Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today in response to the motion by the hon. member for Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine concerning Forillon National Park.
The park was created in 1970 to protect and showcase an example of one of Canada's unique and most beautiful natural regions. Few Canadians would disagree with that intention. In fact, in this year in which we celebrate the centennial of the creation of the government organization which later became Parks Canada, we cheered Canada's outstanding accomplishment in protecting some 360,000 square kilometres of land. This is an astonishing achievement.
We can also celebrate how far Parks Canada has come in learning how to balance the need to protect our natural spaces for future generations with the need to sustain the communities that lived in harmony with these spaces for generations past.
I appreciate the hon. member's concerns for the families who were required to leave their lands when the park was created in 1970. They were asked to leave a place of astonishing natural beauty, a place where, for several generations, they had clung proudly to a way of life that depended upon the salt cod fishery.
The world turns, the times change, and perhaps the descendants of those early families would not care to exchange the quality of their lives today for the lives of those generations ago salting cod on the pebble beaches of Gaspé. However, we honour those generations for their fortitude and resourcefulness, and celebrate the memory of the communities they built. In fact, in 2009, Parks Canada organized a reunion for the families who were required to leave their homes at Forillon.
The House may be interested to know that more than 300 people attended the event. Parks Canada hosted similar events at Kouchibouguac National Park in 2007, 2008 and 2009, with up to 700 people attending. Equally important, Parks Canada has taken steps to honour those families by telling the stories of their communities and the event that led to their departure. This is a significant change after 40 years in which the park's interpretation programs paid little attention to the events that led to the park's creation.
However, last year Parks Canada launched an exhibit called “Gaspesians from Land's End” that addresses the theme, and that park management has committed to work with former residents and their descendants to tell their stories and celebrate their heritage. The exhibit will showcase the cultural richness and diversity of the residents who made the Forillon Peninsula their home. The Government of Canada invested close to $1 million to reconstruct the Dolbel-Roberts House and to create “Gaspesians from Land's End”.
The exhibit was developed by the Parks Canada team, which included the members of committees representing both the families who left the land and the communities that continue near the park to this day. Some 60 people contributed by providing documentation, photos and first-hand accounts.
One of the special features of the “Gaspesians from Land's End” exhibit has been a montage featuring 13 videos in which former residents give first-hand accounts of everything from childhood and day-to-day life to family ties and social relations. The interviews for the montage illustrate the rich lives of the people who inhabited the peninsula.
The exhibit is a way for Forillon National Park to reconcile with the families who were required to leave their homes to make way for the park. The national park wants to renew ties with those families and their descendants, and wishes to highlight the contribution these families and communities made to the history of the region and, of course, to Canada.
Parks Canada has further plans to commemorate the persons whose homes were expropriated so that the national park could be created. It will design and install interpretive panels to show the names of the families who lived there before the park was created.
It will continue to work with the committees that have been created to pursue further activities. One of these is the Forillon expropriated persons commemorative committee, which is composed of Parks Canada employees and representatives from the Gaspé community. Its mandate is to commemorate and highlight the presence and contributions of Forillon's former residents, along with their rich history and way of life.
The other committee consists exclusively of people who were required to leave the area that is now Forillon National Park, as well as their descendants, and was established in 2009 as the Forillon expropriated persons interim committee. One of its activities is to organize various reunion meetings in various sectors of the park.
In the meantime, Parks Canada is taking steps to count and assess the buildings of the former residents. These buildings are now 40 years old and of the 16 buildings submitted, 12 have been recognized as cultural resources. Parks Canada has taken action to protect and preserve them.
The “Gaspesians from Land's End” has been set up at the refurbished Maison Dolbel-Roberts. As well, St. Peter's Church has seen major restoration and is now in very good condition. At Grande-Grave, the Hyman store and its warehouse, the Anse-Blanchette buildings, and others were restored, and with the exception of the barn are rated in good condition. Parks Canada has been examining the possibility of preserving and restoring other buildings, including sheds and barns, to help showcase and maintain the region's beauty and historic character.
All these steps have been taken to commemorate a community that once made the Forillon Peninsula its home and developed a deep and rich cultural legacy, a legacy we now honour. We can learn valuable lessons from how Forillon Park was created and we can find better ways to work with communities in creating national parks.
That is what we have done. We can see it in so many of the new areas that this government has made its intention to protect. But we do so not against the wishes of the local communities but in partnership with them. We can see this process at work across the country.
On the east coast, for example, we can see in Labrador where we worked with a steering committee to examine the possibility of creating a national park in the Mealy Mountains. The Innu nation, Nunatsiavut government, and Labrador Métis nation were involved in the steering committee. It recommended that the park continue to maintain traditional land use activities by Labradorians from the surrounding communities, because the Mealy Mountains are not just home to wildlife. Like the Forillon Peninsula in 1970, they are home to people who have lived in harmony with this land for generations.
The proposed national park reserve will continue to accommodate traditional land use activities for Labradorians in the surrounding communities. We continue to work together to manage these activities in a way that ensures the long-term ecological integrity of this land as a national park reserve.
That is what we have done in Labrador. We have done something similar in the Northwest Territories where we expanded the boundaries of Nahanni National Park, so that it is now six times its original size. It is roughly the size of Belgium.
We could not have done this were it not for the co-operation and collaboration with local communities, including first and foremost the Dehcho first nation, the government of the Northwest Territories, and the mining and hunting industries of the north.
The Dehcho people were steadfast and tireless in their support for the expansion of the park reserve because for them it is a place of mystery, spirituality and healing. The new national park reserve will commemorate and reflect their culture. The Dehcho will participate in the management of the park reserve. The Dene and treaty rights of the Dehcho members and all aboriginal groups will be fully protected within the boundaries of the expanded park.
But at the same time, the park reserve excludes areas of highest potential for mineral and oil and gas extraction. We want to improve the prosperity of the Northwest Territories with its vast resource potential. We have been working with all partners on the creation of the Nahanni National Park Reserve. We know better how to work with communities so that everyone benefits from the creation of a national park.
Finally, for a third example, let me remind the House of what we have accomplished on the west coast where we established the Gwaii Haanas National Marine Conservation Area Reserve and Haida Heritage Site. Canada has become the first country to protect a region from the alpine meadows of the mountain tops to the depths of the ocean floor beyond the continental shelf.
To make this happen we worked with the Haida people to protect some of the world's most abundant and diverse marine habitats. For hundreds of generations, the Haida Nation has lived in harmony with this environment. Today, this wealth of marine resources continues to sustain local communities as well as a recreational and commercial fishery. This new national marine conservation area reserve will ensure that this can continue.
What these three examples have in common and share with other examples such as Lancaster Sound is that we work with local populations to make sure that the creation of national parks serves their needs as well as the need for protecting the environment. We do not just preserve habitat for wildlife, we can protect a way of life, one that has sustained humans for generations. If we are wise, it will continue for generations to come.
I am pleased that the former residents of what is now Forillon National Park are working with Parks Canada to preserve their legacy. I am also pleased that from their experience 40 years ago, Parks Canada has learned valuable lessons that it now applies to help maintain the way of life in communities across Canada where national parks are being created.
We cannot turn back the clock. But we can give the people who lost their homes, and the descendants of those people this assurance: Parks Canada will keep the memory of their communities alive and will continue to work with other communities so that never again will a people have their homes expropriated where we can achieve so much more if we work together.