Mr. Chairman, I also understand that the territorial government is probably the only government that I know of so far that has made a contribution to the Metis locals in the communities. Are there some other avenues that the Metis organizations and the Metis governments receive through other funding arrangements through settled land claim agreements? Are there other areas where the Metis locals have yet to settle? They are still in negotiations. Is it something that this government here sees going forward in some type of strategy to ask the federal government?

I know the special provisions in the section under the Indian Act where aboriginal Dene First Nations receive funding. That has been a long-standing issue. In terms of giving some support to the political government of the Metis, is this government here going to see how they could increase funding by asking the federal government? I know we are pretty well living on what we can provide. There is $13,235 per organization for the Metis government. I think this is something that the federal government should have a good splash of water in the face to wake them up in terms of the Constitution of Canada.

Mr. Chairman, I guess what I am asking is, have we gone to bat for the Metis in terms of funding that we are giving to our people to run their own affairs? When you look at this amount compared to other amounts that we give to other organizations in the Northwest Territories, it is not quite the same. I want to ask the Premier here, in spite of what we may hear from the federal government I think that we should really take a serious look as to how we fund our own people, especially the Metis people who have similar rights under treaties, what they call their Metis script. Is this something that the Premier could maybe enlighten me in terms of some of the challenges he made and this Cabinet made or this government, or we just don’t want to go in there because it opens up other issues that we have not yet prepared ourselves to do?