Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  In terms of economic development?

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The way we're working it through at the moment, because we're doing a lot of work in this area, is that if you look across the spectrum of what's required in a community for effective economic development, it's everything from access to resources to effective governance in commun

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm sorry, I know I'm rolling on.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's an interesting question. I think a lot of it depends upon how the community uses the results from the negotiated settlements. There have been some really wonderful success stories in which they have used--for example, if it was moneys--investing in community activity and

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The more important distinction is really with respect to the nature of the land, the richness of the land, in terms of whether it has resources, whether the location is good.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  In the office of one of my staff, there is a pictorial representation of the entire process. It literally goes from ceiling to floor and is dense. I mean, there's just so much that has to happen, with so many different stages and so on. It really is a business process re-engineer

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I think the challenge we have in answering that question is that there are a lot of moving parts that haven't stopped yet. For example, we're embarking on consultations with the Assembly of First Nations with respect to legislation and so on that could significantly help the proc

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We'll get you a formal update on that. I know there has been a lot of work done on it and there have been discussions across the federal government in terms of how we want to proceed, but we'll get you a formal update in terms of the actual stage of development.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm not aware of that. We've been trying to focus on getting the process working more effectively. On the side of economic development, as you may be aware, last fall the lands process and responsibility were pulled in with economic development and put in the same sector. This wa

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We would not be able to comment upon the methodology of the Auditor General. We're here and are happy to talk about her findings and the very important issues that we're trying to work on, but we would not be able to comment on her methodology.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  As you can see, sometimes we're held up because lands have not been selected. It is difficult to process them until we know what and where they are and so on.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  From a perspective of continuous improvement, the more data we have and that we're sure about, the more and better we can do going forward. That's in terms of seeing what our progress has or has not been, what we need to do differently, and where the bottlenecks appear to be, and

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  It's a highly complex process and there are many parts to it. One of the things we're trying to do to particularly help with that part of the process is this work that we're doing with NALMA. It's more sort of a manual, templates, to assist first nations in doing the due diligenc

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's certainly the hope.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We're not absolutely sure, so if you don't mind, we'll get a written response to your question with respect to the actual tax treatment. We can guess, but I'd much prefer to get back to you with accurate--