Canadian Heritage committee  In Canada, “indigenous” is more inclusive of all first nations, Inuit, and Métis people. It's the move we're trying to make in British Columbia and in the Royal BC Museum. We're trying to be more proactive and respond to what community members are saying, to be more inclusive.

Canadian Heritage committee  For the Haida, as we've gone out on our repatriation journeys to museums all over the world, it became more our responsibility to ask for the intangible heritage. They often thought we were only there for our ancestors. As we got a little bit more experience, we learned that it was up to us to ask, because museums were not necessarily forthcoming in saying that they also had Haida recordings and historic Haida photos.

Canadian Heritage committee  Of course. I think you probably know of the famous Haida carver Bill Reid, and how much attention his beautiful work has brought to the Haida and to the indigenous people of Canada. I don't think I would ever suggest that it's a clean sweep—let's repatriate everything now—because it's a complicated process and relationship.

Canadian Heritage committee  For the Haida repatriation, Nika probably spoke to it. The Haida word Yahguudangang means “respect”, and with everything that we did with our ancestors, we always came back to that one word. As you can imagine, having to repatriate hundreds of human remains is a strange thing. That's not a normal thing that anybody would have to do.

Canadian Heritage committee  Okay. [Witness speaks in Haida] Good afternoon, friends. My name is Lucy Bell. I come from the Haida Nation and I work at the Royal BC Museum. Haw'aa. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today. I'll begin with a little bit of the background of why you've probably called me here today.