Mr. Speaker, I would describe this as kind of an incremental move toward self-government. This is not uncommon in the country. There are different places across the country where first nations have approached us and suggested and we have been willing partners to say they may not be ready for full self-government today but they can see a road map. They can say, “We want to do this today, and then we want to move ahead with maybe a tripartite agreement on education”, and move toward self-government. That is a good way to do it for those first nations that want to approach it that way.
This is a step along that line, although in a sense it is more formalized. With the Cree Regional Authority we have been able to take the government arrangements that have already been given to the nine Cree first nations in the territory and expand that to the Cree Regional Authority, and now the new relationship document talks about how that will then flow from the Cree Regional Authority and expand to the Cree nation government.
The negotiations that will take place subsequent to this will allow us to talk not only about the monetary part of it, as there are a couple hundred million dollars to facilitate that happening on the government side, but more importantly, there is a process established that is part of a continuum. There is a settlement, we have implemented it, we have expanded it to the Cree Regional Authority with this legislation, and then, importantly, the Cree nation governance will flow from that quite quickly and naturally, based on the new relationship agreement. The dollar figures and all of that are already established, so my sense is the authorities will be relatively easy to negotiate.