Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I rise to speak on the Forest Act, to represent the Aboriginal Indigenous governments of my riding. I have been contacted by the Indigenous governments that are not in favour of this bill moving forward at this time. The Indigenous governments would like to see the bill go back to the government, and they would like to see them participate as a government. Right now, they feel like they are stakeholders. The bill has been drafted with all the Indigenous governments across the territories treated as stakeholders. In this act, being a stakeholder would mean that they may not even be the main stakeholder that the government deals with moving forward.
One opportunity that the Indigenous governments have to have a say in what happens with the Forest Act is not necessarily through a technical working group when, at the last minute, we are being asked to intervene and not pass this bill by the governments that we represent for that reason. They feel like they are stakeholders. There are large gaps between when they get to see the act. The Forest Act is an important act. It is a renewable resource act. It is a renewable resource act that is replacing acts from the federal government at this time, two acts.
It is similar to what happened with the Wildlife Act. In the Wildlife Act, the Indigenous governments got to co-draft the act. It took three or four governments. It took 10 years, mind you, but it essentially set the standard on how government should be drafting legislation. It was at the cutting edge of drafting legislation when you have a public government that is working with Indigenous governments to draft legislation. It took a long time for the Wildlife Act to go through, but we replaced an antiquated act back then. It was an act that the people see as an improvement. It is an act that the Indigenous governments can say that they held the pen.
This is not the case here. In the Forest Act, they have gone backwards, maybe, back to the idea that the GNWT will do all the drafting and they will do consultation with the Indigenous governments from time to time or work with the technical working group.
Today, or over the last few days, I have been contacted by the Indigenous governments. They feel like stakeholders through this process. This government meets with these Indigenous governments on a regular basis and treats them as a government when they sit across from each other in bilateral meetings. Not in this case here. In this case here, they are treated as stakeholders, stakeholders who may have less of a stake than industry.
Once this Forest Act is passed into the third reading, it would go to committee. They would have an opportunity to speak on the act, and they would have opportunities for consultation. That is not the full involvement that the Indigenous governments would like to have. The Indigenous governments want to co-draft legislation.
Like I said, this is an important piece of legislation. There are two very important renewable resources; wildlife and forest. They had an opportunity. Although the process took a long time, they had that opportunity in the Wildlife Act. Today they are not going to have that opportunity.
If we pass this second reading, it will go to consultation, and that is what it will be. It will be consulted. They will be consulted like any other stakeholder across the territory. If there are stakeholders registered to speak on this act, then they will be at equal level to the governments that this government sits across in bilateral meetings and indicates that "You guys are a government. We respect you. You guys sit across from us, but only on some things, not on all things. Legislation is not one of them." Thank you, Mr. Speaker.