Caroline Cochrane

Mr. Speaker, I know that renewing our government's relationship with Indigenous governments is important to all Members. That is why the 19th Legislative Assembly has established settling and implementing treaty, land, resources, and self-government agreements as one of its priorities. We have also made it a priority to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People.

On June 5th each year, we commemorate Inuvialuit Day to celebrate the signing of the Inuvialuit Final Agreement in 1984. In many ways, this agreement led the way for the future negotiation of land...

My understanding from the Chief Public Health Officer report is that it will be with Nunavut. It's not with the Yukon at this time. There will be an announcement next week on it. However, the opening of the borders actually will take a little bit more work. It's not something that you can just do in one day. There will be background work that needs to be done to open up those borders.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There were negotiations going on. There weren't negotiations; there were talks going on. That is the problem with having different tables, Mr. Speaker. I was talking. I brought it forth to the Premiers at our northern Premier meeting. In reality, I hadn't yet spoken to our Chief Public Health Officer. The Chief Public Health Officer has the whole authority over the borders. I'm clear with that; it can't be fettered. I thought we'd start this discussion just by bringing to the Premiers, and then I would bring it to the Chief Public Health Officer. At the same time...

I am not going to take credit and say that, because there are nine women elected, we are doing that, but we are doing that right now. It was the right thing to do, whether it be women or men. In this House, it is the right thing to do.

Again, that is within the Minister of Justice's department, so I'll defer the question to her. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Some communities are working in partnership a little bit differently than other communities. Some communities are working with their Indigenous governments on their checkpoints. Indigenous governments did get money. They got money from the federal government for COVID-19 with flexibility on being able to use it. We want to help our municipal governments. It's not a matter of if we want to help them or not. We do want to help them. We are waiting for the $10 billion ask to see what that happens with. We're still collecting the debts from our municipal governments, as well. We're looking at...

Absolutely. Like I said, our job, especially with Indigenous affairs, is to help the Indigenous governments. However, I do need to clarify that the Indigenous governments, and I am respectful of them, have asked me to not interfere with their federal funding, that they wanted it directly. I have advocated and lobbied the federal government that that money should go directly to the Indigenous governments, so it's a fine line. I am careful of how I lobby. I will lobby for additional money, but I will not ask where, how much, or to whom because I think we are crossing a line at that point. Thank...

As spoken, we are in the process, ENR is in the process, of reviewing the harvester assistance program to see how we can make that more flexible, but the key thing is that the Indigenous governments did receive federal money. I do not know, Mr. Speaker, how much that was, respectfully. It was given directly to the Indigenous governments. However, my understanding from the department is that the federal government is looking at perhaps supporting more money to the Indigenous governments for COVID-19.

Again, those were conversations at the beginning. I did promise to have feedback from MLAs. Those are the conversations we will be having. I will not make that decision on my own; I don't think it's appropriate. I will be having conversations with our Cabinet, and then I will present to committee, the appropriate committee. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Those conversations, those are conversations we started, actually, as a Cabinet before COVID-19 hit. We were looking at all of our departments and how they fit, if they needed to be changed, et cetera. It was an idea I put out in my speech, but I also said that I am open to feedback on it. In honesty, Mr. Speaker, due to COVID-19, that kind of got put on the back burner, but I do know that, after this session, once we take a break and give our departments a break because everybody has been going 24/7, we will be starting those conversations again.