In this episode, Mike Van Dyke talks about the treaties and their impact on treaty rights in Canada. He also talks about some of the ways in which treaty rights have been violated, and why we need to do something about it.
00:00:00.000With every treaty is available on the internet in full, and the remarkably short, simple documents.
00:00:05.860I mean, most of the text within a treaty, it's spent defining the terms and defining the boundaries of new indigenous reserves.
00:00:12.000A large part of treaties go into detail on how indigenous signatories are also ceding all further claims to lands and rights outside of what the treaty has determined.
00:00:20.940That section of the treaty is the most abused one in the modern times, actually.
00:00:23.740Now, aside from that, treaties tend to call for things such as a small annual stipend for chiefs and headmen, along with the provision of some agricultural implements.
00:00:33.160In Treaty 6, for example, the Crown's obligated to provide ammunition and guarantee hunting rights for indigenous citizens on their reserves.
00:00:40.080This is where some legislation is indeed threatening treaty rights, as Prime Minister Trudeau's Bill C-21 could lead to the seizure of firearms that indigenous citizens use for hunting.
00:00:50.440Treaty 1 and Treaty 2, they call for the provision of schools for the children on reserves.
00:00:55.980So, yeah, while people don't like to talk about it, access to schools was enshrined as a right in some treaties and probably inspired some of the residential school systems.
00:01:04.320And treaty signatories signed on wanting that education for their kids.
00:01:07.920So, give those treaties a read. They're interesting.
00:01:09.720Now, most of the things people reference as being treaty rights in Canada, they're actually rights and benefits conferred by the Indian Act.
00:01:16.960And there's many things wrong with that act, but it isn't entrenched within the treaties.
00:01:21.180And it's an act. It can be amended or even scrapped.
00:01:24.320Treaty rights have been violated before.
00:01:26.900It's usually a matter of land being taken or obligations for land not filled.
00:01:30.500Our courts have been settling many of those disputes already.
00:01:33.020When it comes to the legislation being entrenched within Alberta and Saskatchewan, where we're asserting provincial rights, there's no conflict with any treaties.
00:01:40.440Before indulging somebody's point when they claim a treaty rights being violated somehow, just ask them which right and which treaty.
00:01:47.580It's easy enough to check online right on the spot with your phone.
00:01:50.880They're all out there and they're small.
00:01:53.200Chances are no rights probably actually being violated.
00:01:55.980With the ability to instantly fact check claims of treaty rights, we should be calling out those claims as soon as we hear them.
00:02:01.220They've been hampering rational policy discussions for too long already, and we don't need to let that happen anymore.
00:02:07.280Right now we've got the chiefs lined up.
00:02:10.740It seems Rachel Notley has managed to get them together and claim they weren't consulted now in the Sovereignty Act.
00:02:16.320Guys, we don't have an obligation to consult them, to bring in legislations.
00:02:20.400I mean, we still want to consult people as much as possible, as we do with the rest of the electorate.