Thank you.
That was a very interesting presentation.
I'm from the Northwest Territories. We have five large aboriginal governments there that are working hard to be in control of what happens on their traditional lands, to govern their own people, and to make decisions on behalf of their own people. One of the most important things they bring forward is good communication.
I find it surprising that you have already decided that everybody that wants to be consulted is against this. I totally don't agree. I have responsibilities within my riding to those first nations, and I would expect that they would want to be consulted. I don't think that has happened yet.
When some of the first nations moved towards self governance, they started defining who their people are, so there's going to be a challenge there. How are we going to work that? We haven't figured that out. Some have settled. What does that mean? They opted out of the Indian Act.
There are a lot of things that have to be taken into consideration. There is great impact here.
I totally agree with some of your comments. We're not going to see communities overpopulate overnight. In fact, we're seeing the reverse. People are leaving the small aboriginal communities I represent. They are not trying to come back. There's a level of despair. They want jobs. They want to have houses. They want to have good health.
So there are a lot of things that people are saying that I don't believe.
I recognize that a lot of this may be “I want money”, but I really feel strongly about the consultation process.
First of all, I want to know why you would think we don't need to talk about these two other parts of Canada, why you would think they don't need to have a say in this.
Second, what's telling you that stage two may not even happen or is not going to work?
Maybe you could clear that up for me.