very hard, travelling the country from one end to the other, meeting with first nations' leaders, chiefs, councillors and individuals living on reserves. I think he has done an outstanding job. He has put together an incredible policy document that was accepted by our convention. It was very forward looking, I think much more so than anything we have seen from the government on this file.
With regard to how this bill will affect my riding, the potential is there for it to have a significant impact down the road in the context of the latent oil and gas resources that currently exist in northern Saskatchewan and being developed at some point. I would really like to see those resources developed by first nations.
Too often in northern Saskatchewan we see the incredible natural resource wealth leaving northern Saskatchewan with not a lot of the value remaining in northern Saskatchewan. Quite frankly, I think that is reflected in the statistics. Northern Saskatchewan has the poorest riding in the entire country. It is 308th out of 308. The federal government has largely ignored the interests of northern Saskatchewan and that is reflected in the fact that we have reserves and first nations that are some of the poorest in the country.
That would change under a Conservative government. We have given a commitment. I actually introduced today a motion that would extend the resources of the northern strategy to include northern Saskatchewan and northern Manitoba. This would mean that over four years $120 million additional dollars would be available to northern Saskatchewan and northern Manitoba that currently do not exist in what are two of the poorest regions of the entire country.
The Conservative Party has a very forward looking view for first nations and a positive outlook as it moves forward with a plan to actually transfer powers currently exercised by the federal government to have self-government on reserves for first nations. This is a positive thing and our vision is far better than that of the government.