Kevin O'Reilly

Yeah, thanks, Madam Chair. Look, I've already said that I agree in principle with this, and I will take issue with the Premier's comments. This is not about me trying to exclude Indigenous governments from getting to shared decisionmaking agreements. This is about trying to find out how Regular MLAs can have a say in agreements before they're finalized. And it's about MLAs doing their job. I'm just not prepared to give Cabinet a bank cheque, I guess. So that's what I think this is about. But in any event, Madam Chair, I do want to move to a motion if I could.

Thanks, Madam Chair. I can't let this one go without raising some concerns and issues that I think are well reflected in the report itself. But I like this idea of a statement of consistency for government bills. I think government has the resources, and they can and should be doing this. The difficulty is that the way the bill was drafted is that requirement for a statement of consistency was also imposed on Private Member's bills without any discussion/consultation with this side of the House. And I'll confirm this when the Minister's up in the witness chair when we get to it but just no...

Yeah, thanks. That sound pretty good to me. I would prefer having a little bit more meat on this nonderogation clause, so to speak, that makes sure that, you know, we support the land resources and selfgovernment agreements that have already been negotiated, and there's the ability to add more. So I think this is good language. And it's a little more specific than just section 35 rights. It brings it down to our situation in the Northwest Territories, so. But it includes those so, yeah, I agree with this. I support it. We've done it before, and I think we should do it again. Thanks, Madam...

Yeah, no, thank you for that. Yeah, I think we're not like a lot of the governments that the Premier described that have party systems. This is supposed to be a consensus government. So the way that the bill has been drafted now and I think this was a helpful addition was that, you know, Regular MLAs will now at least get notice if negotiations a Minister's authorized to begin negotiations on a shared decisionmaking agreement. But the only time there's no requirement there's nothing in the bill about what happens with those agreements other than they're going to get published at the end...

Yeah, thanks, Madam Chair. So this is an interesting feature of this bill is that the Cabinet will authorize individual Ministers to go off and negotiate something called shared decisionmaking agreements with Indigenous governments. It's also part of BC's legislation to implement the declaration. I think this that's a good thing. I support it in principle. But I do think that Cabinet dropped the ball in terms of not adopting the approach that BC has of actually making that delegation of authority or at least not providing notice to the public that that's going to happen. What has been added...

Thanks, Madam Chair. I just want to understand. I believe this language comes from is repeated in at least a couple of other pieces of GNWT legislation. And can I ask the law clerk to confirm that for me, please.

Yeah, thanks, Madam Chair. Yeah, I respect all the comments I heard. You know, this motion does not require or enable elected MLAs to participate in any way in the action plan committee. It allows for a representative to be there on the terms and conditions that are set by the committee itself. This is not about interfering or trying to influence the process. It's about understanding what's happening there and how it will change the legislative branch of government. This is not about the executive branch of government. This is the plan, when it's done, will change the legislative branch of...

Yeah, I'm kind of a bit surprised we're just rushing through this because I think there's some pretty significant public policy issues here. And this recommendation, I certainly support because I think there's going to be a lot of work necessary to come up with an action plan to revise policy legislation of this government. And that does require resourcing of some of the Indigenous governments to participate in that process. And then, you know, we get to the stage of actually this won't happen in this Assembly but in the next Assembly and the Assembly after that, individual pieces of...

Yeah, okay, if I wasn't concerned before, now I really am. If GNWT's going to interpret this bill in a manner that may allow for seizure and sale of Indigenous settlement lands, I'm voting against it right now. This is just not right. And the department doesn't seem to have done the work to discuss this with Indigenous governments. This is not a good place to be. So I guess I let's start with what engagement was done with Indigenous governments on this bill? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move that Bill 85 be amended by deleting subclause 8(2) and substituting the following:

(2) The action plan committee must be comprised of

(a) members appointed by Indigenous governments or organizations of the Northwest Territories;

(b) members appointed by the Government of the Northwest Territories; and

(c) subject to subsection (2.1), one member appointed by motion of the Standing Committee on Accountability and Oversight or any successor committee that may be established by the Legislative Assembly.

(2.1) The action plan committee may, in respect of a Member...