Thanks, Madam Chair. I move that this committee recommends that the Premier initiate a broad and thorough public review of all devolution-related legislation as soon as it is within the jurisdiction of the Government of the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The motion is in order. To the motion.
Question.
Question is being called. The motion is carried.
---Carried
Thank you. Does the committee agree that we have concluded consideration of Committee Report 3-17(5)?
Agreed.
Agreed. Thank you. We’re moving on to Bill 10. Could I ask the Minister responsible to please provide us with his opening remarks. Premier McLeod.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to Bill 10, Northwest Territories Lands Act. The passage of this legislation is an important step towards implementing the Northwest Territories Lands and Resources Devolution Agreement.
The Northwest Territories Lands Act is a mirror of the federal Territorial Lands Act, which Canada will make inapplicable on Territorial lands on April 1, 2014.
Under the Devolution Agreement, the GNWT is committed to “substantially mirror” Canada’s legislation that is repealed or made inapplicable to public lands transferring to the GNWT through devolution.
The mirroring exercise means that the new GNWT laws will address the same matters, in substantially the same way, as federal laws do now.
The mirroring process also required that the GNWT limit changes to addressing issues such as correcting outdated language and applying GNWT drafting standards.
Mirrored legislation is a practical first step to ensure a continued delivery of services on April 1, 2014. Mirrored legislation also ensures that there are no legislative gaps or overlaps between the GNWT and Canada.
The parties to the Devolution Agreement entered into a Protocol for Review of Devolution Legislation. Under this protocol, all parties have been able to review and comment on this legislation before it was introduced in the Legislative Assembly. We have considered these comments carefully in preparation of the bill before you.
The Northwest Territories Lands Act will provide the Government of the Northwest Territories with authority related to the disposition and use of land, including the disposition of subsurface minerals.
This legislation will form part of an integrated regulatory system of land and water resource management in the Northwest Territories with the new Waters Act and the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act.
The authorities set out in the Northwest Territories Lands Act will be the responsibility of the new Department of Lands, with the exception of the administration of subsurface minerals which will be administered by the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
The bill provides the GNWT with the authority to lease and sell land, and sets out prohibitions on trespass and the unauthorized use of public lands.
Regulations made under the Northwest Territories Lands Act will also govern the issuance of land use permits in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region.
I would be pleased to answer any questions Members may have. Thank you.
Thank you, Premier McLeod. I would like to ask the Premier if he would like to bring witnesses into the Chamber.
Yes, I would, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Premier McLeod. Is committee agreed?
Agreed.
I will ask the Sergeant-at-Arms to please escort the witnesses to the table.
Premier McLeod, for the record, please introduce your witnesses.
Thank you, Madam Chair. To my right I have Kelly McLaughlin, director of legislation with the Department of Justice; to my left I have Jamie Fulford, legal counsel with the Department of Justice. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Premier McLeod. General comments. Are there any general comments? Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I’d say if there was any place we could be generating confusion, this could be it given that we now have two lands acts, once we have this in place, the NWT Lands Act and the Commissioner’s Lands Act. Not only that, but, as I understand it, this legislation, Commissioner’s lands, it reaches out to the Commissioner’s Lands Act, changes it to allow Commissioner’s land to be considered under this NWT Lands Act and vice-versa, it provides for Territorial lands to be considered and regulated under the Commissioner’s Lands Act. How or when this will be happening, I haven’t seen one word about that, or why. I know there is concern in the public that this could be used to actually avoid some of the regulatory visions of the Commissioner’s Lands Act which is stronger in terms of the need to ensure mandatory closure plans and financial security. That is my first point.
I guess related to that, I would say what certainty is provided in terms of mandatory closure plans and financial security requirements are in this act. I know 19.(h) begins a little bit in that direction. What is in the act mandating a closure and reclamation plan for any lands that are leased pursuant to either legislation?
The leases should be a matter of public record. We’ve heard a lot of complaints from the mineral industry, for example. They know they’re working in the area of leaseholders. They know they theoretically have access to that land, but they need to notify leaseholders about that. They’re not able to find out and there are many, many reasons why those working on the land should have access and there should be transparency. This is public land that is leased out. There should be absolute transparency on that. I don’t believe that’s in this act, but maybe I could get confirmation on that or clarification that it is where it is.
The bill contains provisions, 57(3), to allow Cabinet alone to decide to move these lands back and forth between the acts. Why do we need that? I don’t think I’ve seen any reasoning provided for why we would need that and I don’t believe that’s any kind of a mirroring. That’s above and beyond the need to mirror here.
Again, the concern is it would allow Cabinet to allow developers to avoid putting up financial securities or, for example, other more restrictive provisions of one piece of regulation or regulation over another. So it seems to be a questionable authority to ask for, and not in the public interest.
There are two aspects of the NWT Lands Act that would also require public review. I think the details would be in regulations more than legislation itself, but the first is royalty and fees. Again, in order to ensure an adequate and fair return to the public, those should be reviewed. Secondly, the regime to administer mineral rights disposition is free entry, as we’ve discussed before, where mining is considered the best and highest use of the land, despite other users or owners or the inherent value of the land itself. Again, a very problematic situation and I know many other jurisdictions, Ontario and Quebec, our largest jurisdictions come to mind, have changed that free entry system.
So, again, the public review is long overdue and has been called for in the past when it was federal law without any response. I guess I have those comments and questions, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Premier McLeod.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess the best way to counter those comments is this is mirrored legislation and we are essentially doing what was done under the federal government. As a government, we have committed to undertake a review of the legislation and, as well, our Aboriginal government partners are very supportive of a review as well. So we’ll be setting up that process in order to respond to the very detailed questions raised by Member Bromley. Through you, Madam Chair, I will ask Jamie Fulford to respond. Thank you.
Thank you, Premier McLeod. Mr. Fulford.
Thank you, Madam Chair. If I could just start with maybe what we can call the land trading provisions in the mirror act. The reason it was thought necessary to do that is that, at least as of April 1st, this act will only apply to lands that come into the administration and control of the GNWT on April 1st or after. So, as the Member correctly pointed out, there are two different land regimes and there are a lot of reasons why you’d want to have a way to coordinate administration of those lands. Maybe if I could give an example. With a community that has a block land transfer with Commissioner’s lands around it, maybe there’s a need to administer lands that are just outside the block land transfer. This would allow Territorial lands to be transferred under the administration of the Commissioner’s Lands Act, so you would have a single regime applying to both lands.
Further on, the intention is not to avoid any requirement of either one of the two acts. I think the Member correctly points out, as well, that there is no express requirement for security to be given under the Territorial Lands Act. That’s a feature of how old this act is. It’s a standard term of leases right now under the Territorial Lands Act that security can be given and there are provisions of remediating the lands essentially after the end of the lease.
Further, maybe I can just point out that in Yukon the same kind of land trading provisions were included in their mirrored lands act for the same reasons. So that was the model that we used for those provisions. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Fulford. Mr. Bromley.
Is there a mandatory requirement for a closure and reclamation plan for any lands that are leased pursuant to either legislation? Thank you.
There certainly isn’t in the Territorial Lands Act. There isn’t a statutory provision that would make that a requirement. Under the Commissioner’s Lands Act, several years ago it was amended to include provisions that speak specifically to security and reclamation. So that is definitely a difference between the two different land management regimes. Thank you.
I guess the obvious question is, to connect the two issues, will land designations be moved back and forth either to ensure that financial security is provided or not and will that mechanism tend to delay merging these two pieces of legislation? I’m hoping the Premier will tell me that, in fact, the review is meant to get these two pieces of legislation merged as quickly as possible, so we don’t have the confusing situation out there. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Mr. Premier.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I seem to recall when we were doing this work, there was a call to keep it separate. If other Members of committee want us to put them together, I’m sure they will come out when we do a review. If that comes out of that review, then we’ll do that. Thank you, Madam Chair.
I don’t think that recall is correct. Cabinet came back to us in response to our concerns that there had not been work done to ensure that gaps were filled between the two different pieces of legislation. So it was a Cabinet idea, not a committee idea. Anyway, I guess there was another question and maybe Mr. Fulford was prepared to answer that. Thank you.
Maybe if the Member could repeat the question he’s awaiting an answer for, then we’ll respond to it. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Just on the question of the leasing and that it should be a matter of public record. I think the reasons for that are obvious. Is that provided for in this legislation? Thank you.
Mr. Fulford.
Madam Chair, there’s no express requirement for leases to be made public in this mirror legislation. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Fulford. That’s the 10-minute time for Mr. Bromley’s general comments. I have Mr. Dolynny and Ms. Bisaro on the list, but I’m afraid we’re going to have to defer that until tomorrow. I’d like to thank the Premier and his witnesses for their attendance in the Chamber today.
