Debates of February 22, 2010 (day 32)

Yes, please, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Does committee agree?

Agreed.

Sergeant-at-Arms, please escort the witnesses in.

Thank you. Could I have the Minister introduce his witnesses?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, joining me at the table is the deputy minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, Ms. Gabriela Sparling; and to my right is Mr. Richard Robertson, director of policy and planning. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. We’ll start with general comments. Committee, open for general comments. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, my comments are going to be specific to the comments I heard from the Minister. Through the discussion of details, I will ask the Minister about some things I’d like to know in detail.

Regarding political development in the Northwest Territories, we have some issues that are pretty sensitive right now to the aboriginal governments in the North here. Here, we try to build a common front for political development to look at some bigger issues on the table regarding resource revenue sharing, devolution, the common vision for people in the Northwest Territories. How do we all get along? We’ve got some issues here that this government has rubbed up against some of the aboriginal groups, governments, in terms of rights, working together. The Minister has indicated that he has close to $800,000 in the budget to develop some common front here. Within the time frame that we have and the state we are in with some of the aboriginal governments, I am curious and wondering about this department’s strategy in terms of how do we get everybody onside to say we’re in this together, we’re going to work on this towards the end of this government here to sit down with Ottawa and hammer out some of these bigger issues here.

I think the one thing that we really need, and it’s not there anymore, is the Aboriginal Summit. We kind of broke up the aboriginal governments here. We have a couple of the aboriginal who are on with the Aboriginal Summit, but some of the aboriginal governments are not with the Aboriginal Summit. It’s a fragmented coalition or front and that really concerns me in terms of moving forward there, Mr. Chair.

Another one is the self-government funding, self-government requirements, you know, the costing out. Once you start negotiating these self-government agreements and we start to see the finalization of these agreements and costing out of these agreements here, it’s going to take quite a considerable amount of effort by this government and the aboriginal governments to put down a final number on self-government agreements here.

Mr. Chair, the Minister did talk about, on page 3 of 3 on a revised mandate, a new negotiation of the Northwest Territories, the result, new or revised mandates will be responsive to the lessons learned and precedents set by the finalized agreements. I want to maybe ask some questions when it comes to this section in the details in terms of the revised mandate, in terms of our side being included in the loop of things, in terms of what is the revised mandate, where does it stem from and how it’s going to be impacted in terms of the agreements that are going to be put in place in terms of self-government agreements.

Mr. Chair, this is a very important department for me. It has to deal with lots of aboriginal rights, treaty rights, Metis rights, so I really wanted to also ask the Minister in terms of his draft frameworks, I think it’s a draft framework on consultation. I know I have some information, what I got from the website there in terms of what the department is looking at in terms of consultation. It’s something I look forward to having the Minister come forward with in terms of finalizing it, in terms of finalizing the consultation policy and the framework and see where we can go with that there.

So, Mr. Chair, those are my comments for the Minister. Again, as I said, this is a very important, for me, it’s a very important document. This is a nation-to-nation building document for myself. We have aboriginal governments that believe strongly in their treaties, aboriginal governments believe strongly in the land claims settlements, aboriginal governments who are negotiating their own government through a self-government arrangement, yet we have the federal government sitting there waiting to see, you know, how are we going to work together in this small Northwest Territories. We’ve got aboriginal governments that own huge tracts of land, you know, even had the power on it.

I was in Deline over the weekend and people are talking about where did we let the one government have power on our land. There are agreements. When did those agreements come in place in terms of aboriginal and treaty rights? So they want to have that kind of discussion. Where did we sign over? So I guess that’s part of the political development I see. Key areas that need to be answered, that need to be discussed and they need to be talked about. Maybe that’s kind of the guidelines for consultation with the aboriginal government.

Metis rights is one that still bothers me today. It’s a university entry program they have with the federal government that says aboriginal people can apply for that program. You ask the federal government and they say only Inuit and First Nations, but not Metis. We administer a program and it still bugs me today. I talked to Minister Strahl, Minister Prentice. The last government said they were going to look at it. They never looked at it. And Metis is still not included in there. That’s a shame, you know. They said that they’re breaking their own law that says aboriginal. In the definition of aboriginal it says Metis, Inuit and First Nations. What is the government here doing to help us to include Metis into that university entry program? This is what you guys should be fighting for us, fighting for the Metis people to be included in that program. I’ve got Metis members in my home region there that are saying this is discrimination. Yet, two federal Ministers said they were going to do something about it and to this day, six years later, there’s still nothing done. This is totally ridiculous in this day and age. And that, Mr. Chair, that’s only one program.

That’s how I see our Premier, part of his role as a Minister for Aboriginal Affairs. I could be wrong here, but that’s what we’re looking for from our leader here, is protecting, enhancing and strengthening our treaty and aboriginal rights. It’s key here, this department, it’s very key, especially today in terms of how we’re going forward. We just talked about one issue here in the last couple weeks on the animal. You know, that’s key, and I don’t want to raise it again, but I think I will leave the rest of my comments for the detail, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Committee, we’re in general comments. Does committee agree that there are no further general comments?

Agreed.

Thank you, committee. Minister Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Yakeleya has covered a number of significant areas that we’re involved with as the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations. Our role is to be involved from the GNWT side to ensure that we promote the best practices as the Government of the Northwest Territories in a number of areas. The Member has touched on, as I said, a number of key ones.

Political development, as we go through, is one of those key pieces of how we go forward as the 16th Legislative Assembly, and working with our partners in the Northwest Territories. We’ve been holding a number of meetings now. We just recently held our seventh meeting, I believe, with regional leaders, and from there we had our second meeting on political development. As we’ll be dealing with that budget item later, we can get into more detail. That political development is about building a common vision for the North and how we approach the federal government in a number of key areas where they still impact on delivery of services and programs here in the Northwest Territories.

So as we do that work, we do that work recognizing the aboriginal rights that have been established through treaties, through court decisions, through land claims agreements and, for example, through the self-government agreement that’s been signed in the Northwest Territories with the Tlicho. All of those things come together to help us form our position that we could work together on, and that’s recognizing each other’s roles when it comes to program delivery services in the Northwest Territories.

The area of the Aboriginal Summit, well, the regional leaders’ meeting, in a sense, is the evolved version of that. The Aboriginal Summit came together as an initiative in the last government. It may even have started in the 14th Assembly to do some of its initial work. That, after a while, wasn’t including all of the groups at the table. Whereas, the political development piece or the Northern Leaders’ Forum, as we call it, includes everybody at the table, and the GNWT isn’t the one setting all of the agenda. We, in fact, work together as leaders to put the agenda items on the table for discussion. Our next meeting, hopefully, is near the end of March, and we’ll be talking about that political development piece and formulating for more certainty the future working arrangements of the Northern Leaders’ Forum. I look forward to having that further discussion. I think that will bring us the furthest of any Government of the Northwest Territories in solidifying our relationships with aboriginal governments in the Northwest Territories.

Further to that, the revised mandates, we’ll be able to speak to it in a little more detail later on as well. But we’re working with committee on that and, hopefully, we’ll be able to sit down here soon. I believe we have some time set up to start that work in going through our mandates. Some of those mandates are quite old and, as talked about earlier, the common vision, developing that, the aboriginal rights established today, some of these mandates outdate the new agreements that are in place and the new interpretations that have happened from either agreements that have been put in place by aboriginal governments and public governments as well as the courts. So that work is meant to update that.

The consultation framework is something we’ve worked with the Assembly and committees. We gave them a document a while back on the consultation framework the process was undergoing. We then did training modules with departments and from going forward we will serve, along with the Department of Justice, as the tool that department can use when it comes to satisfying the requirement of consultation when it comes to dealing with aboriginal governments and organizations.

When it comes to the Metis, the Government of the Northwest Territories treats Metis as aboriginal groups. We recognize them in delivery of programs and services. We do not differentiate like the federal government does, and we will continue to advocate on that issue when it comes to the peoples in the Northwest Territories.

The Member talked about the sensitive area of the animals and rights legislation when it comes to conservation and so on. We continue to work with the groups up and down the valley, and that is a very complex issue. Much like water, much like land, animals are a very important part in the fabric of who we are as northern peoples, aboriginal peoples in the Northwest Territories. So we have to make sure we do the best we can in ensuring that our future generations can have what we’ve taken for granted with what we have established as our rights. So we continue to work with that, but in a complex environment, for example, with the land claims that are in place, there are co-management bodies that have worked very, very well for us when it comes to dealing with conversation issues, harvesting rights, as well as legislation. The Species at Risk, for example, is an example of that, and the Wildlife Act that’s being worked on is another example of a more collaborative working arrangement on developing legislation that this government will put in place.

It gets a little more complicated when you come to the areas where there are negotiations ongoing where some of the groups that are negotiating feel they don’t want to sign off on some of the legislation we’re working on because they feel it might prevent them from taking a more active role in their own direct negotiations. One of the things I say to our aboriginal partners in the North, no matter what happens, as we draw down that authority from the federal government and self-governments then get signed off and then implemented in the Northwest Territories. That will then pass, if it is just for the sake of discussion, Mr. Chairman, from the federal government to ourselves, as the GNWT, and then to the self-governments as those agreements are signed and then implementation goes into place. The one place we have more clarity is, in fact, with the Tlicho Government, for example. That is the self-government that has been signed off and enshrined in the federal legislation, as well as ours, and there is a working relationship established there. As they go towards implementing and drawing down their powers, we will continue to work with them on that side of it.

So it is a complex environment. When it comes to representing the interest of the peoples of the Northwest Territories in general and then more specifically on the rights issues that are established and being defined on a day-to-day basis as well.

So I look forward to having the discussion with Members as we go through this work. One other area that the Member discussed was self-government financing. That is an issue we feel is very serious. In fact, we took it upon ourselves to look at all the negotiation tables that are negotiating and what is being requested through those negotiations and we came up with a model. Now it’s not the be-all/end-all but it is the basis of a starting point. We came up with cost estimates on that model and put it to what we deliver in today’s environment. We’ve identified a gap of between 24 and 30 million dollars if we were to implement every self-government table across the Northwest Territories. We’ve raised that with the federal government. In fact, we’ve held bilateral meetings between aboriginal organizations and governments and ourselves to show them the work we’ve done, so they are well prepared and looking forward in dealing with the federal government to have them recognize that as they sign these agreements, there’s a need for additional resources to be able to implement these agreements and make sure that in signing those agreements, everybody fully understands those cost implications of doing that as well. We can get into that detail as we go further on into this budget process. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Does committee agree that we go into detail?

Detail.

Thank you, committee. We’re going to defer page 4-7, the department summary, operations expenditure summary. We’ll start with page 4-8, department summary, Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, infrastructure investment summary. Questions?

Agreed.

Page 4-9, department summary, information item, Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, active position summary. Questions?

Agreed.

Page 4-11, activity summary, Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, corporate management, operations expenditure summary, $2 million... Mr. Yakeleya.

We’re probably going to get a similar answer if I ask the question, but I have been asking it ever since I’ve been here. About the Metis core funding, I think it’s averaged out. I think it’s $13,000, if I can recall. Every year this funding has not increased. That’s one of the complaints I get from my region, is that the Metis get core funding. I know it’s a nice thing to do for this government here. There really is no funding for them except some Metis are under a land claim settlement and they have other kind of funding. This one for the GNWT, I guess it’s a nice gesture to recognize the Metis government and to support it through a core funding initiative. I think it’s about $14,000. I am not sure if this is ever going to increase or this is something that we maybe should discuss on another level. Regarding this funding, are the Metis going to get any more than what they received the last four or five years? I believe it’s about $13,000 per Metis local organization. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the Member. He is consistent on this issue. The Member is right; on an annual basis, core funding is provided to Metis organizations that are eligible for $13,235 and the total amount we have set aside is in the neighbourhood of $225,000. What Metis organizations need to do is to qualify for that by having their registries in good standing. That’s the only requirement we have. We’ve been working with the NWT Metis in this area. We’ve had discussions. It hasn’t progressed at this point, but we’ve had discussions that they may be interested in taking over the actual delivery and allocation of those resources. What I said in that area is we would be willing to consider that if they were to have agreement with the Metis councils through the Northwest Territories to have that happen. Until that, we will be going through this programming as it is established.

Right now, this does not include an increase in that area and we would have to discuss that as we go forward. They are also eligible for special events funding to aboriginal organizations and that total amount is $75,000. That is by application based for different events that we can provide funding for. Thank you.

This requires agreement in this House to increase the funding. I am not too sure if we even have an appetite for this by the Members. Of course, we have to find funding elsewhere and it’s got to go through a whole process here to seek an increase for funding. I am not sure if there’s an appetite, like I said, to increase the Metis funding for the locals here in terms of their operation. It is a good gesture by this government. No doubt about it. You know, for the Metis people for $13,235. You know how much it costs now to operate an office? Even ourselves as MLAs, we get budgets here to operate our own office here. You are talking about a Metis Nation of people who are working hard to establish themselves here. There is different Metis funding and this is nice funding to have. I will let the Minister know that the Metis in the Sahtu that I represent certainly appreciate the funding. It’s something that this government has done more than the federal government in terms of funding. I am not sure if we can entertain some kind of funding review of this.

As I said, Mr. Chair, I have been here for the past six years and this has always been the same, even with the increase of doing business in the North. I just wanted to know if there is any type of appetite to look at an increase of this part of the budget here. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This budget itself doesn’t represent an increase for core funding. As it is, it’s a small amount, the Member is correct, when it comes to operations in any community in the Northwest Territories. Again, this is an example of how we do things different as the federal government doesn’t have any core funding for Metis, which they do for bands across this country.

I would be prepared, if Members of this Assembly want to take a serious look at this level for the next business planning cycle. If Members are interested in this area, I would be prepared to sit down with Members to see if we can incorporate any possible changes as we go forward. Thank you.

From this side here, I certainly appreciate the Minister’s willingness to look at this. There are certainly no guarantees in any type of reallocation or jigging of the numbers here or even to increase it. So I do appreciate his openness to see if we can get some support to have a look at it and maybe come back in the coming year to see if we can do something with this.

I do want to talk to the Minister regarding the special event funding for aboriginal organizations. Is it okay for the Minister to provide us with a list of the type of organizations and funding we can have? I know some of the groups I have in the Sahtu want to have access to this funding. This is very popular funding because there’s not much money here, but it’s a good thing. More of a request of information from the Minister and then I’m done, Mr. Chair. Thank you.

I will provide a note to Members about both the special events funding. It’s $75,000 a year; $5,000 per application for each regional aboriginal government organization to help offset costs for holding special events such as general assemblies or special assemblies and celebrations that mark milestone anniversaries of settled agreements, for example.

Also part of that fund is $1,000 in support to community-based aboriginal organizations and that’s band councils, Metis locals, community corporations, Native Women’s Association, to help celebrate National Aboriginal Day. We have a list of how that funding has been allocated in the past and we’ll get that provided to Members. Thank you.

I’m good for that page.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Questions on page 4-11?

Agreed.

Mr. Beaulieu.

Just one question on the special events funding to aboriginal organizations. Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the Minister could advise me if this budget is fully taken at the end of the fiscal year each year.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the funding is usually fully subscribed; in fact, oversubscribed. It is not a large amount. For example, with the Dene Nation, there is more than one assembly they’ve had and they’ve qualified a number of times for that. So we go up to what we can. If there is any possible funding we have in other areas of the department, sometimes we top it up. But that information will show, as it goes around to Members, the previous years’ allocations. Thank you.

One more comment on that page. I would also support to see core funding increased to Metis locals. I have one Metis local in Tu Nedhe, so they are always finding ways to get funding to do various initiatives in the community. They are fairly active and so on. That is something I would support as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. I didn’t hear a question there. Committee, we are on page 4-11, Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, activity summary, corporate management, operations expenditure summary, $2.421 million. Agreed?

Agreed.

Page 4-12, activity summary, corporate management, grants and contributions, grants, total grants, $300,000.

Agreed.

Page 4-13, information item, corporate management, active positions.

Agreed.

Questions?

Agreed.

Page 4-15, activity summary, Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, negotiations, operations expenditure summary, Mr. Yakeleya... Mr. Beaulieu, excuse me.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am wondering if this section of the department is responsible for the land use plans from the various self-government organizations.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Minister Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in the negotiations section we would be involved, for example, when it comes to the negotiation time of it and what’s being negotiated, but for actual land use framework plans, I believe it is within the Department of Environment and Natural Resources that deals with that area specifically. Again, this area of negotiations, we’d be involved with at the negotiation process and then the further section on implementation, we would have some involvement on that side of it too. Thank you.

I’m wondering if the Minister could advise me if there’s any involvement at all such as taking the position in how the land use plans are laid out from the various aboriginal organizations, like any position at all in the area of land use plans. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, in consultation with other departments, specifically in the one with land use frameworks, we would be in consultation with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to come up with a position that would be accepted by, for example, Cabinet. We would have to get a mandate to set the framework in place, and that mandate would be worked with other departments, then be accepted by Cabinet and go forward on that basis. That, for example, we discussed earlier, the mandate review that is happening and those are basis of our negotiation discussions. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I’m curious about how come some of the land use plans have been moved forward and so on, I guess, from looking at what has developed in other negotiations, what would be upcoming, I guess, for Akaitcho, although I am not heavily or very minorly involved with the negotiations, Akaitcho. I’ve never sat in on any, but just talking to people and so on. There might be some pitfalls with the land use planning system or the land use planning process, because of the position the GNWT might take in the area of lands set aside for resource development or land set aside for protected area strategies and the various types of positions that the GNWT could take. So if we’re talking about Protected Areas Strategy, the responsible Minister could be ENR. If we’re talking about lands set aside for resource development, I’m not sure if that’s an area that’s set aside for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, or it that’s the responsibility of the Minister of the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, usually on the land use plans that are developed, they are developed and the principle is set up in, for example, a land claim agreement. Those are the ones we have examples of, and then, as they’re signed, implementation then goes into developing the actual land use plan. But we’ve also had tables that are in negotiations now working on a land use plan at the same time or, in fact, have probably got the land use plan further ahead than actual negotiations of the main table, in a sense.

For, again, different aspects, as the Member highlighted and I responded earlier, as ENR helps with the land use framework itself and land use planning. For allocations, for example, when we set a target of a percentage that would be set aside for economic development purposes in the future, that would be an initiative that would be between the Executive and Aboriginal Affairs and other departments. We’d pull them together. So Executive would be the coordinating role in pulling information from all the departments to come up with what we think would be the best solution possible, taking into consideration demands for programs and services. If we were to actually take down full authority, and knowing that there’s a shortfall in the dollars that we have in today’s environment, needing to come up with some new resources in the future. Economic potential for whether it is the GNWT who ends up delivering a program and service or the aboriginal self-government who delivers that service, they’re going to need a revenue base to deliver that. That is what we take into consideration. For example, we use the MERA, and that’s the Minerals, Energy… Oh, I’ll have to get the proper terminology, but I think Members are familiar with the acronym of MERA, and that is to do an assessment of the mineral potential in the area and we would take that into our discussions of what we could work with and what the future may be for economic development in a particular region. So that helps us put that together.

All of that, though, as we discussed earlier, is in the mandate reviews we will be doing. We will be putting that forward. What we don’t want to be doing... No matter what we do at the end of the day, we want to ensure that there are enough resources available for whether it is a public government delivery or a self-government delivery, that the revenues are in place to deliver services that the people expect to have as these agreements get implemented. Thank you.