Madam Speaker, the challenge for me in speaking to the official opposition motion on the Nisga'a agreement is how I address something in 10 minutes that I have been talking about since 1995.
I believe that both levels of government in their eagerness to embrace the Nisga'a agreement have manipulated the facts and misrepresented the public interest. The federal government is imposing on British Columbia a deal it was not prepared to impose on itself in the Yukon or the Northwest Territories. The federal government is imposing on Canadians a deal with the Nisga'a that the separatists in Quebec would welcome with open arms. Contrast this with the federal posture toward Toronto, a city state that Ottawa refuses to recognize.
The B.C. government through its eagerness is leaving hundreds of millions of dollars worth of federal transfers on the table by virtue of a poorly configured, poorly negotiated and one-sided federal-provincial cost sharing memorandum for treaties. The B.C. government is a willing participant in an agreement that threatens the fiscal integrity of its citizens. The official opposition, federally and provincially, oppose the current configuration of the agreement.
The great irony is that upon either party forming a government, their hands are tied. The final agreement states that no party, federal, provincial or Nisga'a, may challenge any provisions of the agreement and any amendments require the consent of all three parties. That is a veto. The Nisga'a agreement is to prevail over federal or provincial law in the event of inconsistency or conflict. We must remember Meech Lake and Charlottetown.
In March 1995, I presented my analysis of the Nisga'a deal at that time largely from an evaluation of the forest resource. I projected the costs of settling land claims in British Columbia at $8.5 billion. The provincial aboriginal affairs minister said that I was extrapolating figures from various sources in order to scare people. Just seven months later the same minister stated that the total B.C. compensation package would exceed $10 billion. Let us remember that I said $8.5 billion just months earlier. It was a very puzzling admission given his earlier statement and not a statement to inspire confidence in the negotiators. Now some analysts are forecasting costs to exceed $20 billion.
The department of Indian affairs bureaucracy has used treaty making as an excuse to avoid responsibility and to cover its total failure at representing the interests of rank and file band members. It has had a fixation on chiefs and high visibility events and politics has continued to take precedence over competent management.
Native Indians have the worst statistics in the country. They deserve better. Canadians in general and the rank and file native population clearly place priority on solving social problems. Instead, the agenda has been hijacked by academics, lawyers, advisers, consultants and self-serving interests in large part so that the focus has been on seeking unconstrained self-government.
At the end of 1996, the negotiators for the Nisga'a stated that their negotiation costs to date were $31 million. Many people will say that would have been better spent in giving several aboriginal communities clean drinking water.
In the past, I offered some specific recommendations to both senior governments. Contrary to statements by the minister, Reform is in the business of offering constructive alternatives. Federal and provincial negotiators are non-stakeholders in the results of the local negotiations in rural British Columbia because they are from Ottawa, Saskatchewan, Vancouver or Victoria. They should be at least regionally based individuals with some connection to the area under consideration.
The second point is finality. Contrary to public expectations, the arrangement entrenches special aboriginal interests on crown lands outside the Nisga'a settlement lands. The public expectation is that aboriginals would have equal rights with other Canadians outside the settlement lands.
The third point is that the agreement should clearly state that Nisga'a members will be covered by the Canadian Human Rights Act. Although this may follow from removing most provisions of the Indian Act, a clear statement that the Canadian Human Rights Act applies would be helpful. Currently, Indians living under the Indian Act cannot pursue a case of discrimination through the provisions of the Canadian Human Rights Act. They are excluded.
I will now talk about some specifics regarding the Nisga'a government. The agreement authorizes the Nisga'a to formulate and adopt their own constitution, which is exactly what Lucien Bouchard wants to do and this government rejects, at least for Quebec.
The lawmaking powers of the Nisga'a legislator are extensive and include: to decide Nisga'a citizenship, Nisga'a culture, environmental assessment projects on Nisga'a lands and assets; to protect public order, peace and safety; the administration of justice; taxation; forest, lands and resources; fisheries and wildlife; subsurface rights; provision of social services to Nisga'a citizens; health services on Nisga'a lands; adoption of Nisga'a children; child and family services; preschool to grade 12 education of Nisga'a citizens on Nisga'a lands; post-secondary education within Nisga'a lands; controlled possession, sale or consumption of intoxicants on Nisga'a lands; Nisga'a police services, including a Nisga'a police board; a Nisga'a court to administer Nisga'a laws and corrections centres.
If Lucien Bouchard was offered all this, would he say, “No thanks?” This list represents a major divestiture of legislative power from the Parliament of Canada to what is to be in effect the parliament of the Nisga'a central government.
Apart from the Nisga'a legislature, there will be a bureaucracy to administer Nisga'a laws, programs and institutions. The agreement calls for a number of boards to oversee a host of matters. With an adult Nisga'a population of about 1,200 residents in the area, one wonders who will not be working for the new government.
The new Nisga'a government is to be given the power to impose taxes on persons or businesses that own and have interest in land within the area. If such persons are non-Nisga'a, they cannot vote in Nisga'a government elections but they would pay taxes. This is a classic case of taxation without representation. It is racially based taxation.
Evelyn Gillespie, the NDP MLA for the Comox Valley, recently wrote that the Nisga'a final agreement provides the Nisga'a with a municipal style government. She said this knowing that the people fully support municipal powers, as do I. The reality is that no municipal government has any status under the constitution while the Nisga'a will. This is the third order of government sought by former Assembly of First Nations leader, Ovide Mercredi, and rejected by his own people and by a majority of Canadians in the referendum on the Charlottetown accord.
Nisga'a citizenship and not residency determines who votes. Would Jacques Parizeau not love to have that? The Nisga'a agreement retains one part only of the Indian Act. This is the very worst part, that which defines who is an Indian. The tragedy of the Indian Act is that registered Indians are treated differently by government than other Canadians, usually to their detriment. Why would anyone want to perpetuate this difference constitutionally? A Nisga'a committee will review bloodlines to protect prospective citizens. Incredibly this is what we are entrenching in our constitution.
Registered Indians are 2.5% of the B.C. population of whom half live on reserves or pursue what can be remotely considered to be a traditional native lifestyle. There must be a better way.
What would I do? I will summarize it this way. I would make the negotiating mandate public; compensate aboriginals for what the courts recognize as their modest aboriginal entitlement; establish aboriginal governments consistent with municipal style governments, similar to the Sechelt Indian government; subject the Nisga'a and all other native persons to the same tax system as other Canadians; ensure finality and certainty; and, keep it simple.
New Zealand eventually tired of a never-ending agenda and did just that.
