Senator Forest: It is all about representation. If I understand correctly, the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, which is a very good organization that does a lot of work to promote the cause of Indigenous people, is not necessarily an elected organization.

What your amendment is proposing is to formally reserve a seat on the council for the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples. Why that organization and not some other national organization? Would it not be appropriate for us to instead set out criteria for selecting an organization? People may or may not be members of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples. If I were an Indigenous person who was not a member of that organization, I might not feel as though it could speak on my behalf.

I have a problem with arbitrarily granting this organization a seat on the council.

[English]

Hon. Denise Batters: Thank you, Senator Martin. Following Senator Brazeau’s speech about this matter, I asked him about its history, since he was someone who had previously been the head of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, or CAP. There are generally five recognized national organizations of Indigenous people, and Senator Brazeau mentioned that the government helped create them. Four are included in this bill. At one point while it was in the House of Commons, it included the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples as well, but CAP was later removed.

Do the government’s criteria consider all five of them, in the many things that the government is dealing with, to be proper national organizations for Indigenous people? If so, is this bill a bit of an outlier in that it does not include the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples?