Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to continue to talk about the caribou issue today in terms of trust and relationship. Today I don’t want to talk about whether the decision was good or bad, right or wrong; I want to talk about it in the context of consultation as more than a fly-by, a coffee, a hey, how you doing? That is a southern mentality that has been brought up here for years when they speak to true Northerners and it does not work. Anyone here even for a short time can tell you that is not how decisions need to be made.
Last week I heard a wise man say, what good is a right if you can’t exercise it? He was true to his point. Because no one wants to hear the last rifle shot to take down the last of the caribou. The GNWT must realize that the caribou harvest is more than a right. It is an essence of spiritual being of the aboriginal people of our North. There needs to be some decision with context that works with them. It’s not about our lawyers are smarter than their lawyers and the Constitution tells us what we can tell you. It’s about working together. It’s about the moral obligation to ensure that the aboriginal people are sharing in their treaty rights, their destiny as how we work together.
It’s turning into more of a school-ground argument where my dad is tougher than your dad. But I’ll tell you, their lawyers are just going to waste more money on our lawyers and we’re going to lose in our relationship of trust.
There is more here than the law at stake, it’s politics; the politics of what we can do with our friends and their friends. I think there’s an equal relationship that needs to be constantly fostered between the Northwest Territories government and the aboriginal leadership.
The decision of the caribou needs to be a decision with the aboriginal people. A political decision like this is not just about the caribou, it is rather about the Dene culture. I think it’s time for this Minister and this government to immediately call upon a caribou summit that invites the Dene leadership to discuss this issue. Leave the special interests at home. Leave the bureaucrats, those Mandarins, at home. Have a face-to-face, eye-to-eye conversation with the leadership of the Dene and our government leader on this issue, Mr. Miltenberger, and we’ll find an immediate solution by calling a summit and together we’ll find a path to work together.