Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will try to live within the limits of the 10 minutes. I guess, first and foremost on land and resources, with regards to questions with land-use planning, those responsibilities remain with the federal government. They were not devolved. We certainly agree with the Member that land-use planning funding should be provided for. We are certainly fully supporting that. We see land-use planning as the way of the future.
The South Slave is becoming very complicated because there is a number of land-claims negotiations. You have the Akaitcho. You have the NWT Metis Nation. You have the Denesuline from Manitoba. You have the Denesuline from Saskatchewan. I guess I should mention the North Slave Metis Alliance, as well, then, of course, the Dene Tha. There is significant overlap in that region, so it will be quite a difficult task, I guess I foresee, to come up with a land-use plan for an area that encompasses all those different Aboriginal governments.
Self-government, we have two self-government agreements negotiated in the Northwest Territories. The Tlicho negotiated self-government at the same time they negotiated their land and resources agreement. Deline has a community self-government agreement. I guess, about 30 years ago, the government tried to organize themselves so that capacity would be built as Aboriginal governments would take over programs and services. We also clarified successor rights. We also have the NEB so, when programs are taken over, employees can access resources.
We see the need for capacity building. We do have a current arrangement with the Gwich'in government. That is a tri-party agreement between the federal government, the Government of the Northwest Territories, and the Gwich'in, where we have people that can enter into this program. I think we have been at it for two years. I think it is working very well.
As far as implementation, it is up to the Aboriginal government to decide how quickly or how late they want to draw down programs and services. With the additional resources, we see us making a big push. The ministerial special representative reports they have recommended that the governments take a greater responsibility for facilitating agreements. We will endeavour to do so.
We have been very hesitant to put GSOs into Yellowknife or regional centres because people can walk down the street and get the services that they need. The GSOs in the small communities were put into place mainly because of the Aboriginal language requirements and to help seniors. If the committee is all united that Yellowknife should have a GSO, then I guess we would have to look at that. We have a pilot project with the federal government, so we know that works well.
Ottawa office, I think it is important to understand that the federal government is making a lot of significant changes, not only the fact that, as a Member pointed out, we are a creature of the Government of Canada. We are born as part of the NWT Act. The federal government can change the act whenever they want to and could change the whole structure of our government if they saw fit to do so. I don't think they will do that, but they are looking at how programs and services are delivered.
One of the big items is the federal vision for the North. They are starting to work on that. The federal government will lay out their vision for Arctic provinces and territories up until 2030. That is something that will be a very important piece of work for our government and will involve some significant involvement, primarily in Ottawa. If we are not there, the federal government will see fit to move on without us.
Also, with regards to still-unfinished business with devolution, I think the biggest area of change is 10 principles that were announced by the working group of federal Ministers, which we will look at. I guess the one principle that will have the most effect on us is the principle that talks about revisiting the fiscal arrangements for programs and services delivered to Aboriginal people or Indigenous Aboriginal people.
That is something that affects us significantly because one of the areas that the federal government is moving is distinction-based approach with three national Indigenous governments. They are talking about taking money that is being used for programs and services and giving it directly to Aboriginal governments. Our Aboriginal governments have been talking to the federal government for at least two years without our involvement, without our knowledge. It is only recently that we have all agreed to work together. We think it is all in our best interests if the Aboriginal governments get as much of the resources that they are entitled to, not only in Aboriginal housing, health, education, where those dollars could be transferred to Aboriginal governments.
It is important for us to be there. The federal minister, Minister Philpott, has invited us to the table now. We will be part of that process. Her responsibilities are primarily to Aboriginal people on reserves. We have to make our case so we don't get left out. Historically, the federal government puts a lot of money into reserves and they forget about us. We have to make sure we are there knocking on doors so that we are not left out of the picture.
Nutrition North, we talked about that before. It is a federal program. They are going to continue to do what they do. We have asked them to give us resources for Nutrition North in the Northwest Territories and we would run it. They have not seen fit to do that.
On the contributions, people approach us. We try to deal with them. The view is that there should be no one-offs. I guess that is something we can look at.
On net metering, all we do is provide administrative services to the Public Utilities Board. Personally, I think it would be better if the Public Utilities Board was housed in the department that is responsible for energy and public works.
Northern Resident Index, we looked at it before, before this federal government came into power, before they put an increase into the northern residents' deduction. We have to go talk to all of the provinces and territories that are eligible to claim this deduction, so we probably have to talk to the three territories. I think there are at least six other provinces that we would have to try to get that change.
UNDRIP, the federal government has said that it has to apply to the Constitution of Canada. We are waiting for where they are going from there. I guess the only other area is that there are a number of things with the Ombudsman, I think, that are pretty close to being done as I expect that it will come forward in the very near future. Thank you, Mr. Chair.