Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Premier in terms of his meeting with the aboriginal leaders later on this afternoon or this evening in Edmonton. I want to ask the Premier in terms of his discussion and in light of any type of documentation or indication from the aboriginal governments, in terms of their support to sign on with the territorial government to begin the next steps in terms of this draft agreement-in-principle. Can the Premier inform the House and the people of the North in terms of what type of reaction he has from the aboriginal governments so far?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the process that has been laid out, the chief negotiator sent a letter to the aboriginal groups to seek their input and gave a response time of the 31st. We’ve been sticking to the process of waiting until they have had a chance to look at it and make response. We’ve started receiving those responses and looking at those areas where there seems to be movement to move forward, but there are issues and concerns raised. There are also some pretty straightforward comments that have been made publicly that they are not interested in sitting at that table. What the meeting is tonight is to see, in fact, where the regional leaders sit on this and to see if we can find a way forward together. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I was carbon copied a letter by the Sahtu Secretariat certainly indicating their position on the draft AIP. I want to ask the Premier, in terms of my regional position here from the leaders, the chiefs and the Metis presidents, in terms of the attitude or the position of the federal government and the territorial government on the government-to-government relationship, and they certainly didn’t feel that they were participating as much as they wanted to and several issues from the Sahtu were not left to be discussed and they certainly don’t feel that it can be discussed any further when they start, if they do start the next process for the AIP. Can the Premier indicate to me in the House as to how concerns like this that are in the Sahtu can be addressed so we can feel comfortable enough to put our hand to the pen to sign this deal?
Mr. Speaker, the process and the communications between the aboriginal groups and ourselves and aboriginal governments on what we need to do going forward and some of those concerns, we’ve been tracking those. Again, with respect to the process, I’d like to sit down with the aboriginal leaders and have the discussion specifically about the points they’ve raised. Some have put it quite publicly, their emotions, and, in fact, naming of negotiators to go forward with concerns about a process going forward. I hope that as we have our meeting this evening, that we will be able to put certain concerns to rest and address the other concerns as we go forward through final negotiations. That’s the hope and we’ll have to see where that goes. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I certainly hope that the Premier has much success in terms of the negotiations or discussions that are going to happen in Edmonton this evening. Certainly the issues of the Sahtu are very important to us, to a point where it stated clearly in my letter from our chairperson, carbon copied to me, that we are not prepared to advance the territorial agenda until some very basic concerns of the Sahtu are addressed. I would like to ask the Premier in terms of what type of indications that would weigh, I guess, in terms of this Cabinet decision to say, yes, these are the basic issues of the Sahtu that can be addressed in terms of our self-government negotiations in our communities that we feel that we are developing our own level of government, and certainly that weighs heavily on the minds of our leaders.
Mr. Speaker, I think the Member is probing to see if I will give him information as to what might become a response to a question, or an issue that may get raised this evening or as we go forward into making a decision on this AIP as the GNWT. The simple fact, again, of honouring the process, wanting to sit down with the regional leadership and hear from them directly on some of the major issues, what can we address through an AIP and what is more important, I guess, addressed through the self-government process. Again, the AIP is a devolution of authorities over public lands. It is Crown lands that remain being administered by the federal government at this time. That is where we are at this process. I, as I have committed to Members and have followed up regularly with updates, will continue to do that as we progress on this file. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. Final supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In terms of this whole draft AIP, it comes down to one issue. It comes down to trust with our aboriginal governments and this government here. So far we have not seen that in terms of how this process comes out to play in terms of we have to post this agreement on CBC for everybody to read. Mr. Speaker, our leaders here are saying that we need more than just having a government-to-government. We need a third government. I am not too sure when this decision was made to have a territorial government and federal government come to a deal and then turn around to say to the aboriginal governments, sign if you want or like this deal. We need to have a government-to-government relationship. That is a basic fundamental question. When was the decision made to have a government-to-government and not include the aboriginal governments on the same table with the negotiators? My negotiators are saying they were just standing by and watching the process happen.
Mr. Speaker, I think the Member, as well, has past experience in negotiations. As they go to an AIP, once the initialling happens, at that point, then, you have your technical briefings, have the discussion about what it means as you enter into then the final set of negotiations. We haven’t even entered in. We haven’t even initialled an agreement-in-principle. In fact, as I said earlier, aboriginal governments have been part of this negotiation, informing of this AIP, especially in the Chapter 6 portion of that. The decision made was expressed at a number of meetings by the federal negotiator in the position that has been taken that is put forward in the AIP process. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
