Gary Vidal

[Indigenous Affairs, December 1st, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives promote and believe in economic reconciliation. It is the solution to eradicating poverty and, with it, the social issues that poverty creates. Treating symptoms rather than the root cause has failed.

It is time to fundamentally change that approach and, away from the Ottawa bubble, that change has already begun. From the Kitimat LNG project in British Columbia to Cameco’s uranium supply in Saskatchewan, from Vale’s base metal mining in Ontario to the Mi’kmaq communities of Nova Scotia and their acquisition of Clearwater Seafoods, first nations communities are taking control of their economic destinies. They want to be true partners in responsible resource development. They have started business, created employment, increased capacity and have generated opportunities that will pay dividends for generations to come.

Self-determination truly begins when indigenous communities manage prosperity instead of poverty.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North very passionately talked about all of the great work the Liberals have done since 2015 and how there was a sense of urgency.

With regard to this particular bill and the four calls to action that he speaks of, this matter was first introduced in December 2017 in an announcement by the Prime Minister. That included the formation of an interim board of directors, which did its work from January 2018 to June 2018. At that point, it issued a report with 20 very specific recommendations for the foundation of this legislation and some next steps. It also included a draft bill. That was in June 2018.

The next step taken in this process was to announce the transitional committee, which was one of the recommendations from June 2018. Guess when that happened. It was in December 2021, three and a half years later. That does not indicate a sense of urgency to me in the progress on this bill.

Maybe the member for Winnipeg North could tell us, in his eloquent way, how the three-and-a-half-year inaction on this has set us back as we get to this point on reconciliation.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 30th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, the process was a very collaborative one at committee and I appreciate that process.

The hon. member spoke a couple of times about the amendment that was made to call on the Prime Minister to respond to the annual report, rather than the minister, as was in the original legislation. It was agreed upon at committee that we would do that.

I am just curious if the member has a reason why that was not included in the draft legislation in the first place, as that was very specifically a response to call to action 56 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Madam Speaker, just to follow up on the last question for the member, I note the time frame of the progress. It started in December 2017 with the Prime Minister announcing that he was going to pursue this national council for reconciliation. From January to June 2018, the interim board of directors did the work it needed to do and reported, and had 20 very solid recommendations. It actually included in those recommendations a draft bill that could have been put forward in 2018. We then waited three and a half years for the minister to appoint, in the next step, the transitional committee members.

Why does the member think there was a lack of urgency for three and a half years while this just sat in limbo?

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Madam Speaker, there was an amendment made that shortened the total time frame from approximately 11 months to five months for the council to present its annual report and for the Prime Minister to respond to that report.

Would she like to speak about how that raises the sense of urgency in this process? Does she think that is important?

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, it has been a pleasure to work with my colleague from the Bloc at committee. We did get a lot of good work done.

My question is very simple. Bill C-29 originally came to the House without any concrete measurables, without anything to measure. We talked a lot about the fact that if we want to measure accountability, we must set some targets that determine success from failure.

Call to action 55 included a number of those quantifiable measurable items. Why does the member believe those measurable goals were excluded in the first place?

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, that is one of the frustrations that we sometimes talk about in our circles, this gap between words and actions. We see that often. We can talk about the Auditor General report that was released this week.

Every time we ask a question of the government, the response is, “Look how much we have spent on this. We must have fixed it”, but the Auditor General said that the government is good at measuring outputs but not as good at measuring outcomes. Our party is about outcomes.

To the hon. member's specific example, I think the other thing that we always have to be aware of with those projects is that we have to respect the right of people along the way. It is their right to say yes and their right to say no, and we want to respect both of those.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know if this member has an abridged version, but I will try.

I am just going to briefly summarize a couple of the things that we improved in the bill. The first was accountability, through the governance model that was there.

The second thing we improved was to remove some questionable language, which was vague and left room for wiggle space. We want to improve accountability, and we removed some of that language to make the government more accountable to the national council for reconciliation.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague from the Bloc and I do work a lot together on the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs. I hope I got the context of the question accurate in the translation.

Some of the things we did to improve the bill that we worked together on, which I believe was the crux of her question, was that we definitely improved some of the accountability measures within the act.

We heard the minister speak earlier about better governance, where, with regard to some of the authority that was granted to the minister in the original draft of the bill, we actually shared that responsibility with council members so that governance was better. It was not just in the hands of the minister.

That included the appointment process. That included many other things. For example, there was a number of areas in the bill where the language was very questionable in the requirement to create the protocol to provide information to the council so that it could do its great work.

Those are a couple of examples of the things we did to take away some of the fluffy and vague language to make this bill stronger, so that there would be greater accountability of the government to the council.

[National Council for Reconciliation Act, November 29th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know if my hon. colleague was listening to my story about Dalton, the young man of Pelican Lake, but do members know what? That was not from the extraction of any oil and gas. Their businesses are from the forestry business in northern Saskatchewan.

I can tell members 20 other stories of communities in northern Saskatchewan that are not only about extraction. It is about opportunity that gives those young people hope for a better future.