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We are here discussing clean water and indigenous rights. I have been speaking with indigenous peoples in my area and speaking with Chief Cody Thomas of Enoch Cree Nation. I have been working with them for years to find ways to address the need for clean drinking water. A lot of the high-profile cases are related to very rural and very remote communities, but they are not limited. Enoch Cree Nation is a nation that is situated right next to Edmonton, and until recently, it did not have access to drinking water from the city of Edmonton. I know it was a very hard fight, but now Enoch Cree Nation is getting clean drinking water from Edmonton.

The fact that a first nation that is literally right next to a major urban area in this country did not have access to clean drinking water until very recently I think makes people realize how big the challenge is with getting it to first nations in very rural and remote areas. That being said, there are still areas of Enoch Cree Nation, as it is a rural community in many places, where homes are reliant on well water. I know my family farm is right next to Enoch Cree Nation, and we are on well water.

Since the 1950s, there have been many abandoned legacy oil and gas wells and orphaned oil and gas wells. A number of years ago, during a very low period in oil prices, the Liberal government put forward a policy and put forward about $1 billion to try to stimulate the oil services industry in Alberta into cleaning up some of these orphaned and abandoned wells. I think that was a good policy. However, there are a lot of first nations that have these wells. I believe that in Enoch Cree Nation there are over 200 abandoned oil wells. These oil wells risk contaminating groundwater. There are arsenic risks.

Unfortunately, when the government announced that program, there was $137 million left unspent. I put forward a letter to the Minister of Finance at the time, arguing that that money should be re-profiled to support first nations in cleaning up orphaned and abandoned oil wells, so they could protect their groundwater, their drinking water. Unfortunately, the government chose not to deploy the $137 million. I thought that could have gone a long way to supporting primarily Alberta first nations that are dealing with this very important issue.

I also want to raise another topic. First nations members in my area came to me about part of this discussion we are having today, which is settlements. We are talking about $4.6 billion. It was rightly stated that a lot of this money is coming because of court cases the government has lost. I think a lot of Canadians are wondering, when we are talking about these billions of dollars, where all of this money is going. I am very concerned, as first nations representatives come to my office to talk to me and it has been increasingly widespread in the media that the funds from these settlements are being appropriated by law firms that are supposedly acting on behalf of these first nations. These monies are not getting into the hands of the first nations people who need those funds.

This is not an isolated case, and in one case, it is clear that the government had actually been helping to facilitate what I would call the indentured servitude of a first nation. Indigenous Services Canada hand-picked a first nations board, unelected, and this first nations board was encouraged to sign on with one of these law firms. The senior negotiator for the Government of Canada working at ISC, an employee of the Government of Canada, who got this hand-picked first nation to sign on with this law firm quit the government afterward, and guess what. They were appointed as senior legal counsel for that law firm. This is a conflict of interest, and the government allowed it to happen.

I want to give Canadians an example of just how bad some of these cases can be. These first nations are signing very complex legal agreements that contain poison pills that are not normal in the legal sphere, whereby if a first nation even tries to seek any form of independent legal advice to ask if the deal it is receiving is a good deal or not, it will be punished by the law firm. Money will be clawed back and members will be punished for speaking out against the law firm.

In Saskatchewan, courts have found that these firms have been overbilling these first nations. When we are talking about supporting first nations, the government needs to ensure that there is accountability so that first nations are actually getting the money.

Some of the cases that I am hearing are truly egregious. What we are seeing is the term “irrevocable directive”, whereby a first nation is signing away its rights to receive financial compensation in settlements from the government so that the money will go directly to a law firm rather than to the first nation. The billing practices are then not transparent, and Canadians and first nations are seeing this. They are watching their rights being undermined, and the Government of Canada is not doing anything about it.

When we talk about ensuring that we get fresh water for first nations and that the Government of Canada is being fair to first nations, we need to ensure that there is accountability in the process to ensure that first nations are not being exploited by any third party actors and that they are fully aware, without intimidation, of their legal right to seek independent legal advice when they are signing agreements that involve their rights.

We are talking about very high-profile cases in Alberta, where trust funds contain tens of millions of dollars, possibly over hundreds of millions of dollars, in funds that are intended to go to first nations. These are subject to ongoing litigation, but the fact that we are in a place in this country where first nations have to fight not only the government but the law firms that are supposed to be representing them to get what they justly deserve is a key part of the problem. If we do not deal with that part of the problem, we will continue to see cases of first nations not getting the financial support they deserve to get their water infrastructure and the resources needed to deal with first nations health care. We are talking about cows and plows agreements.

We need to ensure that the government is holding all players, including itself, to account. I will certainly be fighting with my Conservative colleagues to hold the government to account to ensure that first nations and indigenous peoples have their rights respected and that they get access to the clean water they deeply deserve and have long deserved. It is long overdue that they get those resources.

Let us be a true north that is as strong and as free as it can be. May God bless our country. Long live Canada.