AANR Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs, Northern Development and Natural Resources

COMMITTEE EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Thursday, January 31, 2002

Á

1105

The Chair (Mr. Raymond Bonin (Nickel Belt, Lib.))

Mr. Guy St-Julien (Abitibi--Baie-James--Nunavik, Lib.)

Á

1110

The Chair

Mr. Guy St-Julien

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.)

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. Guy St-Julien

Á

1115

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey

Mr. Guy St-Julien

Mr. John Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. John Godfrey

The Chair

Mr. Serge Cardin (Sherbrooke, BQ)

The Chair

Mr. Guy St-Julien

The Chair

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CANADA

Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs, Northern Development and Natural Resources

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NUMBER 037

l

1st SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

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COMMITTEE EVIDENCE

Thursday, January 31, 2002

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Á  (1105)  

[English]

    The Chair (Mr. Raymond Bonin (Nickel Belt, Lib.)): I call the meeting to order.

    Although we don't have a quorum, I believe we can deal with the affairs that we had assigned ourselves for today.

    A new House procedure is that when a member or a party asks a question of the minister, there are 45 working days to respond. I suppose before, when they went beyond the 45 days, it was sort of “tough luck”, but now there's a procedure in place. The member need only bring this to the attention of the Speaker of the House, who then delegates the question to the committee--the issue of why it was not responded to, because we're not in a position to respond to the question.

    So now, the minister had 45 days and didn't respond, but the problem with the ruling is that when it's assigned to our committee, we must convene a meeting within five days. I think that's an abuse of committee. I'm in favour of the policy, there's no doubt, but when we're travelling, consulting with Canadians on the Indian Act, we may be gone for five days. I don't think 16 members of Parliament should drop everything because a department didn't respond to a question. I could live with ten days or.... But we'll have that discussion later.

    The situation is that Mr. St-Julien asked two questions, and they were not responded to. Because of his action, they are now responded to, but I still must call a meeting, and that's what we're doing now.

[Translation]

     Mr. St-Julien, you have copies of the answers. Are you satisfied with the responses? Also, I need to know if you wish to discuss the reasons why you did not receive the responses within the 45-day time frame. Are you satisfied with the responses and do you wish to recommend to the Speaker of the House that, having dealt with this matter, it should now be considered closed?

    Mr. Guy St-Julien (Abitibi--Baie-James--Nunavik, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I'm very satisfied with the answers to questions 81 and 82. However, I would like to use a little of my time to focus on these responses, provided all committee members received copies of the responses in English and in French.

    I asked two questions about the 2001-2002 Estimates in the House, specifically about the nearly $639 million for Natural Resources. When we break down this figure, we note that approximately $500 million is earmarked for the departmental operations.

    On looking more closely at the breakdown, we note $200 million has been earmarked for the energy sector, while $164 million goes to earth sciences, $130 million to administration, $108 to the forestry sector, and $39 million to the mining sector. If we break these figures down even further, we note that of the $39 million allocated to Canada's mining sector for programming and so forth, $34.1 million are earmarked for Ottawa, while the remaining $5 million go to the rest of Canada. I have yet to find any mines in Ottawa.

    Mr. Chairman, when members read the two responses provided, they should pay particular attention to the heading “Grants and Contributions” where they will see the figure of $110 million listed. The energy sector received $80 million, the forestry sector, $16 million, and the mining sector, zero dollars.

    Something isn't quite right. Either I table a motion in the very near future and request that the mining sector be transferred from Natural Resources to Economic Development Canada...

    I'm very satisfied. I already knew what the answers would be, but I wanted the other committee members to be apprised of the Estimates as well.

    Thank you.

Á  (1110)  

    The Chair: Thank you for raising these important questions, Mr. St-Julien. You noticed that there are no mines in the Ottawa area. This concerns me directly, since there are 12 mines in my riding. I understand what you're saying.

    Then you agree that we should advise the Speaker of the House that the matter has been dealt with?

    Mr. Guy St-Julien: Yes, by all means. I'm also delighted with the new Minister, Mr. Dhaliwal. Not long after he was sworn in, he forwarded these responses to the House of Commons.

[English]

    The Chair: Mr. Godfrey.

    Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.): It's just a procedural thing I hadn't quite understood.

    Mr. St-Julien is a member of this committee and a member of the House. He asked the question, and he's in the position here, when we consider it, to be satisfied or not satisfied. But what if the question comes from somebody who is not a member of the committee? Does that change anything, or does that person come to join us when we're discussing it?

    The Chair: I can tell you, as chair, that I would invite that person to be the witness and explain to us the content of their dissatisfaction.

    We're dealing with two issues here. It's a new policy, and I'm making this up as I'm going along, but to my mind, we're dealing with two things. One is, what is the answer? So he has his answer, and that's fine, but I don't think it lets anybody off the hook in terms of why they did not respond within the 45 working days. That's another issue that we discuss here.

    The policy is new. Probably in the future, it will happen very seldom that they will not respond within 45 days. We'll be reasonable this time, but if it happens again, I'm sure the big debate will be for the department to show up here and say why they did not respond. That's the question I'm interested in. He's interested in the answer to his question.

    This time I think we've dealt with it, but in future I would invite the member here.

    Mr. John Godfrey: Can you give us a quick heads-up on what's coming?

    The Chair: Yes. As a matter of fact, I have a response from the minister, but it's in English only. I apologize on his behalf, although I don't have to apologize on anyone's behalf. I did hand him a letter yesterday afternoon, and that's why it's back here now. But translation has held it up.

    In the letter, I'm asking the minister to advise us in writing on what we can expect in legislation—

    Mr. John Godfrey: Of which ministry?

    The Chair: Of aboriginal affairs, because that's where the bulk of our work will come from. There are four bills coming. One of them is the Indian Act, of course, and it will be a major project.

    The intent is to suggest to you, my colleagues, that if we're going to have one week or two weeks free before we get this legislation, there's not much time to undertake major studies. However, I would like to invite people...and I say “people” because I will be selective if you authorize me to. I'm not interested in bureaucrats who will come here to read documents for us. I would like to have some educators, people who understand the Indian Act and the history of it, to come in to teach the history of the Indian Act to this committee, some outsiders who would do this. I think it's very important that we have that before we start consulting with Canadians.

    At this point, I had planned to invite the department to deal with Monsieur St-Julien's question next Tuesday. We need not do that. But Tuesday at 11 a.m. we will have a meeting on future business and will deal with all these issues.

    Monsieur St-Julien.

[Translation]

    Mr. Guy St-Julien: As a member of the committee and as a Canadian citizen, the priority for aboriginals, for next week and for the future, is housing. Yes, we do have the Indian Act, but we need to get the message across to the minister, whether it takes one half hour, or one full hour.

    We know that there is always money left in the budget as the end of the fiscal year draws near. Rumour has it that there are several million dollars remaining in the Indian and North Affairs budget. If we dig deep enough, we manage to uncover some interesting facts.

    The former chair, Ms. Nancy Karetak-Lindell from Nunavut, worked diligently with all members on the housing issue, but we will need an answer soon. How much money will be allocated to address the housing problem? The problem of homelessness was in the news recently. We need to know the status of this file. Has the issue been shelved?

    For me, the priority is housing. At this very moment, in Iqaluit, Nunavut, Nunavik and James Bay, there are cases of 22 or 23 people living in the same house.

    Housing must be a top priority.

Á  (1115)  

    The Chair: Understood.

    Before I turn the floor over to Mr. Godfrey, I would ask you to make your case for these kinds of issues at Tuesday's meeting. It will be up to you to convince the committee of what should be deemed a priority matter.

[English]

    Mr. John Godfrey: Doesn't the minister still owe us a letter— that is to say, on Cree-Naskapi—or am I missing something here? Didn't we agree not to have a report on the condition that he would submit what would be in effect a reasoned response to the biannual reports on Cree-Naskapi?

    The Chair: I got one.

    Mr. John Godfrey: Did we get one?

    The Chair: I got a response in both official languages, and I gave it to the clerk to be distributed.

    Mr. John Godfrey: It could be just that my mind is playing tricks, but does this ring anything with you?

[Translation]

    Mr. Guy St-Julien: The Indian Act concerns the James Bay Cree.

    Mr. John Godfrey: I'm referring to the commission that draws up biannual reports. We weren't at all satisfied with the response and we asked officials to appear before the committee. The minister agreed that instead of tabling an official report requiring a response, we could simply send him a letter. Have we received a response to that letter?

    The Chair: That rings a bell. I believe I received a response, in both official languages, to a question about this matter that was raised by Ms. Karetak-Lindell. I'll check to see if you received it. In any event, I'll ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Mr. Finlay, to make certain we have an answer by Tuesday. All right?

    Mr. John Godfrey: That's an entirely different matter.

    The Chair: I'll ask the Parliamentary Secretary then to be certain that we have an answer to Mr. Godfrey's question.

[English]

    Mr. John Godfrey: John, you know what I'm talking about; we'll talk later.

    The Chair: Is there anything else for the good of the club?

    Monsieur Cardin.

[Translation]

    Mr. Serge Cardin (Sherbrooke, BQ): Mr. St-Julien has requested copies of the responses. When can we expect to get them?

    The Chair: Hasn't it been tabled in the House?

    Mr. Guy St-Julien: Yes, but since the matter has come before the committee, each member should receive a copy of the response.

    The Chair: It will be sent out to you today.

[English]

    We will ensure that if it's tabled in the House, it will be sent today.

    An hon. member: All right.

[Translation]

    The Chair:Then we'll be certain to get copies to committee members.

[English]

    We meet again next Tuesday at 11 o'clock.

    Merci.