Mr. Speaker, I usually use the phrase “aboriginal peoples” as opposed to “first nations”.
With the motion of last week that added the words “within a united Canada”, I had hoped that would represent a context that would help to more clearly define for average Canadians what nation meant and what we were really doing on this. In the subsequent days that followed that did not happen. In terms of the commentators, they would be using the word in whatever way it was most useful to them.
This question is important to all Canadians, as we have seen in the debate in the last three or four weeks. This is our country and this matters a lot to us. The way in which we get to debate it and resolve it is critical to what we end up resolving. The key to the whole thing is how we end up living with it out the other end.
The story the Bloc members will tell in terms of Quebec has nothing to do with the desire of creating a common understanding about nation. It is nation as a way of creating country.