Thank you.
First, I want to acknowledge that this is how you end up in court: having legislation like that passed. I think there are better ways forward.
I will pick up, Harold, on what you mentioned with regard to the development that your nation is undertaking.
Other nations are also undertaking similar developments. I'm going to reflect on the Tsawwassen Nation, which is a modern treaty nation building between 8,000 and 10,000 residential units to address the housing crisis. Why I think that's so significant is that local communities are coming together to come up with solutions that are meeting local needs. When you have that type of thought process, I think it's better reflected versus a top-down, legislated process.
I would be very concerned with regard to the disposition of federal Crown lands when you have indigenous nations that have not settled treaties and that have an ongoing connection to the land. To me—and this is the lawyer in me coming out, so don't hold that against me—that is how you end up in long litigation and with areas of litigation that will not result in addressing the actual issue.
If we want to address the housing issue, I think there are better ways to move forward. Again, restitution is what we're talking about. We're talking about land back. When we have indigenous communities that have been ostracized and removed from their lands for the settlement of Canada, it flies in the face of what we're trying to achieve when it comes to reconciliation and building that new relationship based on trust and mutual respect.
I see a number of issues and challenges with that, particularly given the context in British Columbia—which is where my expertise lies—where we have 50% of first nations currently negotiating modern treaties. We have a huge level of uncertainty when it comes to access to lands and resources, as well as to ensuring that indigenous nations are able to have control over their territories.
This is outside of just the reserve lands. They have access, control, jurisdiction and law-making authority over their entire territory. If that also includes federal surplus lands or federal lands that we haven't had that negotiation about, we haven't resolved the issue. I think that would be very dangerous.
That's my perspective. I think there are ways forward, which would be negotiations.