Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. End gender discrimination and support a Senate amendment. When you get rid of discrimination, that is the guarantee. Promises of reporting are nothing. We've had those before. Quite honestly, you can move forward in a staged process to deal with Indian registration and band membership in general by, number one, passing this amendment.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Hi. [Witness speaks in Mi'kmaq] I am from the sovereign Mi'kmaq Nation on unceded Mi'kmaq territory. I acknowledge that we are here on unceded Algonquin territory, as well, which carries a huge responsibility. I hope that every one of the committee members recognizes what a historic moment they are in.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you for your question. It's true, I did about 10 years' hard time in the feds. I'm almost rehabilitated, but one of the really eye-opening things about working at INAC, especially as a director of lands, was that we'd sit around a senior management table and have to make decisions about who gets put into intervention and who doesn't.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's exactly it, because of everything that INAC is mandated to do. While there are 5,000 employees and billions of dollars appropriated by Parliament, we only get half of that. If the reason is to improve our lives and to improve social and economic well-being, then do it. Everything that's not contributing to that needs to be axed or substantially revised, and this is one of those policies that—if we were to sit in a non-public forum and talk about it—we all know very well doesn't help anybody.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  First of all, all the funding that comes from the federal government is own-source revenue. All of the money that's in Canada comes from our lands and resources, so we're just talking about “let us control our own money”. Second, there's no reason why first nations couldn't be receiving a portion of all federal, provincial, and municipal taxes that happen on our traditional territories.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Think about flooding, as an example. It's a temporary hopefully short-term emergency in which you need extra resources and extra support. Sometimes first nations can do it themselves if they have their own support, and sometimes they might need emergency management folks to come in to help.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you. Kwe, ni'n teluisi Pam Palmater. I am from the sovereign Mi'kmaq nation on the unceded territory of Mi’kma’ki. I want to thank you all for inviting me to speak to this issue today, and I first want to acknowledge that we're on the unceded territory of the Algonquin nation.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I agree with with Ellen and Mary. I just throw it back to you and say that Canada's Minister of Justice has certified that this legislation is charter compliant, and you have heard consistently, as has the Senate, that it is very obviously not. It should concern all of us that we are here doing this.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I agree. This is the third time around now dealing with gender equality. Justice Canada and the minister testified in the Senate, in the other place, that in fact they know it doesn't deal with all gender discrimination. They testified otherwise, but they have since testified that they know that what they're dealing with is simple gender discrimination instead of complex, the complex meaning we have multiple layers of discrimination on us as indigenous women and that shouldn't be dealt with.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I agree that it needs to be amended. My caution is that it should be amended to make sure that men and women, married or not, and their descendants are equal pre-1985 under paragraph 6(1)(a) so that there's no hierarchy. However, this was attempted before, with McIvor in Bill C-3, and that amendment was ruled out of order for procedural reasons.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'd like to respond. Sorry, you wanted to.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  [Witness speaks in Mi'kmaq] Pam Palmater. I'm from the sovereign Mi'kmaq Nation on unceded territories in Mi’kma’ki. I want to thank you for allowing me to come today to speak to some of my concerns with Bill S-3. First, I think it's important to acknowledge that we're on Algonquin territory.

International Trade committee  No, of course not. First nations have been doing it a lot longer than Canadians have been, but it's not only the process. You can't undo the fact that we were excluded. It's the content of the TPP as well. Even if you had included us and this was the result, we would still be opposed.

International Trade committee  We wouldn't have come to this result had we been included.

International Trade committee  Yes.