 but just wanting to welcome everyone to Embracing Indigenous Rights, bringing life to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, hosted by Kairos's Prairies North Region. And this is the first of two sessions we'll have for this event today and then Tuesday evening at 7 p.m. CST. I would encourage everyone to continue introducing yourselves using the chat function. We'll all need to keep ourselves on mute for the event unless of course we're speaking. And we're using the chat as a way to communicate with each other. And so please do share your name, where you're from, your city and or territory and any church or organization you're affiliated with. My name is Amanda Dodge and I'm the program director with Mennonite Central Committee Saskatchewan. I oversee and resource our local work in reconciliation, restorative justice, refugee resettlement and more and have a background with the justice system. I'm from Saskatoon here in treaty six territory. As we proceed, I wanna note that this event is being recorded and if you would prefer not to be seen in the recording, you do have the option of turning off your camera and or changing your name. Now we'd like to move forward with the treaty land acknowledgement and I'd like to introduce a fellow member of our planning committee, Kathy Cameron, a retired registered nurse with longtime involvement in social justice in her parish and her nursing union. Kathy. We acknowledge that we live and work on treaty four territory. These are the territories of the Nehaloch and Shalopec, Dakota, Lakota and Nakoda and the homeland of the Metis Mishief Nation. Today, these lands continue to be shared territory of many diverse peoples from near and far. Wonderful. We're blessed to have an elder with us today and I'd like to introduce fellow planning committee member Myron Rogel, who will be introducing our elder. Myron coordinates the office of justice and peace for the Roman Catholic diocese in Saskatoon and is the staff person for the diocesan council of truth and reconciliation. Myron resides on treaty six territory. Thank you, Amanda. So it's my privilege today to introduce to you elder Diane Anderson. So elder Diane is a Metis woman whose family comes from here in Saskatchewan in Batash on the beautiful banks of the North Saskatchewan River where her family's home is now a historical site. So elder Diane has two children, Derek and Angela, eight grandkids and two great-grandchildren with one more expected in March. So congratulations. She has two dogs, Roxy and Daisy, a cat named Trixie. Elder Diane enjoys praying the rosary. She also enjoys being an elder, sharing prayer and stories with others. She appreciates family time and her work in prisons which she has been doing for 14 years and 11 months. So on behalf of the organizing committee, I express my gratitude to elder Diane who has dedicated time of prayer for this gathering. She's been praying for us over the past week. So we're grateful for that. Today elder Diane will be saying a short prayer to begin our gathering in a good way. So she will be saying this prayer with her mic turned off and I invite all of you to enter into a time of silence shortly at which point her prayer is finished. She will say hi-hi and we will continue on. So thank you elder Diane and for sharing this with us today. A few introductory comments before we proceed. We're so pleased to have this gathering of Cairo's Prayers North. Today and Tuesday's events have been planned by Saskatchewan based committee and we're delighted to be hearing Saskatchewan voices today. Cairo's Prayers North region has been active. Cairo's was formed in 2001. Its activities have included events and newsletters. The recent focus of its work has been on issues related to indigenous justice. In Saskatchewan, the coordinating committee has waned in recent years and part of these events are to engage folks in our communities. We're working to rebuild the coordinating committee and if you're interested, we encourage you to be in touch with Shannon Neufeldt, members relations and network coordinator with Cairo's. It's wonderful, but through technology we can be welcoming folks from our own communities here in the Prairies as well as communities from across the country. We're just delighted to be seeing all of you here for this learning experience. So a quick roadmap for our session. We're going to begin with a brief introduction to the United Nations Decorations and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Then we'll have a legal presentation on international human rights covenants and what it would mean for the United Nations declarations on the rights of indigenous peoples to have a domestic legislative framework. After that, we'll have a presentation on putting UNDRIP into the context of traditional indigenous culture and values, especially with respect to relationship with the land. So I'll now introduce fellow planning committee member and colleague of mine, Mark Biglund Pritchard. Mark is the migration and resettlement coordinator at MCC Saskatchewan. He has a background in sustainable energy and is an active member of climate justice Saskatoon. And Mark will be giving us the brief introduction to UNDRIP. Thank you, Amanda, and welcome again, everybody. So we're going to hear, I think, quite a lot about the content of the declaration from our speakers. So I won't go into that too deeply, but I figured it would be useful to give you a little bit of the history and the involvement of indigenous peoples representatives in seeking international recognition actually goes back quite a long way. It goes back at least to 1923 when Haudenosaunee Chief Desca Hay, I hope I pronounced that correctly, sought to speak at the League of Nations to raise Canada's failure to honour treaties. The League of Nations wouldn't let him speak. And two years later, a Maori leader made a similar move with regard to New Zealand and also was not allowed to speak. But things have improved a bit since then. And the history of UNDRIP, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, starts in 1982, when the United Nations Economic and Social Council formed a working group on the indigenous peoples to create an overarching document. The numerous drafts were presented from 1994 until 2006. And finally, in September of 2007, the final draft was brought to the UN General Assembly and it was overwhelmingly supported. 144 in favour, four opposed, 11 abstained. You want to know who the four who were opposed were. The US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. But that's changed. New Zealand and Australia changed their position and endorsed the declaration in 2009, followed by Canada and the US in 2010. However, the Canadian government made clear that this international treaty was aspirational and had no legal status within Canada. Therefore, in the last parliament, I'm just sharing my screen so you can see what I'm talking about. Romeo Saganash MP, who's Cree from Quebec, an NDP member, brought forward a private members bill, C262, to bring Canadian law fully into compliance with the declaration. The bill was supported at the outset by the NDP, the Greens and the Block. And after a strong public advocacy campaign, the Liberals also swung behind it. And Romeo Saganash actually acknowledged the civil society advocacy campaign in his speech, introducing the bill. And he specifically mentioned Steve Heinrichs, who is probably known to several of us at this meeting. So the bill had majority parliamentary support with the Liberals on board, but it's a private members bill. And private members bill have limited time allowances, so it was possible for the Conservatives in the Senate to kill it, basically by running down the clock in the sessions leading up to the dissolution of parliament for the general election last year. C262, or a bill like it, would however still have majority support in the current parliament. And the Liberals promised as follows in their 2019 platform. They said this, we will move forward with introducing co-developed legislation to implement the declaration as government legislation by the end of 2020. That doesn't give them very much time. In this work, we will ensure that this legislation fully respects the intent of the declaration and establishes bill C262 as the floor rather than the ceiling when it comes to drafting this new legislation. And Prime Minister Trudeau's mandate letter to Caroline Bennett, Minister of Crown Indigenous Relations, includes a requirement that she support the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada in work to introduce co-developed legislation to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples by the end of 2020. With just over a month to go, it's not clear to me what progress has been made on this, but hopefully one of our speakers will be able to tell us a little bit more about that. I should say a little bit about the content, even though that will be gone into much more detail later. The Declaration asserts Indigenous Peoples' rights to all the basic human rights that we take for granted since the UN Declaration on Human Rights after the Second World War, to rights to restitution when those rights are denied, to self-determination, to autonomy or self-government, to their own political, legal, economic, social and cultural institutions, to a nationality, to their own cultural, spiritual and religious practices and so on. And there's a lot more to it than that, but it's quite a short document and it's worth reading in its entirety. For those who oppose it, the sticking point has tended to be around land rights and specifically around the principle of free, prior and informed consent, which is central to the Declaration. And no doubt we'll hear more about that from our speakers, but I'll say this. It seems reasonable that two people sharing a land should operate on the basis of mutual consent rather than one partner unilaterally ramming through its agenda and its pipelines. I like to think that my marriage works on the basis of mutual, free, prior and informed consent, but there will be some give and take, there has to be some mutual listening and we have to work at mutual understanding. That is very different from the tactics of force measure of manipulation of sectional financial inducements and of consultant disregard that we so often see from corporate Canada too often backed up by government. With that, I will pass the baton back to Amanda to introduce our first speaker. Thank you so much, Mark, for that introduction to our content. I'm delighted to introduce Sonia Eggerman to you. We're delighted to have a legal perspective on this conversation and Sonia is a lawyer and indeed a very recently minted partner with McPherson, Leslie Thurman, LLP in Regina. Sonia has extensive experience in indigenous law on various matters, including Aboriginal and treaty rights, governance issues, land use planning, on reserve economic development, regulatory and other constitutional issues. She works exclusively for First Nations. Prior to working with MLT, Sonia served in a senior capacity with the government of Saskatchewan's constitutional law division. In addition to her practice, Sonia enjoys teaching constitutional legal issues at the University of Saskatchewan or University of Regina, rather, as a sectional lecturer. Welcome, Sonia. Thank you so much, Amanda. Amanda also didn't mention that her and I both were in Namibia working at the Legal Assistance Center, assisting in human rights in Namibia. And so Amanda was always the reason that I wanted to go into Namibia and I've watched and followed her career and she's really carved out a path that's exceptional and really using the law to do good things for people. So I was very honored and touched that Amanda thought of me today. So I'm happy to be here and thank you so much, Amanda, for the introduction. So nobody usually likes to hear lawyers speak. It's never the funny part of the presentation. But I'm going to get into it a little bit and try to give you an idea from a lawyer's perspective, which isn't always that fun. But at the end of the day, I think what I'm going to try to explain to you is that while there's the legal perspective on the UN drip, from my perspective, this document is so much more than a legal document. It's really a powerful political document and a guideline for achieving reconciliation, which is the purpose of section 35 of the Constitution, which is to provide protection to Aboriginal and treaty rights in Canada. But still I think it's important to understand the legal perspective. I'm going to talk today a little bit about what the legal perspective is, what the UN drip's implications are on domestic Canadian law, which a lot of times there's a lot of confusion surrounding that issue. I'm then going to look at British Columbia's legislation, which seeks to enshrine the UN drip in legislation and make it mandatory within BC. And then the last thing I'm going to look at and talk about is just more what I think the broader implications of UN drip are and how I use it often in my practice with my clients who are primarily First Nations and Metis. Before I get started, I also wanted to acknowledge that I'm here today from a beautiful treaty for and the homeland of the Metis. And I wanted to say a thank you to Diane Anderson for her prayer. It's always an excellent way to start out any discussion. So with that, I'll jump right into it. So in order to determine the legal effects of the UN drip on Canadian domestic law, it's necessary to examine the legal status of the declaration under international law. And as we already heard, the UN drip was adopted as an annex to the United Nations General Assembly resolution. And General Assembly resolutions, including declarations, are actually considered to be non-binding on domestic law. So a declaration is unlike a treaty or an international covenant, which is an agreement between states and establishes binding rights and obligations at international law. So the UN drip actually belongs to a category of international activities that's often characterized in international laws being soft law. So soft law isn't technically, in the most technical sense, law at all. The term soft law describes the international activities that are not explicitly lawmaking in nature, like things like drafting treaties. But it includes things like draft treaties or certain guidelines or certain handbooks that are created by the United Nations agencies or other international bodies for their own internal use or for the use of states, communicates of international conferences, and resolutions of the UN General Assembly. So although soft law does not represent the law as it currently exists, it can be considered Lex Ferenda or developing or desired law in the future. So soft law can be used as evidence of newer developing international laws. And so that's really where declarations fall in. And the UN drip, again, is a form of soft law. And from a legal perspective, the UN drip can be used in Canadian courts in two different ways. So the first way is that the UN drip as a non-binding international instrument can be cited as an aid for interpreting domestic law. In fact, international law principles have been used in both statutory interpretation as well as constitutional interpretation. And we know that from a Supreme Court of Canada case called Baker versus Canada, which is back from 1992. And in that case, Laird du Bay held at paragraph 70 that international human rights law is, and I quote, a critical influence on the interpretation and the scope of rights that are included in the charter. So by extension, a court could use international law, such as the UN drip, to interpret the scope of rights of section 35 of the Constitution. And again, section 35 is the provision of the Constitution that gives protection to Aboriginal and treaty rights. It's not technically part of the charter, but definitely the argument can be made that things like free prior and informed consent or other provisions of the UN drip should be used when the court is going to look at what is the content of an Aboriginal or treaty right. I think that's really what I see as being the critical role of the UN drip in influencing domestic Canadian law within the judiciary. The second way that the UN drip may be cited is as evidence of customary international law. So customary international law is a source of international law that is determined by the twin criteria of number one, widespread sustained and uniform state conduct. And number two, the accompanying opinion jurist or a belief on the part of the state that their conduct is mandatory or required by law. So evidence of state practice is revealed through an extensive survey of state action, including international judicial decisions, provisions and treaties and other international instruments, official government conduct, the practice of the United Nations, domestic jurist, juridical decisions, and abstract declarations such as general assembly resolutions. Customary international law is binding in the same way that a treaty is without requiring a treaty or any written document. So a good example of this is the prohibition of genocide. That is a customary norm that has been acknowledged by the Supreme Court of Canada. The general rule is that customary rules of international law are directly incorporated into domestic law unless they're explicitly ousted by legislation or a binding ruling precedent by a Canadian court. The Supreme Court of Canada recently considered the role of customary international law in R versus HAPE. In that decision, the court considered whether the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies to extraterritorial searches and seizures by Canadian police officers. The court adopted customary law principles of non-intervention and territorial sovereignty into the common law and applied them in determining the scope of extraterritorial application of the Charter. As a lawyer, I would say that we can cautiously conclude that HAPE establishes a rule of customary international law that will be deemed to form part of the common law in Canada and have direct legal effect unless there's a statute or binding rule of precedent expressly to the contrary. The effect that any existing rule or common law that does not expressly override inconsistent rules of customary international law will be interpreted to conform to the rules of customary international law. So in this case, there's a possibility that customary international law could be used by the Supreme Court of Canada to again determine the scope of Aboriginal and treaty rights under section 35 of the Constitution Act. Once the scope of section 35 has been determined by the court, legislation to the contrary could be found to be unconstitutional as it's inconsistent with the interpretation of the court on a given constitutional right. So the UN Drip may be used by domestic courts to provide evidence to confirm the existence of certain customary international law. As previously discussed, soft law, including the UN Drip may be used as evidence of state practice or opinion jurists. It's possible that any new rules of customary international law that are supported by the UN Drip will automatically be incorporated into Canadian law unless Parliament expressly states otherwise through any type of valid legislation. So what does that mean in practice from a lay person's perspective? From my perspective, it really means that the UN Drip is not gonna be binding on Canadian courts and if it is, it will only be in relatively minor circumstances and it's only going to be brought forward through litigation where lawyers are going to have to make the arguments and really fight it out to get the UN Drip recognized in interpreting any type of laws, including section 35. So it definitely doesn't have immediate legal implications, but that by no means should be interpreted to say that it doesn't have a very powerful presence in Canada. From my perspective, the power of the UN Drip is very much political power rather than the black letter law legal power that the lawyers are often looking for. And one of the ways that we've seen this political power is the fact that provincial governments, the British Columbia government to be precise has decided that they're actually going to take the unprecedented step of passing legislation. And they did this in November of 2019 to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, which the Truth and Reconciliation Commission confirms should be the framework for reconciliation and I would really tend to agree. In British Columbia, it's called the BC Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act and it aims to create a path forward that respects the human rights of Indigenous peoples while introducing better transparency and predictability in the work that the government of BC does with Indigenous peoples. BC didn't just draft this law on its own. It I think took an excellent step in working with the Assembly of First Nations, the First Nations Summit and the Union of BC Indian Chiefs to develop the legislation in a way that was done together rather than government dictating what the legislation should be. And for your purposes today, the BC government describes the legislation as follows. They say the legislation sets out a process to align BC's laws with the UN Declaration. It mandates the government to bring provincial laws into harmony with the UN Declaration. It requires the development of an action plan to achieve this alignment over time. And it provides transparency and accountability and the regular reporting of the legislation to make sure that it monitors progress. In addition, the legislation allows for flexibility for the province to enter into agreements with broader Indigenous governments and provides a framework for decision-making between Indigenous governments and the province on matters that impact their citizens. And Canada has also said for a while now that they've been looking at a similar type of legislation, but we haven't yet seen a draft. We've seen elements of UN DREP covered off in some of their environmental legislation, but we really haven't seen anything broader than that. And so it really isn't a surprise because BC is always the most progressive when it comes to dealing with Indigenous people and Aboriginal and treaty rights. And so it was very exciting to see BC take this step. Certainly they weren't legally required to take this step, but they did it in order to further the path of reconciliation. And so I think that's a very positive thing. So the UN DREP is having legal consequences, not because governments are required to, but they're choosing to take that step, which I think is quite exciting. I have heard just as a matter of practice that the UN DREP has, the legislation in BC is excellent legislation, but the implementation has been a bit more challenging than initially the parties had thought. But I think reconciliation itself is a bit challenging and having direct dialogue about what the content of the act is, is something that I think maybe is necessary and hopefully will produce very positive results on what the content of implementing the UN DREP looks like. And I know often in the news, we'll hear a lot of discussions on business owners or people that are working for a big industry saying free prior and informed consent will destroy the economy. And if you take a very literal interpretation, but certainly I think that that's not what free prior and informed consent is. I think it's governments working towards having discussions and negotiating arrangements where indigenous communities are giving their consent because they've been part of the process and because they've been able to say what their concerns are, how projects will implement their rights and really being a part of the decision as indigenous governments. And so just because we have the legislation in place again, I still think it's a starting point for a lot of future discussions, but those are all very positive things from my perspective. So that's a very high level look at the UN DREP, but what I wanted to leave you with today is that while the legal effects of the UN DREP are not immediate, the UN DREP is a really, really powerful tool from a political and advocacy perspective. I use it regularly in my work. When I write letters to the government, I pull out all of the relevant provisions of UN DREP and say, here's our request and here's what we're asking for. And these requests or for conversations or whatever it is are based on these provisions of the UN DREP. If we're going into litigation, we always cite relevant provisions of the UN DREP. If we're drafting, we draft a lot of legislation for First Nations in their own legislation. We cite provisions of the UN DREP. So we're using it all of the time. And you don't need to be, I guess my point today is you definitely don't need to be a lawyer to utilize the UN DREP. It's an excellent aspirational document that can very much be used by individual people. It's a very accessible read and I would recommend that everyone have a look, read the UN DREP and figure out ways how you can implement it in your own life to advance reconciliation on a day-to-day basis moving forward. It's something that the courts can aspire to. It's something that the law can aspire to. But more importantly, from my perspective, it's something that every Canadian can aspire to. And that for me is really the power of the UN DREP and it's so much more powerful than just the law is. It's a tool for a movement and it's a tool to advance reconciliation. And so, if there's anything today, that's what I would like to leave you with. So Amanda, I think I'm in my close to my 15 minutes. I think we're even ahead of schedule. This is just amazing. And thank you so much, Sonia. I'll note that we will have time for Q&A. So you'll be able to ask Sonia questions after we hear from our next speaker. So thank you so much, Sonia. We look forward to hearing more from you again. But, and now it's my honor to introduce our next speaker, Michelle Brass, Bring Thunderbird Woman. Michelle is Soto, a member of the Yellow Quail First Nation who resides on Papikis First Nation in Treaty Four territory in Saskatchewan, forgive me. Michelle is a writer, speaker, entrepreneur, and coach, deeply committed to the health and well-being of Indigenous peoples and communities. Her work is focused on Indigenous food sovereignty and the impacts of climate change, Indigenous health and wellness, personal healing and transformation, and the empowerment of Indigenous women. Michelle is the creator of the Shaw program, a program that trains members of Indigenous communities to become sustainable health and wellness leaders and facilitators and lead them to understand the direct relationship between the health and healing of women to the health and healing of Mother Earth and vice versa. Michelle is also on the Steering Committee for Indigenous Climate Action, a national organization that inspires action for climate justice by supporting Indigenous communities to develop Indigenous-led solutions to climate change. Michelle, we welcome you and your perspectives. Wonderful, thank you, Amanda, for that introduction. I'm very honored and humbled to be invited to the webinar this afternoon to share some information. So I just wanted to share a little bit about myself, although that biography and introduction was very comprehensive and covers most of it, but I'll add a few more things that I think will be relevant to the conversation today. And as I had mentioned when I first came on to the webinar, I'm suffering with a recent neck injury and I'm under some extreme pain killers. So bear with me, if I lose my train of thought, I will be moving a little bit slower than normal, which is actually a good thing because I'm quite a fast talker and so that might be good. So yes, I currently live on Papicus' First Nation with my husband and eight-year-old son, a member of the Eloquil First Nation and a Steering Committee member of Indigenous Climate Action, which is really the role in which I'm showing up today under that role. I also was a former journalist. So I was a journalist for 12 years, working for many news organizations, the most recent one being the CBDC. And I just bring that up because in the course of my work, when it comes to doing research and connecting with people, understanding reputable sources for information, how people disseminate information, living in an era of social media, living in an era of conspiracy theories which are quickly grabbing on. I find that it's really important that any conversations that revolve around Indigenous rights, the climate movement, social justice, environmental justice that we're always very careful about our sources. And not just certainly news sources or government sources, but really understanding the grassroots people and the way in which we gather information. So I really do try to blend the kind of journalistic research-based background that my first career was entrenched in with new and different ways, or something new, very ancient ways of understanding our natural world and the natural laws that govern our peoples and the lands in which we reside and are a part of. So to go into that now, a lot of what I'll be speaking on comes from my role as a member of Indigenous Climate Action, but also comes from my role, not really so much my role, but my participation and my learning journey when it comes to our ceremonial ways and protocols and the natural law that governs how we as Indigenous peoples live with the land and how we make decisions for future generations and how we live in relationship with the settler state and the settler descendant population that are within these lands and have occupied our lands as well for many generations. So for those of you who aren't familiar with Indigenous Climate Action, I would invite you to come and take a look at their website. It's indigenousclimateaction.com. And what we do is it's a very grassroots movement to really dig into Indigenous-led solutions to climate. Change. So I will be speaking about the relationship to the land in that context for a couple of reasons. One, because it's the one I have the most examples and experience with. So it'll be most relevant to what I can share. And two, it's the defining issue for all of us. And so I think to speak to UNDRIP and Indigenous sovereignty and rights to the land and relationship to the land within that scope I think is really quite relevant for everybody because we're seeing more and more. We're seeing Indigenous peoples, particularly the community-level grassroots movement really standing up to protect our lands and territories and uphold our responsibilities to the water, to the ecosystems, to the animals and that kind of thing with examples such as Standing Rock, with the advent of Idle No More, as well as looking at the Witswetten and their decision to stand up in the path of a pipeline and looking at the Nova Scotia fisheries, lobster fishery. I mean, all of these issues are definitely all interrelated, of course. So one of the things I wanna bring up is, so I'm not a lawyer, I'm a former journalist and I don't call myself a climate activist. I'm a woman, I'm a mother. I am an Anishinaabe woman, a quay that is very deeply rooted in the teachings that our people have carried for millennia, which have allowed us to not just survive the conditions of our territories, like we're going into this winter time, but to really thrive. And we're no longer thriving, we're barely surviving due to the effects of colonization and the laws that have been imposed upon us within our own homelands and territories. But when we go back and look at the roots of the original instructions that we were given, the teachings that we were given as to how to live with the land and in relationship to the land, it provides us all of the answers. And it will always trump man-made law, natural law, the original instructions, they have sustained us and will continue to sustain us through a crisis that is unlike anything humanity has ever seen before. And it will require us to really dig deep and to change the way we do things and not to simply tweak the system that we're currently living in. And so often people will say, well, what are the indigenous-led solutions to climate change? How are we going to do this? And one of the things that I like to mention first off is that had we been living in accordance to these natural laws, we would not be grappling with this global issue right now that when we live in accordance to those original instructions, to those natural laws, which are governed by the ecosystems in which we live. So treaty six territory and treaty four territory will have different natural laws depending if you're living in the boreal forest or you're living in natural grasslands prairie. It will be different than when you're living on the West coast and different in the Canadian Shield. Like, so it's all going to be coming from the ecosystems in which we are living will determine those laws. But had we been living in accordance with those laws, the imbalance that we're experiencing right now throughout the world would not have occurred. So I do find it very interesting and sometimes frustrating that we have created this unsustainable and species-threatening, world-threatening crisis. And people say, well, as indigenous peoples, what is your traditional ecological knowledge? What is your traditional land knowledge and how are we going to get out of this? And it's not that simple because had we been doing these issues, would not have occurred, which is why those laws are in place. So in the context of indigenous climate action, we do reference UNDRIP quite regularly because of what Sony had shared with a look to the article that states that indigenous peoples must have free prior and informed consent to anything that will affect their territories, lands and resources and will impact them in that way. So we refer people to that. And I think that that was a really good overview, way better than I could do as I am not a lawyer and have not studied it extensively. But we always direct people to that because it is a tool, it is a way that Canadians and other people can help support the cause of indigenous sovereignty in ensuring that future decisions that impact our lands and resources can be upheld, can be recognized and upheld. So we refer to that as a tool. But what I'll speak to are what am I talking about when I say natural law or original instructions? And so what that really means is that all of our nations, we have our creation stories, we have what we refer to as original instructions and really what they were protocols, laws put into place to ensure that we would always have balance in our ecosystems and natural world so that all of our relatives could thrive. So you may have heard the phrase, all my relations or all my relatives. And that means not only all people but all life. So that includes the four-legged, the winged, the water creatures, the critters, the soil, the microbes in the soil, it includes the water. And it includes the life force and the consciousness of all of these relatives as well and asserts that they have rights. And so often when we have these conversations about indigenous sovereignty, treaties, different court cases that uphold indigenous rights or First Nations rights, those are really important conversations but what's more important at the community level and at the real world level. When I say real world, I'm not talking about legislation and world governments. I am talking about the real world of water and soil and Mother Earth and the real world that sustains humanity and that sustains all life. And so when we're talking about what governs that, that is what's going to sustain us. And so those are the laws that we really need to look to and to refer to. So when we were given these original instructions, this is what we have. And if we don't adhere to those ways of living, we were always warned that there would be consequences to that. And so when I'm talking about rights and upholding rights as indigenous peoples, when we look at those original instructions, it's a lot more to do with our responsibilities. What are our responsibilities? So yeah, we have the right to self-determination, to govern ourselves, to live in accordance to our own laws within our own homelands, ancestral homelands and territories. But the conversation right now in the social justice, environmental justice, climate justice movements really is shifting more to what are our responsibilities? What are our responsibilities to the water, to the soil? When we look at things like industrial, large-scale industrial farming, when we look at any kind of impacts to the water, when it comes to oil and gas mining or potash mining or any kind of extractive resource that will have an impact on the water, it also refers to any kind of renewable or sustainable or green energies as well and understanding the impact that that could have on say migratory bird patterns, all of these kinds of things to make sure that we are always adhering to these natural laws. But what are our responsibilities? And our responsibilities are also to several generations into the future. So we're not talking about just what is going to make sense for the next four years or until the writ is dropped in the next federal election or what's going to help get the next provincial government elected, it really, really, really truly is about what is going to sustain this long-term. And so some of those league, some of those instructions or natural law, I'll refer to some of them right now. So that's not just some kind of, you know, airy-fairy idea, but it really is rooted in our ceremonial teachings and there's a practical application to all of them. Now, I am going to say that this comes from my experience in ceremony, my experience in sitting down with knowledge keepers and other elders who have very generously shared this information. Many of the people that I sit with and speak with have undergone fasting and sacrificing in order to earn this knowledge of our medicines, of our protocols and those relationships. My husband is a hunter and so we have very strict protocols around when to gather, when to harvest and how to treat that animal, how to treat the plants, when to gather plants. And so these aren't defined by provincial hunting seasons or regulations, these protocols are also nothing that are imposed by the federal government, although we live under Canadian and provincial law that is imposed upon us. But the protocols that we follow really come from these original instructions. So understanding which animals to gather, when to gather plants, how to do it so that it will continue to sustain for many, many generations so that we will always have access to them. So things like clear cutting or just taking more than you need, these really violate our natural laws. And people will often talk about like the law of the land in these legal terms. And my husband and I, we really talk about this phrase a lot because for us when we hear that, when we talk about the law of the land for us, that is what will the ecosystem in which we come from sustain? Because there is no legislating your way out of that. The ecosystem either supports it or it doesn't. And if you do something that violates what it can support, you will pay for that sooner or later. There will be consequences. So in the case of climate change, I often speak about indigenous perspectives on that. And so right now we have scientists, government officials, world organizations that are putting forth their projections, their research and science over many decades to really understand and interpret what is climate change and what are its impacts. I speak from a very spiritual point of view. And in our ceremonies and in our teachings, we were warned of hard times to come. And what a lot of indigenous peoples view climate change as is a consequence of breaking natural law. And this is often referred to as a chinuin or pastahuin where it's a breaking of natural law with severe consequences. And so things like, for example, one of our protocols is to not dig into Mother Earth. So we are not to dig into Mother Earth further than the length of an arm. And the reason for that is we dig into the ground no further than the length of an arm. And that is for the purpose of digging out, say a sweat lodge ceremony pit, or for digging a pit for the center pole in some of our rain, dance, sundance or big lodge ceremonies that we are to dig that deep to ensure that that center tree, that pole can be put in and withstand, but we're not to dig further than that. And the reason is that there are spirits, there are things that live and reside in the ground and that is their place and they are not meant to come up. And so for example, you may have heard the story or the prophecy of the black snake, a Lakota story referring to the black snake coming up and spreading out throughout the land. And this is one way of interpreting pipelines, oil pipelines, oil and gas pipelines. So that is something that within our stories, we have this deeper understanding. So we were warned that to dig deeper than that could bring things up to the surface that we're not meant to reside up here. And some people will poo-poo that and that's fine, but it doesn't change the fact that what you see when you see that these natural laws, when they are broken, when these protocols are broken, when Pastahoin is committed, that there are consequences. And then so we see the ecosystems collapsing, we see animals, the impact on all of these different relatives and all of the life forms that we all are interdependent on. And it's all interconnected. So I often when I'm speaking about these things, it's very difficult for me to stay in a linear description or a linear explanation because everything is so deeply interconnected that we kind of take these little circles and tangents and we'll explore a few ideas and we end up coming around full circle. And it takes a long time to share that. So this is me trying to intend something in 15 minutes, so please ask questions. If there's a point that I've made that you want me to expand on or something that you don't understand because I am going quickly and condensing everything as much as I can to share something that has a lot of depth and significance in just 15 minutes. I have a hard time doing it in my 90 minute presentations, but we at least get a good starting point there. So not to dig deeper than the length of an arm is one of our protocols. So, and because of the consequences that we would face, there are many others too about harvesting, like I mentioned, plants and that kind of thing. So when we look at what's happening in our traditional territories and ancestral lands when it comes to industrial agriculture, oil and gas, potash mining, forestry, so many other elements that so much of modern Canadian society or North American society or world society is in violation of these. And these are the conversations we're having at the community level. So not all indigenous leadership, government are necessarily having these discussions at the tables. Some are, but in our communities, a lot of indigenous peoples are pushing and really challenging our own people to really remember these original instructions when they're making these decisions. And so how does this all relate to UNDRIP and how does this all relate to social justice and environmental justice? And really, when we're talking about truth and reconciliation, for many of us, it's not just about telling the truth of residential schools, it's really telling the truth about the history of these lands, the colonization that has occurred and continues to occur on our lands and what the end game really is. And so really looking at the project of Canada and how did Canada become such a rich country? Of course, through its natural resources, through forestry and gold mining and oil and gas and all of the riches and the farming and all of it, right? Like the riches just come from these lands. And we can start talking about treaty negotiations and how that all came about, but really telling the truth on what is the goal, and for most of us at the grassroots level, what we're seeing and really coming to fully understand is that it is to gather all of the resources until there's no more left. And please tell me and convince me that that's not true because I have really looked hard. I'm of mixed heritage. So my mom is Soto from the El Kofo First Nation from that lake. My dad is Swiss in English. So my paternal grandmother was very English and was very sad when the Maple Leaf was adopted as the flag and really missed the Union Jack and her brother still live in England. So when I speak about colonization and Canada, this is also part of my lineage and my people as well that have come to these lands to extract the resources and to build a very rich nation at the expense of Indigenous peoples' livelihoods and our natural ways. So it's really tricky to talk about these ideas because so many people are looking at, well, legally in these legal structures, what are we going to do? How are we going to generate energy and that kind of thing? The conversation that's really happening at grassroots is how do we get back to this and how do we ensure that our original instructions and natural laws are adhered to in this modern context? And that is why we refer to UNDRIP because it was drafted over a 20-year period by Indigenous peoples from around the world to contribute to this and to really look at what is important to us and what does self-determination look like to us? And so we are still having those conversations and we'll continue to within our communities and not all of our leadership are on board or representative of that just like whichever political party is currently in place at the provincial or federal level doesn't always speak for all Canadians and all policy and that kind of thing so too within our communities we're really grappling with that but in the social justice ecological movement people are really pushing our leadership to understand this and to really put that forward. So that's kind of a nutshell. I do want to leave it there because what I would like to do is expand on the small points that I've made now that you might have a deeper interest in asking me to elaborate on rather than me talking more about say the stories of original instructions or what is the practical application of this? I just wanted to give a few snippets of a few things that I do in my work and the conversations we're having at the grassroots level when it comes to UNDRIP and when it comes to rights versus responsibilities when it comes to decision-making. And I can talk further too on our ideas of reconciliation and what that means. So what I've just mentioned briefly about talking about the truth of the history of Canada and understanding that in game is it looks really plain and simple that our lands and resources and we don't even call them resources like that's even a violation of our natural law to refer to our relatives as resources because that is a violation that we have to understand that they also have rights and that we live in relationship with them. So the idea of having say like dominion over the lands it's really about living in relationship with the land. So this is what we're pushing forward but the thing that as young Indigenous peoples are facing and we'll see more of this as people continue to do marches and go and do activism to get these ideas really in the Canadian consciousness is that there's a lot of despair and dire because it just seems that no matter how much Canada gets Canada wants more, right? And so we had lands reserved for the use of Indians as a legal term. When you look at the Indian Act, when you look at reserves and how they were created and why but that is not our territory, those reserves it is the entire territories in which Canada is living on and mining and extracting it's riches from. And I don't see that stopping. And so we're standing up for the water. I mean, before it was like if we lived in a place where there was a force and they wanted the lumber, they came and got it. And then if there's oil and gas, you come and got it. If there's potash, you come to get it. If that potash mine needs a lot of water, which they do and the water's nearby, you're gonna take it and agricultural lands. And so for us, when we look at these legal frameworks we're trying to find any way we can to stop the onslaught of the Canadian government and settler society to continue to take and take and take from our resources or from our ancestral lands and territories at the expense of our future generations and to continue to commit the pastahowen which is a breaking of natural law. We are literally putting our lives on the line. We are literally standing in the line of pipeline paths to stop those from occurring or to stand up for water that is going to be used for a mining operation nearby or for anything. We are literally putting our lives on the line and we're doing it alone. And so we always implore Canadians and others that have an interest in reconciliation and living on these lands together to stand with us. And so we will refer to items like UNDRIP and say, well, if you're looking to protect and help uphold and recognize indigenous sovereignty, come and stand with us but also write letters and demand from your legal representatives of your country to implement these types of agreements. And as Sonny had referred to, of it being more aspirational as opposed to legally binding, it would be really nice to see Canadians start to look at these tools and documents as a way to help protect what little lands we have left for our future generations. I'm gonna leave it there, but please ask me more questions on the specific areas that I touched on so that I can expand on them a bit more and make a little more sense to you, I hope. Hey, well, thank you both, Sonia and Michelle, thank you, Sonia, for illustrating that UNDRIP is something that's accessible to all Canadians, to all of us and has a lot of power to it, both collectively and personally. I was excited when you named it as a movement. I thought that's a very powerful word to put behind this document. And thank you very much to Michelle, who explained to us how natural laws are paramount and really UNDRIP is just a building upon those natural laws and that with that comes a responsibility and there have been consequences as we've not followed those as a culture. So at this time, we're going to take some questions and I'm going to ask you to use the chat function which you will see at the bottom of your screen and those questions are going to show up in the queue. So there are many of us, there was 160 or more that registered for this event. So I cannot guarantee that all of your questions will get answered, but I will do my best to triage those and we'll take about 18 minutes or so to do that. So whenever you're ready, please start sharing your questions there in the queue and address them to either Sonia or to Michelle or both of them. Myron, I see in earlier a question that was posted during Michelle's talk from your Daniels, I think. The question was for Michelle saying whether she could elaborate on her idea of reconciliation and the end game, for all seeing that earlier. Sure, yeah, I can do that. So my husband and I, the more we learn and go down this path of ceremony and research of all sorts of things from the Doctrine of Discovery to most recent Canadian legislation or when you look at say in 2012 when the omnibus bills were pushed through the federal government and I don't know more had sprung up in response to that, that my viewpoints tend to be quite radical and full of despair. So what do I mean by kind of reconciliation in the end game? So I was interviewed recently, I think for Briar Patch Magazine about kind of this whole idea of decolonizing the environmental movement or climate action response. And the way I see it is that, yeah, Canada, the English who have colonized many, many, many parts of the world and that old phrase of the sun ever sets on the British Empire really went out and conquered lands and the peoples in which habited those lands and subdued them. And so I am under no illusions that Canada has any kind of a real intention of reconciliation. Reconciliation really is both the land who occupies the land, who has the power and who makes decisions over it. So one of the big concerns people have often about say something like UNDRIP is a fear of do indigenous nations then have veto over decisions or will we hold Canadians hostage when it comes to any kind of resource development or extractive industry that is interpreted as necessary and needed for our energy usage and for future development. And so reconciliation isn't to me and to many people that I speak with about say just making amends for the residential school era. Really, I do a lot of work in indigenous food sovereignty and looking at the history. So that's really if you look at that when you look at say reading James Dash textbook Clearing the Plains. If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it. If you have, you'll know what I'm speaking about on what the intent was. So John A. McDonald has been recorded in the Hans artist saying that we are starving the Indians to subdue them. And it was really for the railroad, right? To push a railroad through to stop the Americans from coming up and reaching manifest destiny. So they needed the Canadians needed to put in a railroad to really stop that from happening quickly and indigenous nations were in the way. And so they needed to remove us very quickly. And so they did that by targeting the bison. And that was the one of the first genocides was our Buffalo relatives, the bison relatives were slaughtered. They were hunted down and slaughtered for a very specific purpose to clear some of the planes. We were then incarcerated on reserves and not allowed to leave and kept there. And then our children were stolen for many generations in order to strip us of our culture. And then now you look at the boil water advisories and you look at the poverty that our people are living in within our own homelands and territories and how vast that is. And when you look at the impacts of climate change then which I see as a direct result of colonization because colonization was about gaining power over these lands to build empire essentially to build these societies and for its own purposes and not for the benefit for all the people in the land, for its own people. So for not for the indigenous peoples of the land and you will see that in Australia and New Zealand which of course didn't sign on to UNDRIP initially. And there's a lot of similarities with colonization there. And so when we talk about reconciliation it's not just about like, hey you stole our languages and our culture from our and stole our children. It's you stole every element of our land. Indigenous peoples are living in a post-apocalyptic time. Everything that gave us all of life to thrive was violently stolen from us. And this is not in the past. It is still happening now. All you need to do is look at BC and the Wetsueten and looking at those who are trying to revive our traditional and cultural ways of governing. And to see that the, in one sentence, Justin Trudeau is saying that there's no relationship more important to him than those of with indigenous peoples and that he's going to uphold and implement UNDRIP. And then in the next hand, he's buying a pipeline that a lot of people have said no to. Now granted, I know a lot of indigenous communities have said yes to this. And that is what we're grappling with in our communities because it does commit Pasahau when it goes against those natural laws. So there is some trouble with that. But kind of what is the end game to me is getting all of the resources and keeping all of the power. Whoever controls the land has all the power and I don't see Canadians ever, ever giving up power over the land. They will allow us to do things in our own traditional territories and ancestral home lands or work with us as long as it still adheres to the project of Canada, which is to use all the resources for its benefit and not in a way that would adhere. So I don't see anybody really doing a nation to nation relationship. Those are empty words. And so for us, if you read the books of say, oh, what's his first name? Is it Arthur? Arthur Manuel? Anyway, there's several books and I'll share them afterwards. Maybe they can be shared, but you read books say like Thomas King and the Inconvenient Indian or Arthur Manuel's books. Really about, Canada needs to be clear on what it's doing here, which is to build its society on the lands and it will, I don't think it will ever be in proper relationship with indigenous peoples because I've never seen anybody say what Justin Trudeau did. In the history of, I've never heard a politician say the right things. He said all the right things and he's still, we still got screwed even though, there was hope. So I've really lost a lot of hope when it comes to that, but there's a prophecy that, and there's been a lot of dreams that people have shared within our ceremonies of people coming for the last of the water and indigenous peoples, groups of people cowering and trying to protect the little that we have left. And that's why we're standing in the paths of pipelines. That's why Big Maw fishermen are risking their lives out on the waters because it'll never stop. It'll never stop. And I refer people to UNDRIP, but I don't think that legal documents gonna stop it. I think that's why people are putting their lives on the line. So I just think that the project of Canada is all about getting all the natural resources for riches and I don't think they're gonna uphold indigenous livelihoods or sovereignty. I'm sorry, sometimes I'm not very popular. Thanks, thanks very much Michelle. You're welcome. I get twice people to tell me to do that too. I'll put together a couple of questions here that we'll go to Sonia. And they're perhaps summarized the best here and a question from Mervyn Russell, who asks, does UNDRIP give indigenous peoples of veto? Is the BC government now legally bound to act according to UNDRIP? And could you perhaps Sonia as well, just comment a little bit on some of the challenges around free prior and informed consent and how that has been, so how some of those rulings have been changed by UNDRIP? Yeah, sure, I'm happy to do that. I also saw that there was a question here, someone said, I heard you said that UNDRIP is not recognized in Canadian law, but I thought that the court challenge regarding the trans-mountain pipeline resulted in the court holding that Canada hadn't fulfilled its obligation to free prior and informed consent. So I think all of those questions kind of deal with a bit of a tension in the law that we have. So right now, there is, which you've all probably heard, section 35 requires the crown, whether it be federal or provincial crown, whenever they're going to take an action or make a decision that has the potential to adversely impact Aboriginal or treaty rights that are either established or asserted, there is a duty to consult and accommodate. And that duty to consult was established by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2004 and 2005 in a trilogy of cases. It was Taku River, Haida Nation and Mikasukri and basically those three cases, sorry, I have a bit of a crazy dog here. Those three cases essentially still govern what the duty to consult and accommodate is. And one of the things that the Supreme Court said is that there is no veto in relation to consultation. So while governments have to sit down and if they have a duty to consult, the Supreme Court has said that there is no veto. When we look at the UN Drip, it very clearly says that anytime government is going to be doing something that adversely impacts that indigenous people should be given free, prior and informed consent. And so you've got attention here between domestic law and what the UN Drip says. And so Trans Mountain, the court really said Canada had breached its duty to consult, but the Canadian courts don't consider free, prior and informed consent to be part of the crown's duty to consult. So with British Columbia, we have now a situation where the province has enshrined meet the UN declaration within its legislation. And they say that they're going to act in accordance with the UN Drip. But again, the difficulty that we have here is that what is free, prior and informed consent? And when you look at what Canada says, what Canada says that we're going to seek consensus or we're going to work together to try to seek free, prior and informed consent. The UN Drip doesn't say that at all. The UN Drip just says free, prior and informed consent. So you've got again this tension. And it'll be interesting to watch to see, how will the British Columbia government interpret it? British Columbia as many of you know, have a lot of outstanding Aboriginal title lands where the court does give consent over those lands. The law isn't nearly as generous when it comes to the number of treaties and treaties covering under the natural resources transfer agreement where those governments, they easily come to the table saying no veto whatsoever. And so when we're in consultation cases, certainly every time we have a chance to litigate, we're going to advance arguments that consultation, which is a section 35 obligation, needs to be interpreted in light of the UN Drip, which requires free, prior and informed consent. And so that's the argument that we're moving and trying to go forward with, but it hasn't yet been accepted. And certainly I think it's something out there and there's a lot of fear tactics around free, prior and informed consent, which I think really are really overblown. I think it's a matter that government should come to the table and work with indigenous governments, to find a way to work together and govern together and find a way to respect indigenous law. And I think Michelle makes an excellent point. I'm here today, I'm a practitioner of the law, but of Canadian law, but there's a whole nother area of indigenous law. And I really see where the courts are going is that, the courts have recognized that there's indigenous law, but they're very resistant to grappling with how Canadian law interacts with indigenous law. And I think that's the next stage of where we're headed. And I really see power in the recognition of indigenous law as its own legal form and finding ways for parties in Canada to work together so that there's equal recognition of both sets of laws, which are extremely important. I think Michelle really, she talks about these laws are, while they are indigenous laws, as someone who practices Canadian law, you really see that they benefit not just indigenous communities, but they really benefit all Canadians. And there's so much to learn about these types of laws. And I feel like, although indigenous people have had these laws since time immemorial, you know, we as settlers are really just being introduced to the power of those laws. So I'm excited for that. Well, thank you, Sanya, for introducing that intersection that it sounds like we're heading to where indigenous law will begin to interact with Canadian law, which is very hopeful. We'll take an earlier question here, which goes towards Michelle asking, does the assembly of First Nations represent your concerns that you mentioned here today to the federal government from your perspective? Right, I mean, sometimes it can and sometimes it can't. Just like the Trudeau government may represent your concerns currently, or it may not, or the Harper government and the conservatives when they were in power may have represented your concerns and not. And maybe it can represented the concerns of some Canadians, but not all Canadians. So such as the same with the Assembly of First Nations will represent the desires and needs of some and not of others because of course we have very rich and diverse communities ourselves and we're not all in agreement, right? So even within our own smaller community, of course whoever gets voted in as leadership may or may not represent all of those people. So I mean, but yet I, so no, and the current leader, I'm deeply disappointed in, very deeply disappointed in, but and have with other leaders within that position too. But I still think it's a vital organization that we do have a voice at that level to speak on our behalf collectively. I think it's an important tool for those relationships. However, sometimes it can be very disappointing and discouraging because the current leadership or their policies, they don't represent all of us just like no single provincial or municipal or federal government ever represents the desires and needs of all Canadians as well. However, I'm still glad it's there as well as the provincial groups as well. What I would like to see, I mean, they're in the Assembly of First Nations what I would like to see and it would be difficult to do is to see representation based on say treaty territory or ancestral territory. So for example, in Saskatchewan there's the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations which deals with the Saskatchewan government. However, when you look at say treaty six or treaty four I mean, I don't know how that would work but there's been a lot of talk even with indigenous climate action and how we operate in a kind of a decolonized or going back to kind of really how would what would make sense and who would speak on our behalf and it would be challenging for say somebody from the AFN just like it is for a prime minister to meet the needs of people in the Atlantic Territories and in BC because those needs are still vastly different to have blanket policies covered all which again, which is why we always go back to natural laws and ecosystems because what's gonna work in one region won't work in the other but how do you get a coherent policy or position put forth when you're trying to represent so many vast differences is really challenging. So we often go back to our what are our traditional forms of governance because they had structures and systems and protocols put in place that best did meet the needs of the collective balancing the needs of an individual with the greater needs of the collective. So I'm always very interested in the governance structure and the File Hills Capel Tribal Council in treaty four territory in the Capel Valley they are undertaking some governance revamping right now and they're really showing some leadership they're working from somebody down from the United States as well as a palmeter on how to draft these. So I'm interested to see how governance will change and how we can have these organizations better represent our people. Well, thanks Michelle for helping us to reimagine some of our colonial structures and giving us some concrete ideas for moving forward. So we're going to go back to Amanda now and thank you to both of you once again. Amanda is going to offer us some possibilities for action which we can take. So thank you again. Thanks, Myron. And yes, now we're all so inspired and equipped around the strength of UNDRIP as a tool from a legal perspective from a political and advocacy perspective and how could we as folks who want to support the strengthening of UNDRIP and want to support indigenous sovereignty in Ireland how could we move forward and support that? So the action item that we're offering to the group is the work that Mennonite Central Committee is doing and inviting all of us into around the UNDRIP being put into federal legislation. I'm sharing, sorry, I'm attempting to share the link here. Two MCC's page. Thanks Mark, yeah, there's a couple links there that you'd be able to pursue. Now, this campaign is reflective of MCC's longstanding work on indigenous justice issues and participation in related coalitions. MCC had a campaign last year and urging the federal government to pass Bill 262 which called on constituents and the public to send letters to the federal minister of justice and our own MPs. And the campaign had by far the highest amount of public engagement of any advocacy campaign that MCC has ever facilitated. Hundreds of letters were sent reflective of the poem that Kairos has shared with us about the gnats and being the gnats in the ear of empire. This campaign truly has been that. Now, after their liberals were reelected last year, MCC launched this campaign, urging the government to live up to its election promise, to put UNDRIP into law and using Bill 262 as the floor, not the ceiling as Mark was saying before. Another letter writing campaign has been initiated and is available at this link. We're all able to, there's a button that you can press where you can send a message to the minister of justice and relevant ministers as well as your own MP. There's draft wording there, but of course that's something that you can add to our change. Now, in this advocacy, it's acknowledged that there are a few barriers. Both COVID-19 and the minority parliament posed challenges to the quick introduction and passage of this proposed legislation. However, public dialogue on systemic racism, along with the ongoing impacts of COVID-19 on indigenous communities, underlined the urgency of measures to protect indigenous rights in law. The good public engagement work done around Bill 262 has facilitated a groundswell of support. The bill had the wide support of indigenous communities, was the subject of extensive debate in a parliamentary committee, including testimony from 71 witnesses and had the active support of many faith and civil society groups. Now, MCC is an active member of an ecumenical coalition on UNDRIP and a representative on that coalition is from the office of the federal minister of justice. So we have some insider info about what's happening in Ottawa right now. The federal government has just concluded consultations on UNDRIP with key stakeholders. This includes the mining and petroleum industries who are supportive of UNDRIP and legislation. There are also constructive conversations happening between the ministries of justice and indigenous services previously, INAC, both responsible for the implementation of the UNDRIP legislation if and when it passes. Now, it is expected that the UNDRIP legislation will be tabled by the government by the second week of December. And that's why this campaign and today's conversation is so timely and relevant. It is hoped that royal assent could be attained by early 2021. And the idea is to have it finalized in advance of a possible spring election. Now is the time for us to make our voices heard on this issue. MPs need to know that this is a priority for Canadians and we wanna see the same kind of engagement and the same raising of voices as we saw around Bill C-262. Now, the web link that we shared speaks to the rationale for supporting UNDRIP legislation. I mean, of course, we heard such strong rationale today. We'll just add that it's responsive to the TRC calls to action 43, 48 and 49. It affirms the justiciability of indigenous rights and beyond ensuring the human rights of indigenous peoples and that they are as respected and honored in Canada, serving as a framework for meaningful reconciliation action. So again, as I mentioned, if you visit the site, you get information about the campaign and then the send a message function allows you to send a message to the federal minister of justice, relevant ministers and your MP. So we would encourage everyone to engage in this and to also share the link with your churches and networks. At our second session for this event on Tuesday evening, we'll be chatting more about action that we can take and engagement. So I expect us to have more space at that time to talk about this campaign and other steps we can take to support UNDRIP in Canada. And now I think we're closing, moving towards the close of our time together. We only have about four minutes. And so before we close, I'd like to introduce Shannon Newfeld for some Kairos announcements. Thank you very much, Amanda. I will try to be brief, although I want to come cover a number of different topics. It's so great to have everyone here. I have just put a number of links into the chat and I will explain them as in a moment. Another piece that is available, another new resource is Regarding the Season of Epiphany, which has both some wonderful personal reflections on the scriptures from a variety of different denominations and folks from across the country. And as well as a whole lot of worship resources that could be used in church settings but could also be used in meetings or for personal devotions. And you're invited to check that out. I wanted to give you a very quick update from the Kairos Blanket Exercise just to let you know that a virtual Kairos Blanket Exercise is in the works. Those of us on staff have had a chance to be in a pilot session and very soon this will be available to groups who are wanting to book blanket exercises but not wanting to do it in person because of the pandemic. Another exciting new program is a time of teaching and sharing circles with a group of elders and knowledge keepers. Those have been wildly successful and are full for 2020 but to let you know that there will be more of them in 2021 and to watch for those as well. And just to close to say that we covet your support in so many ways. We appreciate your participation in events like this and we also ask for your prayers, your thoughts, your advocacy, your letter writing whether that's to the newspapers or to the governments and we welcome your donations. So thank you for your support in so many different ways. Thank you, Shannon. And to close our time together, I'll introduce another member of our planning committee, Dan Beverage, who is a convener of the Kairos Regina group and has a long association with Kairos. He's a retired university educator and longtime resident of Regina. So thank you, Dan, for closing us today. Hi, thanks, Amanda. So on behalf of the Kairos and Prairies North Event Planning Committee, I'm pleased to give thanks. First of all, thank you to Elder Diane and our speakers today, Sonia and Michelle, for sharing your wisdom, your perspective, your knowledge to help us to gain a better understanding of this topic and to lead us to engage more fully in the issue. And to all of you who are participating today by Zoom in this event, thanks very much for participating and making our event possible. I also wish to express thanks, well, I guess we owe some of this to technology. So it's good we're able to get together with Zoom. I express gratitude that at a time when in some places public discussion of human rights issues might be uncomfortable, forbidden or even dangerous. And in a way, we can be thankful that we are able to talk about these things as freely as we have been. And finally, I acknowledge those who have worked over the decades to bring this matter to its present state. As Mark has referred to, this UN Drip didn't just happen overnight. This was a result of struggle. So we look forward to your returning on Tuesday. And I wish you good afternoon and good evening.