Environment committee  If we're not involved, it may cost our lives.

Environment committee  I don't mean to speak ahead of our other presenter. This is what I was getting at earlier; I think we need to sit down together, all peoples of this land, including all of the indigenous peoples. A very interesting thing happened in the U.S. two weeks ago. President Obama invited all of the tribal peoples to meet with him, and they talked about the economy and about the future of America.

Environment committee  Thank you. The point I was going to make is that costs do not have to rise if we work together to develop the economy. The difficulty right now is you only get a margin of the views out there and then you develop a response. That doesn't work. That most likely might be happening in those other countries, but there are many more resources and much more to work on—

Environment committee  I am familiar with Canada's position. Yes, I am familiar.

Environment committee  I have not read them, but our technical people have summarized them for me.

Environment committee  I am aware that's an intention of Canada.

Environment committee  I'm not aware of that.

Environment committee  I have not had a chance to read it. I do have an idea of what it entails, and I know my people in the Northwest Territories—at least 25,000 of them—have not read it either.

Environment committee  I do not have it with me.

Environment committee  I want to answer the question in a way that relates to the bill. I don't mean to pull the committee one way or the other; I'm expressing a view from where I am in the world. Your job is to take that and use it in a way that will help you through this. Mr. Chairman, in addressing this question, I'll talk a little bit about what happens when you try to get funding and try to get involved.

Environment committee  We've been approached, and I believe we will have someone on delegations. It will either be National Chief Shawn Atleo or most likely me. I understand that youth have also been asked to be a part of Canada's delegation. The problem, though, is if we're on their delegation we generally don't speak at the table, unless some kind of agreement comes forward where Canada feels comfortable with us.

Environment committee  Again, thank you for the question. The anthropologists tell us we've lived here for at least 30,000 years. The oil and other resources in the ground have been there for a long time. Our people, to a large extent, knew they were there. We used some of those resources. We understand how other people see them.

Environment committee  Yes, I can, thank you.

Environment committee  Thank you.

Environment committee  Thank you very much for the question, sir. First of all, we need to come to terms with the fact that global warming and climate change are actually happening. It's man-made. It's not something that nature has created. We have to admit that climate change is a reality, global warming is a reality.