Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I hope this is not a holdback to any opportunities that come from my riding. There are other groups within my constituency besides land claims organizations. There are individual contractors, band development corporations which follow through from the

Indian Act, it does not have anything to do with land claim agreements.

Mr. Speaker, it is awfully hard to tell someone who has been in a family business for some 40 or 50 years in which they are having problems just to make payroll or keep their businesses in operation. Simple projects such as labour contracts, slashing willows along the road or basically even a contract to paint a ferry. It seems like these contracts, for common sense purposes, should automatically be given to those people who do not have the skills as operators on trucks or cat operators, but who have common bush skills and are able to deal with the bush environment and work in that environment, yet it seems like even those contracts are being taken away from our small communities. Again, can the Minister tell me, is that the reason why a lot of these contracts are being held up in our communities is because of this uncertainty on land claim agreements?