Thank you very much, panel. Hopefully you can hear me better this time.

I hope that you have received my speaking notes. For those of you who need translation, hopefully you will get that very soon as well.

My submission revolves around three particular areas: excise tax, casino and ATM taxes, and carbon taxes.

The Chiefs of Ontario's chiefs committee on economic development, which I chair, has focused on excise tax sharing and its possible feasibility. Also, we have reached consensus on focusing on excise tax, and that work has been ongoing.

We did undertake a legal feasibility study through Woodward & Company, and that recommended that our chiefs committee move forward with the FACT tax-sharing framework mentioned in the federal budget.

However, we are also going to be looking at this with a closer legal eye, considering the case that's going to be coming before the Superior Court of Québec and the Quebec v. White and Montour excise tobacco case in which the court has already found that the charges against them would be dropped. Quebec's government is appealing that.

It found that they're supported by UNDRIP, which is now federal law—they have that right to economic development—and also by the Covenant Chain treaty, which was found to be valid. Back in 2020, then minister Marc Miller used that treaty to meet with the Mohawks who were blocking the railroads at Tyendinaga, so that is an active treaty. That's also one of the 13 areas that Quebec is trying to use to say that the treaty is no longer valid. Also, it found that the excise tax violated their treaty rights under that particular treaty.

It will be interesting to see where this is going to go federally. If this does get to the Supreme Court, the Association of Iroquois and Allied Indians has agreed to intervene in this case in favour of the White and Montour side, supporting those rights going forward.

We are still going to look into the other parts of that and look into the FACT tax-sharing framework creation. Regardless of whether section 89 applies to that, it's up to the federal and provincial governments to create new revenue-sharing agreements with first nations leaders to ensure that tax profits are allotted for first nations community needs.

I'd like to point out that, in Ontario, Grand River Enterprises pays well over $200 million in excise taxes. However, Six Nations itself doesn't receive much of that money.

With regard to casino and ATM taxes, the problematic provincial cartel system hurts first nations gaming hosts from making that profit. When we look at the federal jurisdiction framework for gaming in the United States, we see that they have a larger number of gaming businesses. The federal government should also consider providing partnership opportunities in Internet gaming.

Another option for the government—we know this through Bill C-92 and that appeal from Quebec as well—is that the federal government has the ability to override provincial legislation and recognize first nations jurisdiction in any area it pleases. Of course, gaming could be one of those areas as well. First nations did have gaming before.

Also, we're looking at the Van der Peet test being overturned. That's a very colonial test. Whether your rights are solidified or not depends on when you met a European, which, of course, we know is all based on racism from the 1400s and doctrines of supremacy.

With regard to carbon taxes, Chiefs of Ontario and Attawapiskat First Nation filed a judicial review after the federal government failed to negotiate carbon pricing with first nations in Ontario.

The GGPPA established Canada's carbon pricing regime, which was meant to be revenue-neutral but had disproportionate effects on first nations. Basically, we're asking the federal government to redevelop the policy with their communities by either exempting first nations or allowing for cost recouping.

Currently, we cannot comment on carbon taxes in any capacity due to the current, ongoing legal action.

There has also been some backlash from other first nations communities, as seen from the Anishinabek Nation and the United Chiefs and Councils of Mnidoo Mnising, which made an intervenor memorandum of argument on the GGPPA to the Supreme Court in 2018, arguing that the carbon tax overlooks the exaggerated climate impacts that already affect first nations communities and arguing how these impacts uniquely affect first nations due to their cultural ties to their waters and lands.

This case also shed light on article 29 of UNDRIP and its connections to the carbon tax, which expressly recognizes, among other rights, the rights of indigenous peoples “to the conservation and protection of the environment and the productive capacity of their lands or territories and resources.”

For first nations, carbon taxes are not about federalism but rather a violation of first nations land rights and an affront to the economic reconciliation efforts the federal government has promised.

I'll leave it there for now. Thank you.

Transcript

Discussions (0)