Mr. Speaker, it is really outstanding that we are still debating this bill. I consulted my notes from the last time I addressed the chamber to speak to the bill, which was November 30, 2022. At that time, I highlighted the fact that the bill was missing some important pieces. Specifically, it was missing economic reconciliation as a factor. Economic reconciliation was heard about throughout testimony on the bill. It is something I bring up because it went through and was brought forward by a number of witnesses, yet the bill still contains no actual piece on economic reconciliation. I believe strongly that economic reconciliation is going to be an integral part in how we go forward and move with these kinds of pieces.
The fact that the bill is still here, and that we are still in the process of debating it after having numerous amendments, speaks to the failure to do consultations in advance. I am very proud of my Conservative colleagues and all members of the INAN committee who worked hard to make the bill so much better in the committee process. Then the bill went to the Senate and was amended further. It was amended because the government failed to do adequate consultations before bringing it forward.
In my estimation, and from everything I have been able to ascertain, that tells me that the bill was not done properly to begin with. Typically, good bills with adequate consultation do not actually require that many amendments or need to be in the chamber for this length of time. This speaks to the government's overall failure to consult, and its having a very paternalistic approach to pieces. I am frustrated tonight that we are still here debating the bill. I am frustrated, on behalf of many indigenous people I have talked to in my riding, that economic reconciliation still has not come to pass.
I think this is an important piece because the track record on the legislation before us should be noteworthy. Even though there is cause for some congratulations, and indeed I truly believe this is an important step forward, it has been very frustrating that we brought forward indigenous partners and we brought forward stakeholders who highlighted a missing piece of economic reconciliation, and it was completely blindsided.
We also heard that a not-for-profit organization would be established to monitor, evaluate and report the progress being made toward reconciliation, and that it would respond to call to action number 53 made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. It is worth noting that during the entire year of 2023, the Liberal government that purports to be there for indigenous people and says that is its number one relationship, did not accomplish a single TRC call to action. In fact, there are 94 calls to action, and 81 are still unfulfilled. The piece of legislation before us, had the Liberals put the work in from the beginning, would have fulfilled one of the calls to action.
The problem was not stalling by the Conservatives; Conservatives worked quite collaboratively with many members of the House to ensure that things were going forward so the bill would be the best possible piece of legislation. It is just frustrating that we see there would be an oversight body, yet we are still missing the mark when it comes to some of the pieces. Conservatives have been supportive of the legislation and the very concept around it from the very beginning. I want to highlight that fact. My speaking poorly of this is in the hopes that at some point, when a future parliamentarian looks at this piece of the bill, they will see there were concerns being raised when it was first brought forward that highlight the missing piece.
I have had the great fortune, in my time as an elected official, to get to know Dr. Willie Littlechild. He was a chief. He is now a Companion of the Order of Canada. He was a member of Parliament for Wetaskiwin—Rimby. He is truly such an amazing, wonderful man. He is a great hockey player. He has pretty much done it all.
Dr. Wilton Littlechild, when this bill was first introduced in 2022, said the council will be an important tool for Indigenous Peoples to hold the government accountable to achieving meaningful change for our peoples.” He also said, “We need to know where we are today as far as reconciliation and how do we measure the advancement of reconciliation”.
As with almost all Liberal initiatives, the establishment of this council sounds like a very good thing. Indeed, in many respects it is, but now we come to the first problem with Bill C-29. The act stipulates that the first board of directors would be selected by the minister in collaboration with a transitional committee. However, the transitional committee was selected by the minister in December of 2021, so this raises some pretty serious questions about how independent the new council would be. I have seen the body of this council. It is made up of members such as Dr. Wilton Littlechild, so I do not have any concern with the members who have been put on this council. However, I believe the mechanism by which it was done was not right.
When I was a kid, my mum used to say the ends do not justify the means. One has to do things with the right intention along one's path for it to be ultimately good. I try, in every step I take, to remind myself of the important words of my mom that the ends do not justify the means. While I think that the committee and the composition of that council have some amazing, wonderful people who will really help our country move toward reconciliation, it was not done in a consultative way, in a way that would move us further toward reconciliation. That is problematic to me because the ends do not justify the means.
There have been so many concerns brought forward by my Conservative colleagues. I know the NDP brought forward many amendments when it went to committee, as did others. It seems to have been almost rushed. It is whatever is the most convenient for the government at the time.
I understand that this is complicated. Reconciliation is not static. One phrase Dr. Wilton Littlechild has used frequently has really stuck with me. He said that it is not reconciliation, but “reconciliaction”. It is the idea that we need action. We cannot just sit here and continue to consult, continue to get stuck in the bureaucratic processes and the red tape. We really need to reach past that. How can I make things better?
The fact that we are still here in this chamber more than a year after I gave my last speech on this, still having these conversations about how this bill is better than it was, but still not as good as I believe it could be, is very frustrating. If it is frustrating to me, it has to be intensely frustrating for those who have been working toward this.
One interesting piece about this bill is that it is very prescriptive. It sets aside three permanent seats, one for the Assembly of First Nations, one for the ITK and one for the MNC. They are three national organizations that the Liberal government has almost exclusively dealt with when it comes to indigenous issues in the country.
One thing that I have heard very clearly in my role as the member of Parliament for Fort McMurray—Cold Lake is that the AFN does not speak for the first nations, specifically in Treaty 8. They speak more broadly, but chiefs who I have chatted with, who I have had an opportunity to sit down with and have conversations with have told me that the AFN does not represent them, so consulting with the AFN is not consulting with them. They believe that is an issue when it comes to their inherent treaty rights. I believe this is indicative of the overall issue we are facing when it comes to how the government is approaching some of its dealings with indigenous people. It is going to some of these larger, umbrella organizations rather than having what could be sometimes some very tough conversations.
We have to do very difficult things as people, but people, I believe, are able to do tough things. I try to live in a space where, if I have something difficult ahead of me, I try not to kick it down the road. I try to deal with it in the moment because the faster I can deal with something difficult, the more likely I am going to learn and the more likely I am going to stop and live in that space of discomfort until I can find a space of magic.
The fact that the government is looking to these big national organizations rather than sitting down with each and every chief to have these conversations, to me, highlights perhaps a lack of reconciliation. I know that would require a whole bunch of work, and I do understand that there are some pragmatic challenges with this, but the fact that there is not representation of women or children designated on the council is problematic.
I have had an opportunity, through the years since I was elected and in my time just casually growing up in Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, to have many important conversations with a variety of first nations elders and hear how important the relationship of women was in their society, how the matriarchs of the community help guide how the decision-making processes are, how sacred women are and how sacred the power of women is. The fact that there is no space for women specifically in this takes away from that sacred recognition that exists in many indigenous communities of the power of women, the power of children and the power of these positions.
It is really frustrating that there are not on-the-ground communities, because when someone is sitting there and making the decision from Ottawa, they do not necessarily understand the reality on the ground in a community like Fort McMurray or Thunder Bay or Timmins. They are a bit further insulated from those nitty-gritty minutia problems. It is often in the nitty-gritty minutia that we can find the simple solutions.
They failed to include them, despite the fact that Conservatives put forward many amendments trying to include the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, which represents the 800,000 off-reserve indigenous people in this country. That failure overlooks the important fact that indigenous people do not just live on reserves. Many have chosen to move off reserve, and many have not chosen to move off reserve but were forcibly removed from their reserves. The reality is that there are over 800,000 people in this country who are first nations who do not live on reserve. Through this process, their voices are not prescribed into this bill as being included, so it is very frustrating. In fact, Kim Beaudin, vice-chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, noted, “Bill C-29 is really very, very disappointing...the federal government has ghosted the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples.”
“Ghosted” is the term being used. That is a slang kind of comment meaning when someone just stops talking to a group. I do not understand how a government that is trying to move forward with reconciliation would leave aside the voices of people who are living off reserve because theirs perhaps are more difficult to include.
In fact, Kim Beaudin later said that exclusion from the council was more than just simple oversight by the government. He said it was part of an ongoing strategy to exclude off-reserve and non-treaty status people from the decision-making process. Again, I quote: “One thing that is really frustrating is that this is a divide and conquer policy that’s been around for hundreds of years by the federal government and these organizations—ITK, MNC, AFN—they’re playing right into that playbook.”
Those are not my words. Those are the words of the vice-chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, Kim Beaudin.
As I mentioned at the outset of my remarks, Conservatives support this bill. We believe that reconciliation is critically important, but it is worth highlighting the fact that the ends do not justify the means. I believe that the means of preparing this legislation are part of why we are still here, more than a year later, still having these conversations and still in this space, because the work was not done before the legislation was brought forward.
They did not make it clean and neat, because it was easier not to. As was pointed out, it was divide and conquer. I do not know if that necessarily was the case, and I do not want to assume why members made certain decisions, but it is now pointed out. It has been pointed out many times by members of various parties in this House that voices were excluded.
I am just going to continue laying it down there, because it is important to highlight. Sometimes a mistake is not made intentionally. Sometimes it is an unintentional mistake. However, I was taught that if one has made a mistake, whether it was intentional or not, then one has to do better. When we know better, we do better. When something has been brought to our attention as not as good as it could be, we try to make it right. The fact that the government has failed to do what it can to make it right is frustrating. It is frustrating to a number of indigenous people who have brought forward their concerns to me on this bill. They feel like they have not been heard, that this is not their version of reconciliation.
As important as this bill is, it also highlights the failure of the Liberal government to listen to Canadians, and to listen meaningfully and to consult with indigenous peoples. This is, of course, not the first time we have spoke about the Liberals' inability to consult and listen.
Most recently, the Chiefs of Ontario and Attawapiskat First Nation filed a lawsuit against the federal government over what they allege is discriminatory and anti-reconciliatory application of the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act to first nations.
This is a troubling pattern that we have been seeing, over and over again, with the government, where it is not spending the time to understand what its jurisdictional space is. It steps over the line, and then instead of correcting it, it waits until it goes all the way to a court, the most expensive option. We are seeing increased costs. We are seeing a space where people are waiting in limbo for court decisions to be made, because the government went too far. It goes too far, time and time again.
In this particular case, while non-indigenous taxpayers get approximately 90% of charges refunded through tax rebates, this is not the case for first nations members, because property and income on reserve are tax exempt. Most indigenous people do not use the income tax system if they are living on reserve. Therefore, chiefs are now demanding a judicial review of the policy, something that they said would have been unnecessary if federal officials had bothered to engage with them to begin with.
We are in an expensive, costly court battle over something that probably could have been avoided had there been some actual meaningful consultation and dialogue. That is the difference. Consultation does not necessarily mean that everyone is going to get their way. It means that there is an understanding of the arguments, and perhaps someone can make a change to identify those concerns and prevent them from having to go to court, time and time again.
However, the Liberal government seems to be more keen on satisfying its agenda than sitting down and doing the tough work, and actually having those tough conversations.
In contrast to the Liberal government, Conservatives are listening to first nations. Last week, we announced support for an optional first nations resource charge that would enable first nations to take back control of their resources and their money. This is a first nations-led solution to a made-in-Ottawa problem. First nations and the First Nations Tax Commission developed the plan, brought it to the Conservatives, and we accepted.
Putting first nations back in control of their money and letting them bring home the benefits of their resources would help get local buy-in for good projects to get ahead. Only common-sense Conservatives would fight for real economic reconciliation by supporting first nations taking back control of their money and their lives.
Bill C-29 is deeply flawed, as I have pointed out. Conservatives have proposed numerous amendments to improve it. I am very proud of the work that my colleagues have done to improve this legislation. Many of the amendments have been rejected by the Liberal-NDP government, which continues to implement an “Ottawa knows best” policy, which generally fails to accomplish their goals, no matter how laudable they might be.
On this front, we will continue to support Bill C-29, but not without some very serious reservations on this very seriously flawed bill.
