Mahsi, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman I am not going to support the bill or suggest an amendment because of the overwhelming opposition to it in my constituency when I toured. As well as reading the different letters from different leaders, who have spoken to me on this item.

First of all, the Minister of Finance, Mr. Handley, is right that a lot of people out in our communities look at the Legislative Assembly and lump us all under government. They do not differentiate between ordinary MLAs and the Cabinet. I had to tell them that this is a private Member's bill. Mr. Dent put this forward and this is an issue that has been out floating around this House as far back as I can remember. There is no support for it in the past to deal with it and I would like to commend the Member for bringing it forward, although I am still not going to support it.

The reason for that is like I stated when this motion was put forward a few months ago. The current Wildlife Act is undergoing comprehensive review that will lead to a new Wildlife Act. There is extensive consultation going on now in the communities. Aboriginal First Nations, Metis from different communities, from different band councils, the different regional aboriginal government organizations have agreed to participate in this review. There is a problem that we have here as government that while already doing a review of the total Wildlife Act, whereas a single issue benefiting a single group that has very wide ranging ramifications for the whole area of wildlife and aboriginal rights is thrown into there because of treaty issues, it is going ahead of the process. There is a review going on and people in the review are wondering, are we just wasting our time in this review of the Wildlife Act while this is going on? What are you guys doing there in government? I have to remind you that we are all lumped together as government.

I have to tell them that we set out on a process and we should stick to it. Both aboriginal and non-aboriginal people have contributed to this review of the overall amendment to the act.

I just wanted to make that point that there is a process in place that we have to stick by. My concern has always been this; if any research has been done to try to determine the future development in the North and how many new workers are we going to have and what kind of impact is it going to have on the existing wildlife population, there is no real research that has been done to try to determine how many new individuals will qualify for this reduction in waiting time and what impact it is going to have on hunting and people who are currently hunting.

The fear of aboriginal people is that through the treaties in 1921, which were signed 80 years ago, the agreement for allowing a government of the Crown going on to our land was that we would always have our hunting, trapping and fishing rights protected.

Even today, with the impact that we have, like Mr. Delorey said, there was a decline in wildlife, caribou and moose in the Hay River area. You look at Hay River, it is getting to be fairly populated already. That is just a tip of the iceberg on what you are going to see in the future. That already has an impact on the Dene who live in the Hay River area and how far they have to go to get caribou and moose now to put food on their table.

We have not really determined what the impact of other uses of wildlife, especially the Dene and the Metis people, the Inuvialuit people are going to have on this. There are a lot of things that we still have to look at in terms of a management side and administration side and the impact it is going to have.

That leads me to the land claims that are still outstanding. There are the Deh Cho process. That is there. There is a letter from the Grand Chief of the Deh Cho First Nations, Mike Nadli, who is saying that this issue must be addressed through the Deh Cho process negotiations. The issue is that they have not agreed whether the GNWT has jurisdictions over hunting and wildlife management in the Deh Cho. The Wildlife Act was imposed on them so the leadership there have not really agreed to it or submitted to it yet. This is clearly a fundamental issue of First Nations jurisdiction.

Eighty years ago, the treaty was signed, 1921, and the Wildlife Act is 20 years old. So 60 years after the treaty was signed, this Wildlife Act was put into place. It was a heck of a debate. If you research it over the two-year residency clause in the past, as Mr. Steen was saying, there is a very serious, deep concern on what does that mean to the trust relationship that is there? Dene Nation National Chief Bill Erasmus is questioning why we should be considering new and separate legislation outside of the review already underway? He goes further to say that this type of process breaches on disrespect and violation of the longstanding treaty relations that we have with the federal and territorial governments and hinders the trust factor within that relationship.

He goes further, suggesting that there has to be full input by residents of the Northwest Territories to willingly demonstrate to work together on such proposed legislation. The public should be invited to participate in the current overall review of the Wildlife Act, which would fully ensure full consultation.

I agree with that notion that there is a process in place that as a government, we initiated. This Bill 12 is premature and it is not supported by the majority of the people I represent in my region, as well as the comments that I heard and the feedback I received from the other aboriginal leadership that I have talked to. I just wanted to include that as my comments on this bill. Thank you.