What I don’t like about this bill is the approach that you have, where you divide and conquer, where you do not talk to all First Nations in the affected treaty territories, their traditional territories.

I think Neskantaga has been very clear: If you’re going to build that road up there to the mine, up to the First Nation—it’s through their traditional territory. There is no way it is going through there.

I think with the divide-and-conquer approach, which is very colonial—that will not work. I cannot support colonial legislation.

I think, again, passing this bill, with the colonial way of doing things where you divide and conquer, where you do not speak to all First Nations affected—what that does is, people will start to get together as First Nations, and it will be harder to have these agreements with the mining companies. It will be this government’s fault that they cannot move forward. In passing this bill, the government is shooting themselves in the foot. Meegwetch.

Free, prior and informed consent is—that is free. The government comes to the community. That First Nation does not spend any resources on being informed. “Informed” is, we listened to what’s being proposed. We listen in our language and in a language we can understand. Once we’re informed, that’s when the First Nation will say if they consent to it or not.

Because the government is just plowing ahead—plowing ahead with the legislative bulldozer, I should say—it’s starting to sound like it’s a re-election scheme. I keep telling you here in the House. I’ve been very clear—

The lands that are in those traditional territories—that’s where we are as First Nations people. We’ve been here for thousands of years. You cannot just come over here and then say, “We want to build mines in 15 years.” I don’t know how long you’ve all been here, but we’ve been here for thousands of years. We are the caretakers of these lands. We will continue to look after these lands. We will continue to protect our rights as First Nations people, our Treaty rights, our inherent—

It’s so good to hear the support from the member from Guelph on this bill. I’ve had those conversations with him for the last few years on how critical it is to expand the battery and electric vehicle market in Ontario and the necessity of the resources that we can source from Ontario for these.

I’m curious, though, and this is something that I think is a province-wide issue: When we’re having those conversations and discussions with Indigenous territories that are directly impacted by this, how far out should that net go? Is it just any Indigenous territory in the province of Ontario? Is it just directly those whose traditional lands are in that area?

I was just wondering if the member had any advice for us on exactly what that consultation should look like within that spirit of reconciliation.