There has to be a better way

This much is certain. The present treaty making process in BC is not the answer. It is in need of a substantial overhaul. The provincial Minister of Aboriginal Affairs acknowledges it would take 100 years to complete, and that it would bankrupt the province. There has to be a better way. Why not extend to our native people, at long last, the full rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizenship? In specific terms:

1. Transfer the ownership of Indian reserves to the various bands who now occupy them to be dealt with in the same way as other landowners deal with their lands.

2. Where treaties do not exist, augment reserve lands with the transfer of Crown land, or dollar compensation in lieu, on the basis of a limited but reasonable interpretation of aboriginal title as found in the Delgamuukw case, with a portion of such lands being made available to individual band members.

3. Encourage, where viable, the establishment of democratically-elected municipal governments on native lands, with municipal-like powers only, but outside of land-claim agreements so as to avoid constitutional rigidity.

4. Limit treaties to interests in land and allow all economic and social programs of general application, both federal and provincial, to be available to native people, with some degree of preferential treatment for 25 years.

5. Begin to phase out, to be completed within 25 years, the special federal programs for aboriginals only.

6. Confirm that all laws and government institutions both federal and provincial will apply to native people throughout Canada.

7. Repeal the Indian Act.

8. Turn out the lights forever in the federal Department of Indian Affairs, and do likewise in the various provincial ministries responsible for aboriginal affairs.

The end result would be to integrate native people into Canadian society and yet provide once and for all compensation for their special land rights—integration without cultural assimilation. It is the only workable solution for all concerned. It is time to get on with it.