What does "governance" mean?

The federal government insists that the FNGI is not about self-government. 

Governance legislation, it says, involves providing essential mechanisms for ensuring representative governments that are accountable to the people they represent.  Such mechanisms include fair and open methods of leadership selection and requiring governments and leaders to inform citizens of their activities and account for their decisions.  Additional bylaw powers and bylaw enforcement mechanisms will also be considered. These powers would be delegated federal powers and not involve recognition of inherent lawmaking powers. The federal government describes the federal FNGI as an interim step between the current Indian Act and the ultimate goal of negotiating comprehensive self-government agreements in the future. 

It is clear the First Nations Governance Initiative does involve some issues that are normally part of self-government discussions (such as elections and leadership selection) while excluding a large part of the self-government agenda. By using the term "governance" the federal government is trying to limit the amount of legislative reform it takes on at one time.

The federal government has decided it will not address several other important Indian Act problems at this time. These include:

• Band membership and Aboriginal citizenship issues
• Indian Act equality rights issues such as s. 6(2) which arbitrarily denies Indian status to certain Aboriginal people based on descent
• Issues relating to programs and services for off reserve Aboriginal people.

Why is the government proposing this legislation?

The federal government is in part responding to the decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in Corbiere. In the Corbiere case, the Supreme Court of Canada decided that the Indian Act provision excluding off reserve Band members from participating in Indian Act elections was a violation of equality rights and was unconstitutional. There are several other related provisions affecting elections under the Indian Act that need changing as a result of the decision in Corbiere. One example is the right of off reserve Band members to nominate candidates and to participate as candidates in elections on reserve.

In addition to Indian Act election issues, the FNGI is intended to address several other issues the federal government considers necessary to good governance.  These include financial and political accountability requirements and the need to remove legal obstacles to economic development and the efficient running of reserve based governments.

How will off reserve Aboriginal people be affected by the FNGI? 

The Indian Act does not provide for an acceptable level of "governance" or self-government. Indian Act Band governments are more accountable to the Minister of Indian Affairs than they are to their own people. The federal government proposes to address this problem with measures it describes as "interim" steps pending more sweeping self-government reforms.

In its current form, the FNGI will not address the most basic legal concepts underlying the Indian Act such as Indian status and Band membership. These legal concepts have been used to discriminate against various classes of Aboriginal people. These Indian Act classes of Aboriginal people also violate the rights of Aboriginal people to have their unique political and cultural identities recognized, rather than being classified by arbitrary racial definitions. (Racial classifications have no biological or scientific foundation. They are products of social ideas based on arbitrary factors such as descent or appearance. Racial classification was a key tool of colonialism to establish legal regimes that would subordinate the rights of colonized peoples to those of the colonizers.) 

The Indian Act concepts of Indian status and Band Membership violate the fundamental human rights of Aboriginal people because they interfere with Aboriginal control over Aboriginal identities and violate the dignity of Aboriginal people as individuals and as peoples. Aboriginal people reject the exercise of federal lawmaking power to define who is an "Indian" and to define what collectivities are "Indian Bands". 

Aboriginal people reject the federal governmentís imposition of "bands" and "band council" structures. Our distinct identities as nations can only be defined and determined by the people and peoples affected. 

Canada has acknowledged that the Indian Act is an antiquated, colonial piece of legislation that does not serve the interests of Aboriginal people. However, the proposed federal governance initiative does not build on the federal governmentís recognition of an existing inherent right of self-government that is protected by the Constitution. Aboriginal people also do not accept the narrow scope and delegated nature of Indian Act bylaw powers.