Mr. Speaker, I want to reiterate that on this side of the House we do support free rights and the process of reconciliation with the indigenous peoples of Canada, and we also believe that the path to reconciliation lies in taking meaningful action to improve the lives of indigenous peoples and ensure that they are able to fully participate in Canada's economy.
I listened to the minister's speech and note that some of the concerns that we have on this side of the House pertain to some of the broadly worded provisions and the implications of that wording and the lack of definition of a number of them. I will go a little further. The bill requires a plan to be developed within three years, but it really does not have a time frame to complete that work, nor are there clear and agreed upon objectives to be laid out in that plan.
If one does not even have an agreement or clarity on the work plan, on what basis can it be claimed that an entirely new approach based on free, prior and informed consent can be implemented?