Minister Miller, in a December 7, 2020, letter, former premier Joe Savikataaq of Nunavut wrote to your colleague Minister Wilkinson, who was Minister of Environment and Climate Change at the time. In it, he said:

The [Government of Nunavut] . . . respectfully insists that, until we have achieved a devolution agreement and an offshore oil and gas agreement, that Nunavut lands and waters not be used to meet these targets.

— referring to Canada’s 2030 conservation targets.

During the Nunavut Land Use Planning Commission hearings on the Draft Nunavut Land Use Plan, which were held in Cambridge Bay just last week, the Kitikmeot Inuit Association reminded those present that, under the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement, the regional Inuit associations decide who has access to and what activities can occur on Inuit lands. However, despite these interventions, federal departments continue to engage with communities directly on targeted efforts to create new conservation areas in Nunavut, circumventing both the GN, and, in the case of Talurjuaq’s proposed area, the Kitikmeot Inuit Association. In fact, DFO paid to charter —

I know where he was going, Madam Speaker.

This is a complicated question, and clearly the issue of devolution is top of mind. I would say, as an update, that there has been some strong progress in the last little while. I don’t like to put the cart ahead of the horse, but we’re close on a number of elements.

You mentioned earlier the work that we’re doing with the Inuit-Crown Partnership. One of those was the Inuit Nunangat Policy to make sure that we are actually putting our best foot forward and reminding ourselves internally in the government of our relationship with Inuit, as opposed to Inuit spending the time re-educating others — whether it’s the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, lands and resources or the Department of National Defence — of their obligations and treaty obligations.

When you fold into that the discussion about the territory, and particularly Nunavut, it gets a little more complicated. It is fraught with, obviously, internal politics, and respecting those relationships where the government has to tread a careful path when it comes to creating new areas. I don’t think anyone is in any disagreement with creating protected spaces, but it’s something that has to be done in the spirit of respectful engagement. I don’t think any voices should be left unaccounted for when it comes to that, but you do often see departments tripping over themselves.

Hopefully, if there’s a success or a measure of success of the new Inuit Nunangat Policy that came into effect only a few months ago, it will be whether the departments that aren’t seized of Inuit relations all the time actually respect what is in that policy.