Friends of the Lubicon
PO Box 444 Stn D,
Etobicoke ON M9A 4X4
Tel: (416) 763-7500
Email: fol (at) tao (dot) ca
www.lubicon.ca
November 22, 2006
Yesterday the Minister of Indian Affairs responded to a question in the House of Commons planted by one of his fellow Conservative Members of Parliament. Normally these planted questions are a way of allowing the government an opportunity to make a statement on an issue that might not otherwise come up, or, as is more often the case, an opportunity to take cheap shots at the opposition.
This was clearly the latter. Kelowna MP Ron Cannan threw Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice a question about the tenth anniversary of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. Noting that the Assembly of First Nations has issued a report card on the Canadian government’s failure to implement the vast majority of the Commission’s recommendations, Cannan asked for Minister Prentice’s comments on the government’s failing grade.
Prentice replied "I am pleased to announce that the new Government of Canada is making progress in improving the lives of aboriginal Canadians, unlike the former government. Frankly, I agree with the AFN, the Auditor General, and virtually every other independent commentator who has remarked on the terrible Liberal grade of F for its failure and disgraceful, shameful abandonment of aboriginal Canadians. Aboriginal Canadians now know they have a government that delivers. No more ducking, dodging, dithering or delaying."
No one could dispute that the ten years since the Royal Commission’s report there has been a "disgraceful, shameful abandonment of aboriginal Canadians."
But the Lubicon Nation has seen no action from the federal government to resolve its long-outstanding land rights issue during the past year of Conservative government, despite repeated pleas from "virtually every … independent commentator". They have seen no "progress in improving [their] lives" under the Conservative government. In fact all they have seen so far is "more ducking, dodging, dithering [and] delaying".
The Lubicons and other Aboriginal people need "a government that delivers" more than sermons on the failures of previous governments. They need a Canadian government that can deliver a long-overdue settlement of Lubicon land rights.
Mr. Prentice: no more ducking, dodging, dithering or delaying.
fol-request at masses.tao.ca