Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Thrall. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and members of the parliamentary standing committee. I'd like to follow up Mr. Thrall's comments with some aspects and perspectives with respect to intergovernmental relations. The Yukon Chamber of Mines enjoys a positive, cons

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's correct. Our membership is representative of a wide cross-section of individuals, everyone from a prospector doing work in the creek all the way up to workers in fully producing mines as well as levels of government and first nation development corporations in between.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you for the question, Ms. Jones. I think there are probably some good examples to use here, such as the Brewery Creek YESAB submission from a number of years back. This was a producing mine from 1996 to 2002, and it closed due to low gold prices. When they tried to bring i

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  With all due respect, Ms. Jones, that was a part of our presentation. We did speak to the importance of intergovernmental relations. We spoke to the importance of respectful relations among all levels of government, but at the same time, just to be clear, the Chamber of Mines is

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I refer back to our opening comments with respect to the fact that we have spoken to how the parties do need to work in respectful ways towards arriving at solutions that provide socio-economic opportunities for Yukoners. It's certainly not our place to say how doing that should

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, absolutely. I think that if you were to ask any proponent where they would like to have their application vetted, they would have preferences when it comes to offices, because there is a lack of consistency, a lack of consistent, clear, and transparent application of YESAA,

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Recognizing the sensitivities around those two specific amendments that you've asked for a position on, we spoke to it a bit earlier, obviously, about the delegation of binding policy direction. With respect to that, that responsibility and that power already exist within the boa

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  You're asking a pretty politically loaded question, right? You're asking as legislators whether we should be thinking like legislators and coming up essentially with a game plan as to how—

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  You've perfectly articulated how industry is between a rock and a hard place.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I think that's pretty much fair. Exactly what was said—

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's not what we said.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Just to be clear, at the chamber organization that lobbies on behalf of our membership we're always about compromise and consensus building. That said, certainly we're not in a position to speak to the legislative abilities of the discussions around this moving forward. We just w

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Absolutely, and that was articulated in our opening comments.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's not our area of expertise.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  What you have to understand is that we're talking about the Umbrella Final Agreement here, right? The Umbrella Final Agreement we are not a party to—