Cheryl Gallant

“Mr. Speaker, I could not disagree more with what my colleague just said. Her riding also borders a small part of my riding, because the community of Kebaowek, which she mentions, is part of my riding, and its ancestral territory borders my colleague’s riding. Obviously, indigenous peoples do not share the same understanding of the borders of Quebec and Ontario, and this is particularly true among the Anishinabe, so when my colleague speaks of consultations involving first nations, no, those consultations did not take place, and that is why the Supreme Court ruled in their favour. What my colleague wants, of course, is to strip first nations of their power to enforce their own conditions. She made a rather fascinating claim that money could buy off the chief of the Kebaowek community. The community supposedly did not have enough money, but if it were given more money, well, obviously, it would sign. On what basis is my colleague so viscerally attacking the very integrity of people who are standing up to protect the planet? As for the consent of first nations, what happened with the Chalk River project was that Canadian Nuclear Laboratories approached the Algonquins of Ontario, who are “pretendians”, people who claim to be indigenous or Métis, who are not recognized by the House and who nevertheless speak on behalf of first nations and Anishinabe people. That is a fundamental mistake that I cannot support and will never support.”