Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Nanaimo—Cowichan for her good presentation on this bill.
For 23 years I was involved in the negotiations that resulted in the adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Article 3 of the declaration speaks about the right to self-determination of indigenous peoples, by virtue of which they freely determine their political status. The word “freely” is important in this sentence.
Perhaps my colleague could help me understand something about this debate. It is now 2013, and today we are celebrating the life of a very important person in our history, Mr. Mandela, who brought down the apartheid system in South Africa. It seems that what is being proposed here today, to borrow the parliamentary secretary's words, is the improvement of a system that closely resembles the system that existed in South Africa. Can she explain to me why we are going in that direction instead of letting aboriginal peoples freely determine their political status?