Reflection Paper of Speaker - Chris Henderson (TLE)

Chris Henderson gave a speech at the Treaty Commission of Manitoba learning center Wednesday, February 6, 2013, about an economic development zone. He used different wording than the more familiar term ‘urban reserve’. Henderson starting his presentation holding up a big green book titled, Framework Agreement: Treaty Land Entitlement Manitoba, to give a visual of the amount of paperwork and legal implications to be followed. The Treaty Land Entitlement Committee of Manitoba Inc. (TLE) was established to address the land allocation that was not completed after the treaties were agreed too. For example treaty 1 and 2 were suppose to get figures of similar measure to Treaty 5 – 160 acres for family of 5. One of the promises is the per capita provision- Treaty 5 – 160 acres, or 32 per person.  TLE is not new land allocation to First Nations; it simply honors what was promised at the time of treaty. 

Henderson is the Executive Director of the TLE, and in addition to a brief history behind the mandate, said Oka lit the fire to initiate the TLE. He let us know that there is a Treaty and Aboriginal Rights center on Lombard Street if anyone wants to go do some additional research. Henderson clarified the finer details of the legal jargon beginning with Reserves owed other lands who are given money and then purchase land. Within Manitoba, Rolling River acquired lands outside of Brandon; Brokenhead First Nation acquired land east of St. Paul; and Sapotaweyak acquired land near Swan River. To member First Nations to initiate a TLE, a Community Approval Process needs to be obtained. Then a municipal services agreement needs to be reached, as well as a memorandum of understanding.

Land acquisitions of private land takes on average 9 years to convert land to urban reserve, Sapotaweyak is a victim to rules changing, as well as Long Plain where Yellowquill College is located. He explained there is a legal delay process that comes without penalties or fines, in other words, government can drag its feet when it comes to converting land into reserve status. He acknowledged there should be timelines and penalties if corporations can buy, lease, and use lands faster than reserves. These are the challenges; however First Nations have bought land, and are moving forward. Despite time, challenges, progress is being made. First Nations are moving ahead and the TLE framework is the way to go.

According to Henderson, as a side note to questions why this lengthy practice is commonplace, he gave an interesting answer that reflects opinion within the bureaucratic circles. Referring to an incident years back, when then Chief Terrence Nelson put Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice into a situation in which if he did not convert a piece of land purchased into urban reserve, he would block train lines into the states disrupting the Canadian economy to the highest degree. Prentice reached out to him, asking Chief Nelson what he wanted. Government sped up the process converting the Red Sun Gas Station to reserve land in 3 months. After that incident, the government has been very reluctant because of Nelson the Government doesn’t like to be pushed and now has discretion of what will go up.

I asked the question, what is the legal status of the reserves he is speaking about, that have now entered the Land Management Act with their TLE land, if they go broke, does the land revert back to the province or the band to try another venture, ? – He said he wasn’t sure, would have to check with legal counsel, but he knows that within the big green book, the lands will be held in trust. According to the Treaty Land Entitlement Committee of Manitoba Inc. Annual report 2011/2012, to date, Canada has set aside a total of 462,727 acres of land as reserve; there remains a total of 509,759 acres of land. The total crown land and other lands amount to is 963,097acres.

Winnipeg makes Al Jazeera News

Canada's indigenous thirsty for water rights

Plans to build port and sell lake water enrage First Nations community, who say they will not share in the benefits. Daniel Lak Last Modified: 29 Mar 2013 12:57 Email Print Share Feedback

Linda Redsky almost drowned while crossing a frozen lake to get to her home [Jet Belgraver/Al Jazeera]

Shoal Lake, Ontario - Health worker Linda Redsky sits at her kitchen table, remembering when she almost drowned bringing groceries back from the market. With no roads to her community in western Ontario, she had to walk across the frozen surface of Shoal Lake, a sprawling body of water just north of the Canada-United States border. She and her husband Wyne were walking back to their home on the lakeshore when they heard loud cracks all around them. "I went completely under the ice," she says, her voice trembling. "I remember looking up and it was like a moment of clarity. "I could see the hole I'd fallen through, I could see stars in the sky and I was sinking." But Wyne grabbed her hand and pulled her to safety. They kept each other warm until help came, and it wasn't the first time that the couple had rescued each other. "At times like that I hate living here," said Redsky. "It's beautiful in summer, but I hate those trips across the ice." Cut off The Redskys live in an indigenous First Nation community, known as Shoal Lake 40. Though they're just a dozen kilometres from the Trans-Canada highway and a few hours' drive from a major city, their community had been cut off from Canada's transport network for 100 years. This isolation has been part of a long-running dispute that many First Nations people believe is emblematic of their troubled relations with the Canadian state. In 1913, the city of Winnipeg - about 180km to the west - got the Canadian government to evict the people of Shoal Lake from their lakeside village so they could build a fresh water intake for a growing urban population. Then the city dug a canal to keep the water clean. That canal turned the new Shoal Lake settlement into an island, cutting off the inhabitants from the forests, trade routes, roads and railroad lines all around them. "We were blockaded," said the elected chief of Shoal Lake, Erwin Redsky. "It's manmade isolation. We're not really remote. We can hear the traffic on the Trans-Canada [highway] and hear the trains go by." In January, that isolation came to a temporary end with the opening of what Chief Redsky calls "Freedom Road". Only open in winter, the road crosses a steel bridge that Chief Redsky demanded for years to end his community's reliance on the often-dangerous ice crossing over Shoal Lake. "To us it's freedom, at least for now and until we build a permanent link. No more danger when the ice is thin," he says. "People have been just driving on the road for no reason, just to see what it's like." Tom Ross helped build Freedom Road. He's an experienced heavy equipment operator and despite being in his 70s, he didn't miss a day's work as the road was cut through forest, swamp and rock. "It was like Alcatraz here," he says, laughing. "You couldn't get off the island, but now everybody's free to go and come, anytime." But Shoal Lake's problems are far from over. There are few jobs and even the lake's abundant fish and mineral-bearing rocks can't be exploited, because of the City of Winnipeg's insistence that no development take place near the source of its drinking water. Once-vibrant gold mines and commercial fishing have closed. Selling Shoal Lake's water Chief Redsky says support from the Canadian government has not been forthcoming [Jet Belgraver/Al Jazeera] Now Winnipeg has big plans for its century-old water supply. A project to install central Canada's largest inland port and a proposal to sell Shoal Lake Water to surrounding municipalities has given Chief Redsky an opportunity to call attention to his community's plight. He and his fellow councillors have opposed the use of Shoal Lake water in these new schemes and have managed to get them delayed, if not stopped. Treaties between the British colonial government and Canada's First Nations explicitly allot water rights to aboriginal communities, and Chief Redsky intends to press that claim in the courts and international tribunals if necessary. "Water is sacred to us, to all life, and our treaties call for the water to be shared. So why is only one community - Winnipeg - benefitting from this resource and not all of us?" the chief asks. "We'll do what it takes to share this benefit." Shoal Lake people, he points out, have to drink bottled water because they have no purification plant. The City of Winnipeg isn't commenting on the case while the legal ramifications are studied, but city officials have reached out to Chief Redsky, and even helped fund Freedom Road. The provincial governments of Ontario and Manitoba have also been offering limited support to the chief's struggle. What hasn't been forthcoming, says the chief, is support from Canada's federal government, which has constitutional jurisdiction over First Nations affairs. Chief Redsky says he's still waiting for a substantive reply to a letter sent in January to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Some members of his community, he says, are tired of waiting for Ottawa or some other government to resolve their grievances. With an eye to the recent Idle No More protests and hunger strikes, they're looking to take matters into their own hands. "We're a point now in terms of our relationship with Canada. We're at a crossroads where there's a road to reconciliation and a road to confrontation. "We prefer reconciliation, we prefer sharing our resources, consultation, as promised in our treaties," Chief Redsky says, leaving it clear - if unsaid - that confrontation cannot be ruled out.

First Nations Property Ownership Act: More Shenanigans

The First Nation Property Ownership Act (FNPOA) is all about and eventually who owns the land. Is it the federal crown, provincial crown, First Nations or even private ownership to non first nations? This raises the questions, why is it being discussed – what are the underlying intentions? - Much of proposed acts, policies, and legislation today have a shared history behind them; usually a recycled bill or policy with the removal of existing Aboriginal rights to land through their own consent. The First Nation Land Management Act (FNLMA) is endorsed alongside with the FNPOA as a federally dictated governing tool, but when used separately, can be applied in the right circumstances to benefit a well located First Nation. The FNPOA is not the solution to poverty on reserves, rather a lack of resource sharing and lack of land claims being resolved are among the issues.                                                                                                 According to the AANDC website, the First Nation Property Ownership Act (FNPOA) was introduced in a pre-budget presentation to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance on 15 September 2009, by Manny Jules, Chief Commissioner of the First Nations Tax Commission, proposed legislation which he referred to as the First Nation Property Ownership Act (FNPOA). The FNPOA would allow First Nations to opt out from the reserve land system of the Indian Act; transfer title from the federal government to First Nations governments; and allow First Nations to move to a Torrens land title system. The proposed legislation has received preliminary support from some First Nations and First Nations organizations, and is being examined in partnership with Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada (AANDC).[1] Dr. Pam Palmater points out Jules pulls in a $200,000 federal organization salary spreading the message for the conservative government, and is not a credible source to warn of the dangers on the issue.[2] The question is whose best interest is Jules is speaking for, the federal government or First Nations. History tells us the federal government has always intended that reserve land will eventually return to private ownership, therefore leaving First Nations without a permanent and legal base for land.

The thesis statement of this essay is the proposed First Nations Property Ownership Act to privatize property on Canadian reserves, is a violation of Treaty, international law and domestic constitutional rights. The process is being endorsed as a means to ending poverty on reserves and closing the wide social economic gaps between Indians and the rest of Canada. First Nations assert that this act is not in their best interest but a political move to evade treaty obligations and rights. This process is laying the legal foundation to big projects that will then be proclaimed in the best national interest of Canada. The leading interest in one such project is the proposed pipeline through the BC interior to sell to an Asian market; “China is the highest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world”.[3]

Communal ownership of land can be made increasingly difficult in a legal and political system that promotes individual ownership above all else. The article The Logic of Aboriginal Rights by I. Duncan argues that sometimes group interests are best protected by assigning legal rights to individuals, such as when we protect the collective right of a group by assigning legal rights to individual members to engage in group-specific activities.[4] This is the type of thinking and belief set behind those promoting the direction of corporate and federal conservative government interests. Private ownership of land is not the issue for First Nations and their struggle with poverty. It is the lack in settlement of land claims, sharing of natural resources from their traditional lands, equal funding to First Nations which  are the major issues, not private land ownership. There have been examples, like the certificate of possession on reserve land that showed no benefit in the past as was proposed by the author.[5]

Different interests are endorsing and opposing the FNPOA. Support for the proposed act come from former First Nations Chief of Kamloops Indian Band, Manny Jules. Jules recently wrote the forward in the book, Beyond the Indian Act, written by one of Prime Minister Stephan Harper’s advisors; Tom Flanagan. As mentioned previously, Jules is the Chief Commissioner of the First Nations Tax Commission The term tax is associated with the Appropriations Act where House of Commons have to approve a federal budget from year to year. This is the reason why, funding to reserves is not a treaty right but rather a policy. That’s why the general public, and even our own are accusing First Nations of using tax dollars all the time. All Canadians whether they are First Nations or non first nations benefit from tax dollars because of the transfer payments, equalization payments, and the nature that Canada is a federal state. Provinces benefit from the tax dollars, especially the have-not provinces like Manitoba, therefore all Manitobans benefit from the tax dollars. Joseph Quesnel, a conservative writer for the Winnipeg Sun is a classical apologetic for the Canadian government.

Quesnel article in the Winnipeg Sun, November 23, titled First Nation Land Ownership Isn’t A Cure All, is an example of not knowing the issue and poor research. First, Quesnel admits he was not at the conference in person that discussed the FNPOA, therefore his source is secondary information. Quesnel criticized Dr. Palmater position on the FNPOA. Palmater’s position provides a more accurate picture of how devastating the act will be to First Nations land and to the future. Land is the key interest of First Nations through spirituality and their special relationship to the land. According to First Nations and elders the land is not about money and profits but it is about sustainability of mother earth’s elements like water, air, environment, climate change, ect., - Quesnel questioned why Manny Jules was not invited to this conference to express his views. For First Nations, Many Jules is considered a government agent to do away with land rights. Quesnel himself fails to balance his argument in criticizing AMC. He does not mention financial incentives and options for communities behaving accommodatingly in following certain directions as dictated by the federal government. His statement “reserves are colonially imposed system of land tenure that impede economic development”;[6] fails to take several dynamics into consideration such as location, or First Nation entrepreneurs getting an education, training, then establishing good credit as alternatives. Lastly, he fails to recognize the collective ownership that a land base (reserve) provides to the people and the land.

Opposition to the Act comes from scholars such as Dr. Pam Palmater who are among those who believe a public opinion attitude overhaul is required. Many feel education is the answer for First Nations. This view seems to contradict the view of those interested at filling the holes needed in the low end labour and service sector across the country by the fastest growing demographic in Canada, who are the First Nations people. Further contradictory is that First Nations can already divide their land up if they want, through a section currently in the Indian act. Palmater states this most recent proposed Act is an attempt to speed up the land take over process.  

Palmater in particular spoke out against the FNPOA saying it the potential to destroy First Nation communities, this "unlocking" benefits banks, investment companies, the extractive industry and government - not Indigenous peoples. The very objective of this plan is to open up Indigenous communal lands for mortgaging, credit, loans, liens, seizures, taxation and for economic development in the form of mining and pipelines. She has answered questions surrounding economic development held by the general public who question if it’s true First Nations can't access mortgages or start businesses without owning land in fee simple by pointing out there are thousands of young people who graduate every year, build good credit and get loans to achieve their goals. She has been educating both First Nations Canadians that Canada does not have the legal authority to pass such a bill in violation of Aboriginal and treaty rights, the Royal Proclamation, and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  Further this bill would also help Harper end-run the duty to consult and accommodate regarding oil, gas and mining on our lands. While undermining First Nation leadership and empower corporations like Enbridge to lay their pipes wherever they want. In other words, turning reserves into fee simple parcels registered in provincial land registries under provincial law would enable easier expropriation of our lands.[7]

Dr. Peter Kulchyski said, in terms of resource development, the conquest isn’t over yet. Today the battle is fought in corporate boardrooms and courtrooms against 1000’s of lawyers. He spoke about two key terms Carl Marx used in theory: capital accumulation and primitive accumulation. From Carl Marx’s book, Capital, capital accumulation is economic growth under capitalism. Capital is looking for surplus value, which produces additional capital. Primitive accumulation precedes capitalist accumulation. This primitive accumulation plays in political economy about the same part as original sin in theology. Adam bit the apple, and thereupon sin fell on the human race. Its origin is supposed to be explained when it is told as an anecdote of the past. In times long gone by there were two sorts of people; one, the diligent, intelligent, and, above all, frugal élite; the other, lazy rascals, spending their substance, and more, in riotous living. The legend of the logical original sin tells us certainly how man came to be condemned to eat his bread in the sweat of his brow; but the history of economic original sin reveals to us that there are people to whom this is by no means essential. [8]  Kulchyski defined in particular, primitive accumulation as European practices during the 16^th and 17^th centuries as the process of separating people from their land, to create a workforce of wage workers.

Kulchyski said the intent of the FNPOA is to create land that can be bought and sold. He compared the FNPOA more to the Métis scrip’s in the early years of Manitoba than to the Dawes Act used in America. He asked us how many Métis communities exist today. – Not many, this is the goal; to separate First Nations people from their land. The federal government is providing incentives and options to enter the proposed legislation.[9]         

In Manitoba, Buffalo Point First Nation is billed as the model First Nation. Buffalo Point uses a governing structure that is compatible with, and promoted alongside the FNPOA. This is supported by an internal Indian Affairs study, The Top 65 First Nations in Canada to look at patterns among reserves in Canada that make reserves successful.[10] Buffalo Point First Nation is doing well financially, but there are always two sides to the argument. Let’s forget that that the chief is non aboriginal; that is not important as he was adopted into the Thunder family a long time ago[11]. The criticism is that the Chief and Council is rather the model First Nation for conflict of interest. Apparently the Thunders are shareholders of businesses and allegedly have a beautiful house on prime real estate that would be out of a current chief’s salary range. Recently Chief Thunder denied some of his own members of the band to vote with a reference to a land code that must be passed to ratify this FNLMA. There has been band member protest which leads to believe that membership are not behind this initiative.

Long Plains also made The Top 65 First Nations in Canada list and is doing a lot of positive things in the community. One such venture is using the FNLMA to their advantage by purchasing land that is off reserve to start business ventures in nearby Portage La Prairie. One other band, Opaskwayak Cree Nation (OCN) has also entered the FNLMA, but has taken a different route. Instead of purchasing land, they have turned land set aside for TLE and put it under the provincial authority that the FNLMA falls under. So the danger for both communities is that if they go broke, they both will lose the land and it will then be transferred to provincial status, the difference is that Long Plains will not lose land that falls under the protection of the Indian act. OCN however, will lose the land to banks. There has not been a straight answer either from the government or the proponents of this act how land designated under the FNLMA will determine the ownership and who will eventually be the rightful owners if the bands are using this as collateral for loans.

History is contrasted from Canada’s American counterparts in The Redefinition of American Indian Property Rights in American Indian Reservations by Stephan Cornell and Joseph P. Kalt who were part of the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic.[12] The act raises questions as to just what was the thought processes behind land tenure held by both parties, how these viewpoints fit into the common law and political framework of Canadian government today. The Harvard Project is regarded by First Nations as a better measuring stick of the overall health of a community because self determination is deciding factor  than  by Canada`s Top 65 Bands in Canada list, who use internal documents and a general well being index as indicator.

Congressman Henry Dawes of Massachusetts landmark piece of legislation, the General Allotment Act (The Dawes Severalty Act) 1887, was designed to encourage the breakup of the tribes and promote the assimilation of Indians into American Society. It will be the major Indian policy until the 1930s. Dawes' goal was to create independent farmers out of Indians — give them land and the tools for citizenship.[13] The difficult job of healing and rebuilding a community is hard enough work, yet leadership still has to continue to deal with government officials continually trying to find ways around living up to the treaty process and obligations.[14] During a guest lecture from Dr. Peter Kulchyski, he clarified that the Dawes Act is different than the FNPOA because the choice is up to the First Nations themselves to enter into the FNPOA. Further he also said that the FNLMA is more on the side of governance, an attempt to change the system of governance to a one size fits all model; a new name to the same goals of the First Nations Governance Act.[15]

According to the AANDC website, The FNLMA, enacted in 1999, allows participating First Nations to opt out of the 34 land related sections of the Indian Act and manage their land, resources and environment under their own land codes. The FNLMA then places a First Nation under provincial jurisdiction.[16] Removing the Indian Act is the only legislation that protects Indian reserves from taxation or to be seized for default payments. The FNLMA will be limited because land is now under provincial interest and jurisdiction.  Most recently, Chief Clarence Louis of Osooyos Indian Band, B.C., and (another Top 65 reserve) sounded very unsure of legal status of the land if bills weren’t paid; if the land title would return to reserve status. His community also used the FNLMA and is widely promoted as Canada’s most successful First Nation. This proves rather that First Nations businesses can be just as and more successful than any business.

Finally the question of reserve ownership has always been an issue by the federal government and First Nations. It was always the intent of the federal government to assimilate and civilize First Nations into private ownership, adopt the European thinking of land ownership. First Nations always viewed reserve land as forever from generation to generation. Reserve land was set aside to represent that North America was once owned by First Nations therefore a piece of that land must represent that special relationship to the land by First Nations. Land ownership to many First Nations is not the issue to benefit and make a living and be good citizens of Canada.

In conclusion, poverty on reserves will not be addressed by individual ownership as proposed by the FNPOA. Poverty will only be addressed through proper education and training to First Nations, to address the outstanding land claims and to establish revenue sharing of natural resources from traditional lands. It is also important to understand that transfer payments whether by equalization or tax breaks is available to all Canadians, not just First Nations. Lastly First Nations are entitled to universal programs like education, health, and welfare; it is the lack of equal funding to deliver programs and services on reserves that lead to poverty of First Nations. On the First Nation’s side, it is also good governance including transparency and accountability that must be used to address poverty. Therefore the FNPOA will not address the crisis situations on reserves but rather will jeopardize the original treaties about land rights.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography

1.      Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada: First Nation Property Ownership Act. (www.aandc-aadnc.gc.ca)

2.      Additional resources accesses at:

http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/TV+Shows/The+National/ID/2173712911/

http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/TV+Shows/The+National/ID/2189503699/

http://soundcloud.com/el-chaos/pamela-palmater-reserve-vs-fee-simple-land

 

Al Jazeera News

3.      Buffalo Point First Nation Website. (http://www.buffalopoint-firstnation.ca/)

4.      Christopher Alcantara. (2003)Individual Property Rights on Canadian Indian Reserves: The Historical Emergence of Certificates of Possession. Canadian Journal of Native Studies Vol 23(2) available at:  (http://www2.brandonu.ca/library/cjns/23.2/cjnsv23no2_pg391-424.pdf)

5.      Duncan, I. (2003). The Logic of Aboriginal Rights. Ethnicities, 3(3), 321-344.

6.      First Nation Property Ownership Initiative. (http://www.fnpo.ca/proposal.htm)

7.      Marx, Carl. Capital. New York: Modern Library, 1906.

8.      Pam Palmater. Indigenous Nationhood Blog. (http://nonstatusindian.blogspot.ca/)

9.      Quesnel, Joseph. "First Nation Land Ownership Isn’t A Cure All." Winnipeg Sun

10.  Robson, Mia ."Top First Nations' success to be studied." Winnipeg Free Press.

11.  Soto, Hernando de. The mystery of capital: why capitalism triumphs in the West and fails everywhere else. New York: Basic Books, 2000.

12.  The Dawes Act." NebraskaStudies.Org. (http://www.nebraskastudies.org) Kulchyski, Peter .Class lecture, Indigenous Peoples, Land and Natural Resources. University of Winnipeg.

13.  The Redefinition of American Indian Property Rights in American Indian Reservations:  Stephan Cornell and Joseph P. Kalt. Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development. (www.hpaied.org)

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[1]  Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada. "First Nation Property Ownership Act”. Available at: http://www.aandc-aadnc.gc.ca (accessed October 29, 2012).

[2]  Palmater, Pam. " National Chief Manny Jules: Shared Priorities, Self-Sufficiency & Other Policy Myths". Indigenous Nationhood. http://www.indigenousnationhood.blogspot.ca/ (accessed November 29, 2012).

[3] Al Jazeera. “News”. Television. ( accessed Nov 16, 2012).

[4] Duncan, I. "The Logic of Aboriginal Rights." Sage Publishing 3(3), (2003): 321-344.

[5] Alcantara, C. Individual Property Rights on Canadian Indian Reserves: The Historical Emergence of Certificates of Possession. (2003) Canadian Journal of Native Studies Vol 23(2) available at:  http://www2.brandonu.ca/library/cjns/23.2/cjnsv23no2_pg391-424.pdf ( accessed October 19, 2012).

 

[6] Quesnel, Joseph. "First Nation Land Ownership Isn’t A Cure All." Winnipeg Sun, November 23, 2012.

[7] Palmater, Pam. “Flanagan National Petroleum Ownership Act: Stop Big Oil Land Grab ". Indigenous Nationhood. http://www.indigenousnationhood.blogspot.ca/ (accessed November 29, 2012).

[8] Marx, Carl. “Chapter 26: The secret of primitive accumulation”. Capital. New York: Modern Library, 1906.

[9] Kulchyski, Peter . "Conflict and Resource Development." Class lecture, Indigenous Peoples, Land and Natural Resources from University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, November 26, 2012.

[10] Robson, Mia . "Top First Nations' success to be studied." Winnipeg Free Press, September 2, 2010.

[11] Buffalo Point First Nation Website. Accessed 2 October 2012 at: http://www.buffalopoint-firstnation.ca/

[12] Cornell, S and Kalt J.P.”The Redefinition of American Indian Property Rights in American Indian Reservations. Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development.” Available at: http://www.hpaied.org ( accessed 9 October 2012)

[13] "The Dawes Act." NebraskaStudies.Org. http://www.nebraskastudies.org (accessed October 12, 2012).

[14] Palmater, Pam. “Flanagan National Petroleum Ownership Act: Stop Big Oil Land Grab ". Indigenous Nationhood. http://www.indigenousnationhood.blogspot.ca/ (accessed November 29, 2012).

[15] Kulchyski, Peter ."Conflict and Resource Development."Class lecture, Indigenous Peoples, Land and Natural Resources from University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, November 26, 2012.

[16] Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada. "First Nation Land Management Act”. Available at: http://www.aandc-aadnc.gc.ca (accessed October 29, 2012).