Third ReadingMackenzie Valley Resource Management ActGovernment Orders
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Mr. Speaker, I have found it very interesting that as the Liberals have been debating this particular bill, they only pay attention to half of the bill, and that is the half related to the water board issue. They are completely silent on the very important second half, which is a direct paradox to consultation and collaboration. It is where the government is taking the power onto itself, in terms of placing moratoriums through Governor in Council, through the executive branch, for very vague national interest reasons.
I would ask my colleague to ignore part A in his answer, but look at Bill C-69, Bill C-48, the letter that was sent yesterday from the premier of his territory and part B of this bill, and tell us if he believes that the government is acting in the best interests of his territory.
Michael McLeod Liberal Northwest Territories, NT
Mr. Speaker, I would like to correct the hon. member. There are not only two parts to this piece of legislation. There are actually three. The first part is referring to the superboard. The second part contains the eight regulatory items that were brought forward by the previous Conservative government that I think everybody agreed to and were focused on. When the bill came forward it had the superboard attachment. In Bill C-88, we have a further piece which is the Canadian Petroleum Resources Act. I believe that is the part the member is referring to.
We heard loud and clear from the Premier of the Northwest Territories when he appeared as a witness in front of the indigenous affairs committee. The member was chairing the meeting so she was there when he said he appreciated how well the negotiations were going. There are negotiations that are happening with the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation and the Government of the Northwest Territories and the federal government that will bring oversight and co-management abilities on the Beaufort Sea. This is a piece that was ignored by the previous Conservative government. The Conservative government would not put the Beaufort Sea discussions on the table.
I find it very surprising when members are concerned about how we react to the discussions on the Beaufort Sea when the previous Conservative government would not include it. Neither would it include the Norman Wells oil fields, two cash cows that generate revenue. They were left out. They were not part of the deal. The Conservative government would not let them put these items on the table, but our government has.
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech.
He probably already knows that the NDP will be supporting Bill C-88, which fixes some of the mistakes made by the previous government.
We agree on the broad principles and the fact that the people of the Northwest Territories should have the right to manage their own affairs and govern themselves when it comes to assessments and respect for the environment.
I do, however, have one simple question. My colleague, and all other members of the Liberal government, voted to support the bill that states that we must respect and include the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in every piece of Canadian legislation. Unfortunately, it has not been included in Bill C-88. I would like to know why.
Mr. Speaker, I would argue that this is UNDRIP in action. This includes all of the indigenous governments in the regulatory process. Every government that has agreed to and signed on to the land claim agreements is involved in the regulatory process in the Northwest Territories. Fifty per cent of the seats are guaranteed for indigenous people. We have a resource revenue-sharing component in the Northwest Territories. I do not think any other jurisdiction has that, a revenue-sharing component for indigenous people. They get 20% of the Government of Northwest Territories' share.
This is the best example we could have when it comes to inclusion of indigenous people. I think it is a model that other jurisdictions, including the hon. member's province, could look at using. Other countries have come to look at how we operate and how we include indigenous people. They see it as a very good model that we should share with other jurisdictions.
Larry Bagnell Liberal Yukon, YT
Mr. Speaker, a lot of the debate has been technical, but I want to ask a more spiritual question.
When you make a treaty with first nations, like the treaties with the Sahtu, the Deh Cho and the Gwich'in, there is a trust there. They trust that the government will at least follow the treaty and it will keep its word.
Then, how does it feel when we pass a law in this Parliament that breaks the treaty, that is unlawful, that does not follow the rules of a treaty? This is not the first time it has happened in our history, obviously. I certainly think you would have strong feelings on this.
The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan
I would remind the hon. member to direct his comments to the Chair.
The hon. member for Northwest Territories.
Mr. Speaker, it took many years to get to the point where the management and decision-making around resource development in the Northwest Territories could be agreed to in the form of the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act. The government of the day agreed to it, signed on to it, only to renege a couple of years later, saying it was going to make changes, while not consulting with anybody. A consultant was brought in from Alberta, a consultant who specialized in oil and gas and knew nothing about land claims or self-government or any kind of legislation in that area.
I think it shattered the trust of all the indigenous people who were involved with the Mackenzie Valley resource management boards and also the people who were involved in the creation of the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act. It has taken a long time. People wonder why it has taken so long to bring Bill C-88 back to the table. We had to deal with the trust factor. We had to convince indigenous people that we were serious and that we were not going to do what the previous government did, and that we were going to sort out all the issues before we got here.
Now, every indigenous government that has a role in the Mackenzie Valley boards supports this legislation. They have taken out ads in newspapers stating that they support it. The Government of Northwest Territories supports it. Industry supports it. It provides reassurance that they know the process and everybody is comfortable with it.
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
Mr. Speaker, I have travelled with the member to his territory a couple of times, and I know how important it is to him that the residents of his riding have access to employment opportunities. I know that is important to him and to the people of the Northwest Territories.
In his remarks and in general in the debate on this, there has been heavy criticism of Bill C-15 from the previous Parliament. Neither of us was in the previous Parliament. Is the member aware that his party voted for Bill C-15, the bill that the Liberals are now describing as this terrible, poor bill that needed to be undone by the government?
Mr. Speaker, I am aware that Bill C-15 was a Conservative bill that really shattered the confidence of the indigenous people in the Northwest Territories.
It was a bill that never should have come forward. It is a bill that we are trying to correct today. There is an opportunity for my honoured colleague from across the way, who I travel with most weekends to return home, to support this bill. He has the opportunity to stand up now and support Bill C-88. I would appreciate it if he would do so. I think he knows the bill. He knows how important it is to the Northwest Territories. I think he is quite supportive of indigenous governments and resource development.
This would provide reassurance. I would ask the member to stand up and support this bill. Let us clear up some of the wrongdoings from the past.
Mr. Speaker, I have noticed a pattern with the government. It consults when it feels like it. In the case of the tanker moratorium, in the case of the northern gateway project, and in the case of the Beaufort Sea moratorium, there was no consultation. How does the member align that with his words about consultation around this bill, when clearly there are many times when the government has utterly failed in that area?
Mr. Speaker, the member fails to point out that the moratorium was only on new exploration licences in federal waters. She does not point out the fact that there was no activity. There were no applications in sight. Historically, over the five years prior to that, it was $7 million. There is no economic boom if they are only going to find $7 million spent in the Northwest Territories as a whole on oil and gas. Therefore, there was a natural moratorium.
Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise tonight to speak to Bill C-88, an act to amend the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act and the Canada Petroleum Resources Act.
Once again, this bill, like many other bills we have seen in the House, is being debated and rushed through Parliament in the last few days before the House rises for the summer. It is worth noting that this is a bill that was only studied in our committee on indigenous and northern affairs for one meeting before we went into clause-by-clause consideration. As a result, we were unable to hear live testimony from stakeholders such as the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers and the Northwest Territories Chamber of Commerce.
We have recently seen these legislative delays with other important bills, such as Bill C-92, which was passed at third reading in this House just last week, on June 3. It is totally unacceptable that the Liberals have so utterly mismanaged their legislative schedule when it comes to the bills that are now before us, days before we rise.
Bill C-88 is a bill that forms part of a long Liberal saga to kill natural resources development in this country. The bill would amend subsection 12(1) of the Canada Petroleum Resources Act to allow the Governor in Council to arbitrarily ban any oil and gas activity across the Arctic offshore. Under this bill, the government would only need to invoke the national interest to ban oil and gas development in the Beaufort Sea. However, the term “national interest” remains undefined in this bill, so the government would have complete discretion to decide when it should ban oil and gas activities in the Arctic offshore. These opportunities for greater economic prosperity in the north would therefore be limited and controlled by the ministers here in Ottawa. Again, under the current government, Ottawa knows best.
We have already seen the Liberals reveal their paternalism when it comes to economic opportunities for northern communities. We just have to go back to December 2016. While the Prime Minister was in Washington, D.C., he announced that there would be a moratorium on offshore oil and gas development in the Beaufort Sea. No, he was not up in northern Canada. He was, in fact, meeting with President Obama in Washington.
There was absolutely no consultation with the Government of Northwest Territories before this moratorium was announced in Washington. In fact, the territorial leaders of the day were given less than half an hour's notice before the Prime Minister declared the moratorium, in the United States, the farthest destination away from northern Canada.
By single-handedly introducing a moratorium on oil and gas development in the Beaufort Sea, the Liberals are telling northern communities that Ottawa knows best. The Liberals are saying, through their actions, that northerners do not have the right to pursue their own economic opportunities without the approval of the current federal government.
We heard from multiple witnesses in committee about the devastating impact the Liberals' moratorium has had on northerners. Wally Schumann, the minister of industry, tourism and investment and the minister of infrastructure for the Northwest Territories, said the following about the moratorium:
I guess we can be very frank because we're in front of the committee.
When it first came out, we never got very much notice on the whole issue of the moratorium and the potential that was in the Beaufort Sea. There were millions and millions, if not billions, of dollars in bid deposits and land leases up there. That took away any hope we had of developing the Beaufort Sea.
We also heard from Merven Gruben, the mayor of Tuktoyaktuk. He was very disappointed with the Liberal decision to unilaterally impose this moratorium on northerners. He was very concerned about the effects this ban would have on the people of his community. He said:
It's so easy to sit down here and make judgments on people and lives that are some 3,500 klicks away, and make decisions on our behalf, especially with that moratorium on the Beaufort. That should be taken away, lifted, please and thank you. That is going to open up and give jobs to our people—training and all the stuff we're wishing for.
Unfortunately, the Liberals are not listening to the voices, again, of the northerners, and as a result, communities are paying the price now for the Liberal government's arrogance. There is absolutely no doubt that Bill C-88 is just another attempt by the Liberal government to polarize oil and gas extraction in this country. It explains the power of cabinet to block economic development and adds to the ever-increasing levels of bureaucratic red tape that need to be navigated by proponents of energy development.
The bill makes northern energy development more difficult by increasing the obstacles that must be overcome by energy proponents before they can even put shovels in the ground.
In response to these polarized anti-energy provisions, many stakeholders have voiced their concerns. One of the numerous stakeholders that want to see the Governor in Council power to ban oil and gas development removed finally from the bill is the Northwest Territories Chamber of Commerce. It has written submissions to our committee. The chamber indicated its opposition to the final authority of the Governor in Council to ban northern oil and gas development.
The chamber wrote to us as follows:
The final decision needs to be approved by the Indigenous Nation of the prescribed area who are the steward's of the area but also rely on the land to provide economic independence to their membership and throughout the NT.
Of course, in pushing through Bill C-88 without any amendments, the Liberals have demonstrated that they do not care about the opinions and concerns of our northern communities, which will be deeply affected by this piece of legislation. These northern voices are once again being ignored by the Liberal government.
Another important stakeholder that expressed really serious concerns about Bill C-88 was the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation. Unfortunately, like the Northwest Territories Chamber of Commerce, the IRC was not afforded the opportunity at all to present live testimony to our committee, because, as I mentioned before, we were only given one day to hear from witnesses on this very important matter.
Again, the Liberals rushed the process. It was the result of the Liberals' mismanagement of the parliamentary agenda and a consequence of the fact that the Liberals left this bill to the very last minute for deliberations.
Like so many other crucial stakeholders, the IRC is opposed to the unilateral power to ban oil and gas development in the Arctic offshore, which the bill gives to the Governor in Council.
It is hardly surprising that the IRC is against the arbitrary power given to politicians here in Ottawa to determine the fate of energy development in the north. Bill C-88 says that the Governor in Council can ban oil and gas development projects when “it is in the national interests to do so”. However, does Bill C-88 tell us what the national interest is? Does Bill C-88 tell northern communities what the national interest is? No, of course not.
Like so many other Liberal anti-energy policies, questions of the national interests are only for the Liberals to decide and nobody else. The bill is simply a reinforcement of the arrogant mantra that the Liberals know best.
Given that the IRC was not given the opportunity to offer live testimony on this discussion on Bill C-88, I would like to read into the record some of the serious concerns the IRC highlighted in its written submission to our committee.
First of all, it bears noting that the IRC is an organization that was created way back in 1984 to manage the settlement that formed part of the Inuvialuit Final Agreement, better known as the IFA. The Inuvialuit occupy the Inuvialuit Settlement Area, or the ISR, and beyond.
The IFA was the first comprehensive land claim agreement settled north of the 60th parallel and only the second settled in Canada's history.
Why was this land claim agreement so important for Inuvialuit people, and why did they initiate the negotiations with the Government of Canada? In the IRC's own words, the land claim negotiations “came in response to our limited influence in increasing development activity on our lands and the vast marine areas of the ISR.”
In the short term, then, the Inuvialuit secured a land claim agreement, in part, so that they could have greater influence over development activities on their own lands.
With this background in mind, the IRC has written about its serious reservations with regard to the power the bill would give to Ottawa to declare oil and gas moratoriums on IRC lands. In fact, the IRC already saw the Prime Minister declare a moratorium in a significant portion of their settlement region when the Liberals were first elected to power in 2016. In regard to this ban, the IRC wrote,
it is important to note that the imposition of the Moratorium by the Prime Minister was done without consultation with any Inuvialuit in contravention of the IFA and with the framework established and the promises made under the Northwest Territories Lands and Resources Devolution Agreement.
The Liberals simply seized the opportunity in 2016 to unilaterally implement a moratorium on oil and gas in the north while the Prime Minister, as I mentioned before, was not even in this country. He was in the United States of America looking for photo ops and free publicity. The Liberals did not consult at all with stakeholders before they took on this decision. What is worse, instead of apologizing to many of the northern communities that are suffering because of this moratorium, the Liberals are going full steam ahead with Bill C-88, as we see tonight, to ensure that they can unilaterally put bans on northern oil and gas development again and again.
Bill C-88 says that the Governor in Council can make these bans when it is in the national interest to do so. The IRC and Conservatives would like to know what the Liberals mean when they say “in the national interest”.
The IRC had the following to say on the issue of the national interest:
The national interest criterion is problematic as it elevates the national priorities of the day vis-à-vis Inuvialuit priorities within our traditional territory. It would be akin to an appropriation a constituent might experience in the south without any restitution from the government. Bill C-88 does not define national interest or incorporate an express requirement to consider how the national interest ought to be balanced against the ability of rights holders to provide for their economic future.
Despite these concerns from indigenous stakeholders in the north, the Liberals have demonstrated repeatedly, through their anti-energy policies, that they have no intention at all of ever balancing their vision of the national interest against the views of indigenous groups that do not share the Liberals' hostile attitude toward natural resource development.
Unfortunately, Bill C-88 is not the only bill the Liberals have pushed forward, to the detriment of the indigenous communities across this country. We have just heard from indigenous communities about the real concerns they have about Bill C-69, the Liberal environmental assessment act.
Stephen Buffalo, the president and CEO of the Indian Resource Council and a member of the Samson Cree Nation, said:
Indigenous communities are on the verge of a major economic breakthrough, one that finally allows Indigenous people to share in Canada's economic prosperity. Bill C-69 will stop this progress in its tracks.
Roy Fox, chief of the Kainai or Blood tribe first nation, said the following about Bill C-69:
...I and the majority of Treaty 7 chiefs strongly oppose the bill for its likely devastating impact on our ability to support our community members, as it would make it virtually impossible for my nation to fully benefit from the development of our energy resources.
Bill C-48, the northern B.C. oil tanker ban, is yet another Liberal anti-energy bill that the Liberals have rammed through this Parliament against the wishes of major indigenous stakeholders. Bill C-48 shuts the door to the Eagle Spirit pipeline proposal, an energy corridor that is supported by over 35 first nations and is an indigenous-led and indigenous-owned initiative. It is a $17-billion project that has the potential to provide economic opportunity to numerous indigenous communities. However, as with Bill C-88, this one tonight, Bill C-48 is another Liberal anti-energy bill that is both hurtful and patronizing to indigenous communities. Bill C-48 is another example of the Liberal government here in Ottawa telling indigenous communities that they cannot pursue their own natural resource development when it does not suit the interests of the Liberal agenda of the day.
Indigenous communities are tired of the paternalism that has been constantly demonstrated toward them by this anti-energy Liberal government. The chair and president of Eagle Spirit Energy, Calvin Helin, who is a member of the Lax Kw'alaams First Nation, had the following to say about the viewpoint of the 35 first nations that are in favour of the Eagle Spirit pipeline. He said that these first nations “do not like outsiders, particularly those they view as trust-fund babies, coming into the traditional territories they've governed and looked after for over 10,000 years and dictating government policy in their territory.”
However, the Liberals clearly do not think that these indigenous viewpoints are part of the current government's idea of a national interest, so they choose to ignore these voices. As a result of Liberal indifference to the concerns of these indigenous groups, in 2018 the chiefs council for the Eagle Spirit pipeline had to launch a GoFundMe campaign just to help pay legal costs in a court challenge to Bill C-48. The Eagle Spirit project noted the sad state of affairs by stating that this action is required to be taken by Canada's poorest people against a federal justice department with unlimited resources. Other indigenous groups have either filed lawsuits or are planning to do so pending the legislative fate of Bill C-48.
Sadly, the Liberals again did not listen to these indigenous voices then, and they are not listening to the indigenous voices in our northern communities today. It is glaringly clear that all the Liberals care about is the pursuit of their anti-energy policies at all costs. However, the cost is a very real human cost to the ability of northern communities to be in control of their own economic development opportunities.
The Liberals have promised time and time again to work with northerners. With only days left now in this Parliament, when will the Liberals finally live up to this promise?
Labrador Newfoundland & Labrador
Yvonne Jones LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Intergovernmental and Northern Affairs and Internal Trade
Mr. Speaker, I listened very attentively to my colleague across the way, and there are so many things I could say in response. I know I do not have the time to do so, but I will have the opportunity down the road.
The member talked a lot about what is in the national interest of the country. I want to remind him that the national interest is defined by Canadian legislation. Several references to that can be found in different acts within the House. When I get a chance to speak, I can certainly point them out. Once he has an opportunity to read them, I am sure he will see more clearly why the phrase is used in the context of this decision.
In addition, what the member failed to talk about this evening is how the Liberal government has gotten to where we are today with this piece of legislation. We are here because the Conservatives passed a bill in 2014 that took away the rights to ownership of indigenous land claims and treaties in the Northwest Territories. The bill would restore those values, that trust and the agreements back to indigenous governments in the Northwest Territories.
If that trust had not been broken and the treaty agreements had not been threatened under previous legislation by the Harper government, we would not be here this evening having to right the wrong that was done to indigenous governments in this country. Why did the member not want to speak to that issue this evening?
Mr. Speaker, I should note that I was not here when Bill C-15 first came forward under the previous government. However, of course, the Liberals voted for Bill C-15 in the last Parliament. Here they are now, saying it is no good, yet at the time, they voted for it. It is really interesting.
So what is the national best interest regarding the oil and gas in this country? Today, we saw the Prime Minister ridicule six premiers of this country, including the Premier of the Northwest Territories. They have major concerns over Bill C-69 and Bill C-48, and the Prime Minister took shots at all six of them today in the House.
Guy Caron NDP Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Mr. Speaker, we are indeed talking about Bill C-15, which this bill seeks to replace. I was in Parliament when Bill C-15 was passed under the Conservative government. It sought to replace the regional councils in the Northwest Territories with one large pan-territorial council.
The problem is that those regional councils were created as a result of land claim and self-government agreements with indigenous governments. The regional councils were created through nation-to-nation agreements. The Conservatives unilaterally overruled those decisions without consulting the indigenous peoples involved.
I would like to know why the member wants to go backward. Why he does not want to have this conversation and work on this nation-to-nation relationship that was undermined and ignored by the Conservatives?
Mr. Speaker, we did have Neil McCrank, from Calgary. He did all the consultations regarding the superboard. He was one of the few live guests we could bring in on the one day we had to talk about Bill C-88 at committee. As members may know, other submissions were submitted through email.
At committee, Neil McCrank disputed that claim. He spent months talking about the superboard. As members know, the proposal back then was to go from four boards down to one. Members know the result: It ended up in court and we did not do that.
I want to put on the record that Neil McCrank spent months in the territories dealing with the superboard issue.
Mr. Speaker, what does the member support in the bill?
Mr. Speaker, well, there is not much, as members can tell by my 20-minute speech.
The minister said that the Northwest Territories government wanted Bill C-88 passed expeditiously. Why then did the Liberals sit on this bill for months, if not years? They had the opportunity to move this long before 10 days before the House rises. That is the question I had when the minister stood before us and talked about how great Bill C-88 was when, in fact, the Liberals buried the legislation for months.
Mr. Speaker, I want to pick up on some of the comments my colleague made regarding the arbitrary decision-making that the government has done. The Liberals have not done any consultations. It seems that the Liberals' desire to consult is only when they feel like it, and that would be related to a number of projects, like the tanker moratorium, Eagle Spirit and the northern gateway. There is also the moratorium that was announced down in the United States.
We are hearing increasing concerns not only from indigenous communities, who have not been consulted properly, but also from the premiers of these provinces. I speak in particular about a very concerning letter regarding Bill C-48 and Bill C-69 and how dismissive the Prime Minister and his party are in terms of engaging the premiers and indigenous communities to allow projects to move forward. The Liberals are happy to cancel projects, but they are reluctant to create an environment for projects to move forward.
Mr. Speaker, the letters from six premiers to the Prime Minister came out yesterday. There are letters from the territories, New Brunswick, the premiers of Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. As well, one of the biggest oil and gas demonstrations this country has ever seen was taking place today in Calgary, Alberta.
It is shameful what the government has done with Bill C-69, Bill C-48 and certainly with this legislation, Bill C-88.
Mr. Speaker, I am surprised that the hon. member for Saskatoon—Grasswood, in describing this bill, which is about the restoration of indigenous treaty rights around rejecting the idea of superboards, among other details, has raised the issue of oil and gas, the need for development, and demonstrations in Calgary in favour of oil and gas.
We have a lot of discussion in this place about the need to recognize a climate emergency. I wonder if my hon. colleague has any particular notion of when we should stop expanding oil and gas, and how quickly we need to phase out oil and gas in order to avoid catastrophic impacts from the climate crisis.
Mr. Speaker, Canadians are looking forward to seeing the Green Party policy because it has been under the rug for so many years. Now it has a little jump in its step from the by-election and Canadians are really going to know what the Green Party stands for. It wants to shut down oil and gas. It would rather get it from Venezuela and other countries, not Canadian clean energy.
I am wondering where the Green Party will go in October, because it is not going to be welcomed in my province of Saskatchewan. The Green Party will not be welcomed in Alberta. It will be interesting to see where the party goes once its policies are looked at by Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
Mike Bossio Liberal Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON
Mr. Speaker, I am thankful for the opportunity to speak on Bill C-88, and I acknowledge that I do so on traditional Algonquin territory.
I will be splitting my time with the member for Port Moody—Coquitlam.
This important bill demonstrates the Government of Canada's commitment to the north and to the people who live there.
The legislation now before us proposes to amend the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act and the Canada Petroleum Resources Act. This bill would reverse legislation that aimed to amalgamate three regional land and water boards established under comprehensive land claim agreements in the Northwest Territories. It would also modernize the overall regulatory regime that oversees the development of resources along the Mackenzie Valley and in the offshore Arctic.
Perhaps most significantly, though, Bill C-88 would be a tremendous win for the environment. With the devastating effects of climate change that are evident in the Arctic more than anywhere else in the world, we all know how important this is. While Canada's north is rich in natural resources, it is also a fragile and rapidly changing environment. I am sure that my hon. colleagues will agree that it needs to be handled with care.
How do we do that? We would take a big step forward with Bill C-88 on what I call the three Ps of environmental responsibility: people, protection and prosperity. Bill C-88 would provide the right people with the right regulatory tools to make the right decisions for the environment and for Canada.
The first P in environmental responsibility is people, and one of the best ways to care for the environment in the north is to involve the people who live there in decisions about development projects. In the same way that urban communities across Canada invite residents to have a say in proposed developments in their neighbourhoods, northerners must also have a meaningful say in how natural resources are managed in their region. Bill C-88 aims to do this in the best possible way.
Most importantly, the legislation would repeal provisions in the Northwest Territories Devolution Act that would have eliminated the regional panels of the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board and established a single consolidated board. Bill C-88 would reverse the board restructuring and reintroduce other regulatory elements to function under the existing four-board structure, including the Gwich'in Land and Water Board, the Sahtu Land and Water Board, the Wek'èezhìi Tlicho Land and Water Board and the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board.
These are all independent, co-managed boards that have appointed members who bring valuable local and traditional knowledge to the table. These members have the experience and local knowledge needed to effectively review and influence resource and development projects, as only they can. It is also important to know that the regional land and water boards are part of the existing land claim agreements, and that respecting these agreements is crucial to reconciliation with indigenous peoples.
The second P of environment responsibility is protection. A scientific report from Environment and Climate Change Canada shows that the Arctic is being hit hardest by climate change. The region is warming at a rate that is about three times faster than the rest of the world. In winter, this means melting permafrost and less sea ice. By the middle of this century, most marine regions in the Canadian Arctic may be ice free for at least a month at a time.
This would change everything. The habitat of ice-dependent wildlife, such as narwhals, polar bears and walruses, would be severely impacted. The Arctic caribou population would be at risk, because these animals rely on sea ice for their long-distance migration. Various species of fish would likely move away from where they are usually harvested in search of colder water temperatures. Of course, the melting sea ice would likely open new shipping routes and expose more fossil fuel reserves to development.
What is clear is that we have to understand what is happening to the environment and protect it, for both current and future generations. Bill C-88 would help us accomplish this goal. This is because the legislation also proposes amendments to the Canada Petroleum Resources Act, CPRA, which regulates oil and gas rights on federal Crown lands in the north and in offshore areas not under federal-provincial co-management.
The CPRA amendments support commitments made by Canada and the United States in the joint Arctic leaders' statement of 2016. The two nations agreed to base decisions about the future development of offshore oil and gas resources in the Arctic on scientific reviews that would be conducted every five years.
Bill C-88 would encourage governments and local communities to work together and move forward with both scientific and traditional knowledge to protect and develop the rich natural environment. It is so important that we take our indigenous knowledge into account, which has existed for thousands of years and that has a far greater understanding of the Arctic than any other Canadian does. We need to ensure that traditional knowledge is taken into account when we are considering any resource projects or otherwise that occur in the north.
Bill C-88 would encourage governments and local communities to work together, to move forward with both scientific and traditional knowledge to protect and develop the rich natural environment.
This brings me to my third P of environmental responsibility, and that is prosperity. Canada's prosperity, in many ways, relies on the development of natural resources. As the Right Hon. Prime Minister said recently at the 2019 Nature Champions Summit in Montreal, “We can't afford to ignore climate change.” The future of our country and our economy depends on it. “You cannot have a plan for the future of our economy as a country, as a nation, if you don't also have a plan for environment sustainability and environmental protection.”
Bill C-88 would support a robust regulatory regime that not only protects the environment, but also provides a responsible approach to the development of natural resources. Furthermore, renewing the relationship with northern and indigenous organizations and governments is the proper and just way to move forward in partnership, with legal certainty in regard to environmental protection and toward increased investment and jobs.
All told, I would suggest that this is what reconciliation is all about. It is establishing that relationship with indigenous communities that can be based on trust. That trust is only going to happen if we have meaningful and collaborative consultation with our indigenous communities.
It is about making sure that indigenous peoples have a meaningful voice in important decisions about their lands, their lives and their future. Bill C-88 would enable a resilient resource sector while also respecting the rights and interests of indigenous peoples.
The three Ps of environmental protection, people, protection and prosperity, are the key drivers of Bill C-88. They are also sound reasons to support the proposed legislation. This legislation is finally going to bring about an environment where all indigenous peoples in the north will feel they can actively participate in determining what happens with that environment, what happens with their economy, and what happens with their future, for both today and for their children and grandchildren. Once again, indigenous people always look out seven generations. We need to take that into consideration in the north.
I encourage my hon. colleagues to vote in favour of Bill C-88 at third reading.
Mr. Speaker, one of the things that my hon. colleague did not bring up was the fact that the government has imposed a drilling moratorium on the North Sea and that this moratorium was put in place without any consultation with the Northwest Territories. The government gave the premier a phone call 20 minutes before making the announcement in the United States to a foreign audience. So much for consultation.
Will this member agree that there was no consultation on the northern drilling ban?
Mr. Speaker, it has been great to work with my colleague over the last number of years on the indigenous committee. I think we accomplished a lot of great things together, on many different bills and many different reports, that I feel have made a difference in the lives of indigenous people. I thank him for serving on that committee and his contribution to it.
However, I do not agree with the premise of his question. The Premier of the Northwest Territories and Inuvialuit both agree that they are making great progress right now in negotiations on how to properly develop the resources both in the Beaufort Sea and the Norman Wells oil fields. These are two areas which I have to say the previous government did not consider involving indigenous communities in consultation. Let us face it. That has been the reason that so many big projects like this in the past have failed, because of a lack of proper consultation.
Our government is taking the time to consult with those communities to ensure that they determine the future development of those resources.


For Walker, a 50-year legacy in public housing and then chaos
By Shayla Nidever | Mar 1, 2019
This story is one in a continuing series covering the crisis in public housing in Columbia.
Gilbert Walker’s 50-year tenure in public housing administration came down to a month of chaos and criticism, followed by his abrupt retirement.
The Columbia Housing Authority’s executive director announced his retirement on Feb. 21, just over a month after two men were found dead from carbon monoxide poisoning in the Allen Benedict Court public housing complex. The 26-building complex was shuttered permanently and its 411 residents forced to abandon their apartments, some fleeing during the night because of the build-up of poisonous gases and other life-threatening issues.
Walker has worked for the housing authority since 1968 and became the executive director in 2000. His decision to retire came at the end of a CHA board meeting on Feb. 21.
“There was no one ushering him out or anything like that, that he was able to come to that decision and after more than 50 years of service to an organization, he has a right to go home,” said Cynthia Hardy, a public relations specialist and former television host who was hired in February as the new communications director for the Columbia Housing Authority.
Hardy says that the board made it clear to her that Walker made this decision on his own.
“You spend so much of your years doing something you love, you have a lot of accomplishments and then something tragic like this happens, and you’re responsible,” Hardy said of Walker. “You want to do what you love, but if moving aside and doing some other things are going to make the organization stronger, then a good leader does that, too.”
When the housing authority came under scrutiny after the deaths at Allen Benedict Court last month, District 3 Columbia City Councilman Moe Baddourah called for Walker to step down.
“Somebody has to be held accountable for what happened at Allen Benedict Court,” said Baddourah.
He believes Walker’s decision to retire has been a positive development.
In the next few months, Baddourah said he would like to see a more open process when it comes to the workings of the CHA, and says it’s time for change throughout the organization moving forward.
“Let’s just not forget that there are two dead people that resulted in 411 people out of their own homes. They were asked to leave their houses in the middle of the night,” said Baddourah, “Hopefully we learn from that experience.”
Although Walker was not available to speak directly to his legacy or his next steps, he did release a retirement letter to former Columbia mayor who now serves as the CHA’s attorney, Bob Coble.
In the letter, Walker said, “I regret that current events will overshadow the multiple outstanding achievements of the Columbia Housing Authority during my tenure.”
He noted achievements during his tenure at the CHA, including redeveloping old public housing, increasing the availability of affordable public housing in Columbia, and the demolition of older public housing including Gonzales Gardens, Saxon Homes and Hendley Homes.
Walker ended his letter with a promise to remain dedicated to the CHA during this time of transition.
Read more about the transitions coming to the CHA here.
After five decades at the Columbia Housing Authority, Executive Director Gilbert Walker announced he will retire at the end of June. Some called for his resignation after two men died in January of carbon monoxide poisoning in a public housing complex.
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Shayla Nidever
Shayla Nidever is a Texas native who has a passion for people and telling their stories creatively using words and multiple mediums. She was an editorial intern for Columbia, S.C.’s daily newsletter, COLAtoday. She enjoys writing long form stories and covering unlikely topics. She plans to use her writing to cover difficult stories often avoided and put those people and issues in the spotlight. Along with writing, Nidever wants to tell stories in many different ways, using everything from audio to video to digital design.


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Little Richard: ‘I Am the Architect of Rock & Roll’
The Georgia Peach, the Living Flame, the Southern Child, the King of Rock & Roll: Little Richard is all of these, and he’ll be the first to tell you so
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"I really feel from the bottom of my heart that I am the inventor [of rock & roll]," Little Richard says. "If there was somebody else, I didn't know than, didn't hear them, haven’t heard them. Not even to this day. So I say I'm the architect."
Terry O'Neill/Getty
This story originally appeared in the April 19th, 1990 issue of Rolling Stone dedicated to the 1950s.
More than any performer, Little Richard blew the lid off the Fifties. With his mascara-smeared face twisted in a midscream paroxysm of rapture and dementia, hair piled high in a proud pompadour, he was an explosive and charismatic performer who laid the foundation of rock & roll. His outrageous personality captured the music’s rebellious spirit, and his frantically charged piano playing and raspy, shouted vocals defined its sound.
Little Richard was born Richard Penniman on December 5th, 1932, in Macon, Georgia. His father, Charles “Bud” Penniman, sold moonshine and ran a tavern called the Tip In Inn. His mother, Leva Mae Penniman, raised Richard and 11 brothers and sisters in a small house in the Pleasant Hill section of Macon. As a youngster, Richard soaked up music, which was part of the fabric of life in the black community. He heard acts of all kinds at the Macon City Auditorium – blues, country, vaudeville – where he sold Cokes. He also went to church, not so much for the message as for the music: the fervid, unrestrained style of black gospel singing lit a ﬁre in him.
Little Richard: 20 Essential Songs
Little Richard learned to play gospel piano from an equally ﬂamboyant character named Esquerita, combining it with his own love of boogie-woogie in what became a blueprint for rock & roll. By his late teens he was a veteran of several traveling vaudeville revues, where he got schooled in the theatrical side of performing He cut his ﬁrst sides for RCA Camden in 1951, followed by a string of singles for Peacock. But it was at Specialty Records that the wild rock & roller within was turned loose.
“One day a reel of tape, wrapped in a piece of paper looking as though someone had eaten off it, came across my desk,” Specialty AALR man Robert “Bumps” Blackwell told Charles White, Little Richard’s biographer. Richard was scrubbing pots and pans at the Greyhound bus station in Macon while waiting to hear from Specialty about his submission In 1955 he got the green light, entering J&M Studio in New Orleans with Blackwell and some of the Crescent City’s ﬁnest musicians. After a slow start, Blackwell grasped the untapped potential of Richard’s singing and playing, and they switched gears from conventional urban blues to something that was raw, uptempo and undeniably new. The rest was rock & roll history, as Little Richard laid down a stunning succession of sides over the next several years, including “Tutti Frutti,” “Slippin’ and Slidin’,” “Miss Ann,” “Long Tall Sally,” “Rip It Up,” “Good Golly, Miss Molly,” “Lucille” and “Keep a Knockin’.” Specialty recently issued a box set including every song Richard cut for the label.
Little Richard scaled the heights of fame as he toured the world with his peerless band the Upsetters. But his success, and the hypersexual lifestyle that went with it, came to an abrupt halt late in 1957 when he abandoned rock & roll for religion. He attended Bible college and recorded gospel music until the early Sixties, when he made a triumphant and unexpected realm to rock from the stage of a British concert hall. The second chapter of Little Richard’s career as a rock & roller saw him recapture his popularity as a live performer and cut some well-received albums for Reprise. By 1975, however, a substance-abuse problem drove him to abandon rock & roll for the Rock of Ages once more.
“I think that if Elvis had been black, he wouldn’t have been as big as he was”
In recent years, Little Richard has begun testing the waters again, performing and recording occasionally. The following interview was conducted in the mobile environs of a limousine cruising the freeways of Los Angeles, a city he has called home since 1956. We broke her a lunch of fried chicken, pork chops and collard greens at a favorite soul-food eatery. During the meal a braided and bespangled entertainer calling herself “Afrodyete, the African Goddess of Love” presented him with a signed picture of herself; which was inscribed, “Stay
Chocolate.” With characteristic color-blind wit, Little Richard quipped, “Stay chocolate? Suppose I feel like being pineapple tonight?” –
Let’s start with a simple question. Did you invent rock & roll?
Well, let’s say it this way: When I first came along, I never heard of any rock & roll. I only heard Elmore James, Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williamson, Ruth Brown and Roy Brown. Blues. Fats Domino at the time was playing nothing but low-down blues. When I started singing [rock & roll], I sang it a long time before I presented it to the public, because I was afraid they wouldn’t like it. I had never heard nobody do it, and I was scared.
I was inspired by Mahalia Jackson, Roy Brown and a gospel group called Clara Ward and the Ward Singers and a guy by the name of Brother Joe May. I got the holler that you hear me do – “woo-ooh-ooh” – from a lady named Marion Williams. And this thing you hear me do – “Lucille-uh” – I got that from Ruth Brown I used to like die way she’d sing, “Mama-uh, he treats your daughter mean.” I put it all together.
I really feel from the bottom of my heart that I am the inventor. If there was somebody else, I didn’t know than, didn’t hear them, haven’t heard them. Not even to this day. So I say I’m the architect.
Where were you hearing music – on records, jukeboxes or the radio?
We didn’t have nothing to play records on, ’cause we were real poor. My mother had 12 children, so we didn’t have nothing. We had an old radio we would play late at night We would listen to WLAC out of Tennessee. Back in that time boogie-woogie was very popular. I would say that boogie-woogie and rhythm & blues mixed is rock & roll. Also, back in that time black people were singing a lot of country music. You didn’t see this separation of music as you do today. I’m a country-music lover. I think it’s a true music. It’s from the heart.
Can you remember the first time you sang for people and got a reaction?
Yes. I sung a song called “Strange Things Happening Every Day,” by Sister Rosetta Tharpe. [Sings] “Oh, you hear church people say/We are in this holy way/ There are strange things happening every day…”
And I’d just but this [taps rhythm on car seat] and sing, “There are strange things happening every day.” People used to give me quarters and dimes and nickel to sing that song.
How did you choose the stage name Little Richard? Was there a Big Richard?
No [laughs]. At the time, they had Little Esther, Little Willie John, Little Walter. Everybody was using the title Little. And most people used to call me “Penny-man,” and nobody would say “Penniman” They couldn’t pronounce my name. Another thing – my family did not approve of what I was doing, and I felt that if I didn’t use my name, people wouldn’t know I was a part of them. I didn’t want to hurt them. Music was not respected back then. To them, it was down. Everybody was down on it.
As a teenager, you went on the road with several vaudeville revues. What was your role in those shows?
I just wanted to tear up the house. I would pick up tables and chairs in my mouth and dance with them. I would let somebody stand on the table and dance while holding up the table in my mouth.
That sense of competition stayed. You just weren’t going to let anyone upstage you.
That’s right. I still have that. I think you have to have that in life. I would go onstage, and we didn’t have stages like Michael and Prince or Bruce. We had to do with what they had. If they had spotlights, they had them, but now they carry everything.
You had to do it all with charisma.
Yeah, and that’s when I wore the colors, the sequins, the shoes made of stone, so they had something to light up.
In the 43 years you’ve been playing, has anybody upstaged you, taken a show away from you?
Uh, yes, Jimi Hendrix. He was my guitar player, and you know, we didn’t know he could play with his mouth. One night I heard this screamin’ and hollerin’ for him! I thought they were screamin’ for me. But he was back there playin’ the guitar with his mouth. He didn’t do it again, ’cause we made sure the lights didn’t come on that area no more. We fixed that! We made sure that was a black spot!
How did you wind up signing with Specialty Records?
Lloyd Price came through my hometown. He had this black-and-gold Cadillac, and I wanted a car like that. I said, “How’d you get famous?” He told me about Specialty and gave me the address. I did a tape, and I sent this to Specialty. A year later they got in touch with me.
Did Art Rupe, the owner of Specialty, match you up with Bumps Blackwell?
No. Bumps was the A&R man for Specialty Records. He was in charge of everything. Art Rupe didn’t know anything about music. Bumps had been with Quincy Jones and Ray Charles and all those people. Ray Charles did his ﬁrst tour with us. He didn’t have a band. It was my band that played behind him. And he had “I Got a Woman” and sung that on the tour, with my band backing him up. Am I tellin’ the truth, Ray? You used to come by my room and tell me, “That’s the prettiest suit you got on. I like that suit, that green suit.” [Laughs]
Did you enjoy recording in New Orleans?
Oh, yes. You’ve got to remember that the same band recorded with me, Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, Shirley and Lee, Professor Longhair. It was the same band: Lee Allen, Red Tyler, Earl Palmer, all those guys. When they played for me, I played the piano. When they played for Fats, Fats played the piano.
How would you compare recording in the Fifties with recording today?
I enjoyed recording back then better ’cause it was real. You had to play. It wasn’t no machines, you couldn’t just mash buttons and sound like a band. If you couldn’t play, you didn’t have no music.
Were your songs based on real characters? Was there a Miss Molly, a Lucille, Miss Ann, Long Tall Sally?
There was a Miss Ann. She was a white lady I used to work for. She had a club in Macon filled Ann’s Tick Tock. She and her husband, Johnny, were like a to me. They had been good to me when a lot of people hadn’t. I really appreciated them, so when I got famous, I made up a song. That’s the only real person.
What do you think it was about your music that helped bridge the gap between the races?
“Tutti Frutti” really started the races being together. Because when I was a boy, the white people would sit upstairs. They called it “white spectators,” and the blacks was downstairs And the white kids would jump over the balcony and come down where I was and dance with the blacks. We started that merging all across the country. From the git-go, my music was accepted by whites. Pat Boone covered “Tutti Frutti,” made it broader, ’cause they played him more on the white stations.
You could argue it both ways, but overall do you think Pat Boone’s cover versions helped or hurt your career?
I believe it was a blessing. I believe it opened the highway that would have taken a little longer for acceptance. So I love Pat for that.
That said, what did you honestly think of his recording of “Tutti Frutti”?
He did the best he could. I think mine was the best, but Pat Boone’s version was all right. I think he was forced to record it. He was a balladeer and not a rock singer. I believe his record company saw a chance for him to get bigger.
Is it true you sang “Long Tall Sally” so fast that he’d have difficulty covering it?
Yes. I figured that since he outsold me with “Tutti Frutti,” I’d put so many tricks in “Long Tall Sally” he couldn’t get it.
How do you think the Beatles did with it?
Fantastic. I think the Beatles did one of the best versions of “Long Tall Sally” I’ve ever heard.
“My family didn’t approve of what I was doing. Music wasn’t respected.”
You toured with them in England before they broke over here, didn’t you?
Oh, before they ever recorded, before anybody ever heard of a record company.
Did you see potential in them?
I saw it in Paul McCartney. Paul was the one who was so crazy about me. Paul and George. I believe they had it – they were gifted.
They were gifted, but they also did their homework.
They knew who we recorded with, they knew what doorsteps we walked up, they knew what saxophone we played. They knew more about it than me!
Do you see in Prince a young version of yourself?
Do you like his music?
Oh, I really like Prince a lot. I like Michael Jackson. I like Bon Jovi. I like Bruce Springsteen. I like a lot of them. I get that old thing from them – I think that’s the reason I like them.
Have you worked with any producer since Bumps Blackwell who have been able to capture your sound?
It has to be someone who feels that type of music. I think the problem today is that a lot of black entertainers don’t feel the old music. A lot of white entertainers still use the music, while black people have gone to another type of thing, the synthesized thing that you hear, like [sings], “My, my, my/Once bitten, twice shy babe …
“Once Bitten Twice Shy,” by Great White.
Now, that’s the old way. See, the blacks have gotten so that’s not what they want. They like this other thing, with the synthesizer, and the whites are still with the old music. So that’s the reason when you play for them, you feel comfortable. They appreciate the type of music, the old music, that you play.
Especially in the Seventies, your audience became really lopsided toward whites over blacks.
With the black audience, if you don’t have a hit record, they don’t support you. If you’ve got a hit record, it’s all right, but if you don’t, you’re in trouble
Do you think the black audience at large will ever get interested in black music from a more historical perspective?
They should. I believe that Michael Jackson’s generation will be more up on it than my generation. I believe black people love me, and I believe they appreciate me. But I’m not recording the kind of music they want to hear in this generation. I am where I am, so that’s it.
You’ve claimed that your band the Upsetters was the best show band in the country.
Oh, they were. They were choreographed by me and by Grady [Gaines, the tenor saxophonist]. They wore makeup. They wore beautiful colors. It was the only band with a makeup kit. You thought they were showgirls, but they were showboys. They were very good. Until this day, I haven’t seen another band surpass them.
Would you have preferred to cut your Specialty sides with the Upsetters instead of the New Orleans guys?
I did do one song with them, “Keep a Knockin’.” We did that in Washington, D.C. You can’t tell the difference, can you?
No, you can’t. Led Zeppelin nicked the drum intro on “Rock and Roll.” Have you heard that?
No. Did you know Led Zeppelin’s manager used to be my chauffeur? Peter Grant was my chauffeur for about three years! I used to argue with him all the time. I saw him in Miami later on, and he said: “Little Richard, I’m wealthy now. I’m a millionaire. You want me to buy you dinner?” I said, “No, Peter.” He said: “I’m gonna buy it anyway. I have a group called Led Zeppelin. I don’t have to take your abuse anymore.” [Laughs loudly] Old Peter! And you know, Sonny Bono used to drive me, too. That’s before Cher. That was about 1958. He was working for Specialty Records, and they used to send him to ride me around.
As far as your live shows, which are considered to be some of the most incendiary performances in the history of rock & roll, where did the energy come from?
I don’t know, and it still comes. We just did Palm Springs, and it was unbelievable. People was crying, screaming. You wouldn’t believe I was the age that I am. It was just like a power, and you felt like crying. When I touched the piano, the house just went insane.
In the Fifties you’d scream, pound the piano and toss clothes into the crowd. How did you rise to that level every night?
I didn’t drink or smoke at the time. I didn’t take any dope or nothing. The music turned me on. The music still does it! If the music is good, you got me.
Were you ever concerned that you’d taken an audience too far? Has it ever gotten to a point where it became dangerous?
I have seen ’em go a long way. I have seen people worked into frenzies. I’ve seen ’em foaming at the mouth, I’ve seen ’em fall out. I’ve seen people screamin’, cryin’, can’t stop. I’ve seen girls who just wanted to touch me, just screamin’, lookin’ at me, screamin’ and fallin’ out.
Wasn’t there a night when the stage actually caved in?
Collapsed. That was at the Olympic Auditorium [in Los Angeles]. The piano fell. The stage fell. One guy broke his leg. It was pandemonium: The crowd was screaming, and they kept screaming. I was on top of the piano, and I was screamin’, too, ’cause I was fallin’. Everybody was screamin’. Screamin’ and screamin’!
Did you ever get into what the jazz people call cutting contests, where you’d be on the bill with someone and you’d each be trying to top the other?
Oh, I’ve been on plenty of those. Me and Chuck Berry, for instance, have done it plenty of times. He’d say that he’s the star and I’d say that I’m the star. He’d say, “I’m gonna close the show.” I’d say, “No, you’re not” I’ve been on a bill with Jerry Lee Lewis like that ,too. And I’d say, “Okay, you can close the show.” And I’d go on first and sing for about two hours, and then can’t nobody come on the stage. We were all of us vain back in that time. It’s a shame. The young and crazy often need a-spankin’ and a-plankin’.
What was it like after a show? What would you do to wind down?
I would go to clubs just to hear girls scream. I would go to clubs to have a good time and then bring girls back to the hotel.
We have an impression of the Fifties as being a very staid and conservative era, but to hear you talk, it sounds a lot more sexually liberated than people might imagine.
Oh, it was liberated all right! It was experimental, too, ’cause we were young and hadn’t done a lot of things. Being a country boy from the South, I had been held back. My family was religious. Sometimes you couldn’t toe-tap or tap a toe or ask for mo’, and that’s for sure! And that’s the way it go! And we was po’!
I used to like a lot of girls back in that time. But I wasn’t into anything out of the ordinary. Just regular do’s.
Where do you stand on homosexuality now? You made some pretty strong statements against it in your book.
I’m not against it I believe God gives every man a choice. Every man has a choice to do what he will, bad or good, right or wrong, black or white, rich or poor. I was just saying that from where I stand, a lot of people think different things because of the way you look. Some people will judge you, and they don’t even know you. I played the piano, I wore the hair, I wore the makeup, and everybody classified me without asking me anything.
But didn’t you want to he “the Living Flame,” “the bronze Liberace”?
I am the Living Flame. Not so much the bronze Liberace, but I am the Living Flame. I just wanted to be a musician that spread joy to people. I’m not down on any lifestyle, any shape, form or fashion. Whether God has sanctioned our lifestyle or not, we still have a right to do what we want So I’m not putting anything down. Neither am I picking anything up! [Chuckles] And I’ll leave it right there.
When you had your first religious conversion in 1957, what persuaded you to walk away from the phenomenal popularity you’d worked so hard for as a rock & roller?
I wish I knew then what I know today. I was young and didn’t have anybody to talk to. I’ve always been religious, basically. I wanted to do God’s will. I’ve always wanted to do his wil. But at the time I had nobody no really counsel with.
Touring must have taken a toll.
No, I enjoyed touring, but I had a bad dream. I think the dream kind of disturbed me, the thoughts kind of shook my mind. The dream was “Prepare for eternal life.” That was it.
And you went to Bible school.
Yes. Let me let down this window and say hello to these people [rolls down the window of the limousine and greets a couple on the sidewalk]. I just wanted to make their day. Excuse me. I feel all right! [Laughs]
When you quit rock & roll for the second time, in 1975, you were coming out of a period of heavy cocaine and alcohol use.
Yes, yes, yes. My nose was big enough to put diesel trucks in. I was payin’ almost $10,000 a month for cocaine. I was into it. I was eatin’ it. I was snortin’ it, I was freezin’ everything that could be frozen. I was screamin’ and hollerin’. It was a terrible time for me. I’ve never had this drug they have today, crack. By the grace of God, I don’t drink or smoke now, haven’t done it in years. I’m just glad to be alive and show the young people that it doesn’t pay, that you can live above it and that it don’t make you famous, it makes you dead. It steals life from mankind, and we need God in our life. And that’s what it’s about.
Are you getting more comfortable with the idea of playing rock & roll again?
Well, what I feel about music now is that I love God, I will always love God, and I feel that I’m a messenger for him. To me, rock & roll music is the only way I know how to make a living. I’m making people joyful, and I still spread my love for God. So I’m still the person that God has placed, but the music is my job.
Did you think Elvis did anything as far as opening the door for the white audience to listen to black singers?
I think the door opened wider, but the door may have already been opened by “Tutti Frutti.” I think that Elvis was more acceptable being white back in that period. I believe that if Elvis had been black, he wouldn’t have been as big as he was. If I was white, do you know how huge I’d be? If I was white, I’d be able to sit on top of the White House! A lot of things they would do for Elvis and Pat Boone, they wouldn’t do for me.
It’s like they won’t even give me a Lifetime Achievement Award, and look at Paul McCartney. [McCartney was given a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Grammys on February 21st.] I was the first famous person he ever met, the first famous person he ever traveled with. They give him a Lifetime Achievement Award, and they won’t give me one. They won’t even mention me! They give Dick Clark an award, but they don’t give me nothing! Don’t even mention my existence! It’s a shame, but that’s what it is.
Do you think McCartney should have mentioned you in his acceptance speech?
Yes. I just don’t understand some things sometimes. I was sitting there in front of him, and he didn’t say nothing. It makes you feel like crying, you know?
I was surprised about that myself.
I was shocked. I should have run up on the stage and did one of my outrageous numbers and said, “Listen, Paul, let’s face it, now you know that I’m the one that bought the hamburgers.” I should have done that. But I think that when you’re in love with God, your reward is what he says it is – eternal life. So I think I’m going to have to settle for that .And I’m not dismayed or disarrayed. I will settle for that. In fact, I’d rather have a crown of gold than to lose my soul.
In This Article: Little Richard


A Haunting in Savannah
If Savannah Georgia is the second most haunted city in the United States, I don’t want to hang around in the first. Actually I did. New Orleans holds that distinction, but I didn’t go on a late night Ghost Tour in New Orleans, much less hang about in one of the most haunted houses in the city. I can’t say the same for Savannah, a heritage city that expanded over the graveyards and cemeteries, where the dead are as restless as the Spanish moss blowing with the wind in the gnarled old trees. As with many others, the city first came to my attention when I read the bestselling book, and watched the film adaption of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. True crime, travelogue and drama collided in an acclaimed story that convinced the world that Savannah is home to decadent eccentrics, where wives compared their husbands’ suicide notes, drag queens (the legendary Lady Chablis) reigned in high society, political and personal corruption was the norm, and the elite drained artillery punch inside their southern gothic fortress mansions, impervious to the outside world. Or something like that. Along with Gulfstream Aerospace, a military base, the second largest port on the eastern seaboard and the Savannah College of Art and Design, tourism keeps this quirky city thriving.
The historical district, dating back to the arrival of British settlers in 1733, is a grid system comprised of 22 leafy plazas, churches, and ornate antebellum mansions. Antebellum is defined as “before the war” – both the War of Independence and the Civil War, in which Savannah was spared a sacking by Sherman’s Union Army. There’s so much history here you can trip on it, which is what I did as soon as I crossed the Savannah River from my hotel. A free ferry dropped me off near the first of many statues depicting the characters and legends of Savannah. The lady who waved a flag at every passing ship. The flag-bearing soldier who was killed during the Siege of Savannah (along with a couple thousand other soldiers). There’s fountains and steeples, scenes reminiscent from the many films shot here, including Forrest Gump, Glory, and yes, Spongebob Squarepants. I bought a ticket for a hop-on hop off bus which was a little lazy, considering I basically walked the entire route looking for the bus after hopping it off it explore the fading tombstones that remain in Colonial Park Cemetery. Ten thousand people were buried here, but only 600 grave markers remain. They say the city was built on the dead, as other cemeteries were moved or built over. Construction in the old town often yields unidentified bones.
It was a fine spring day, the warmth blanketing me after my long northern winter. In summer, the temperature is hot enough to make a skeleton sweat, but late March I was happy to walk beneath the shady plazas, reading the many informational plaques, soaking back a beer in a go-cup (it’s legal to drink on the streets in Savannah, although my grey whiskers did little to stop bartenders carding me for ID at every turn). River Street is the main tourist strip, and it can get pretty ugly. Guns and cheap crap and booze and morbid obesity and religion. I check out Rousakis Plaza where a strange construction quirk creates an echo chamber. I spoke to eight locals in my 36 hours in the city, and nobody knew it existed. When the city was founded as a buffer between British South Carolina in the north and the Spanish in Florida to the south, there were four prohibitions: no slaves, no alcohol, no Catholics, no lawyers. All of that went by the wayside pretty quickly. Various fires destroyed half the town, and a yellow fever plague in 1820 killed on in ten people, including all the doctors. Despite all this, its strategic location as a port and the booming cotton and shipyard trade ensured great wealth flooded to Savannah, funnelled into rich families living in their sprawling mansions around the leafy squares. It makes for great walking, open-window tour buses, horse carriages, cycle tables, bike rides, Segway Tours, scooter tours, Pedi-cabs, heck there’s even hearse tours. Few tourists go beyond the old district, to the parts of the city less scenic and far more troublesome. I was warned that even though the bars are open late, the city shuts down early, and it’s best not to marginalize myself on the fringes late at night. Which of course is actually what I did, but only after spooking myself right out with a late night ghost tour to the Sorrel-Weed House.
I had one night to myself in the city, and judging by the sheer volume of brochures at the airport, Ghost Tours seemed like all the rage. I laid them out on the hotel table, and my hand was drawn to the Sorrell-Weed tour, consisting of a one-hour walking tour and an hour in the house itself. The tour and house has been featured on all the Ghost Hunter type shows, but so have a lot of others. It is however the only tour that lets you go into one of these houses at night, and truth be told I was expecting something hokey when I showed up at 9:30pm on the corner of Bull and East Harris. The house was built in 1840 by a wealthy merchant named Francis Sorrel, opposite Madison Plaza, scene of an epic battle during the War of Independence. Francis’s wife Matilda was a social butterfly, throwing lavish dinners and parties, the house was a social hot spot, hosting the likes of General Robert E Lee, and all seemed swell. Except that Matilda, the sister of Francis’s deceased first wife, suffered from depression, and one day found her husband in bed with the head slave Molly in the slave quarters. Matilda promptly ran into the house, up to the third floor balcony, and jumped off it, breaking her neck. Three weeks later, Molly was found hanging from the rafters. The Sorrel fortunes took a nose dive, but not before their son, a doctor, turned the basement into a little house of horrors, amputating his way through death and carnage in that wonderful time where infections were best treated with hacksaws. It was a not a happy place, and let’s not go into the dozen dead bodies lying beneath the foundations dating back to the war. The house was sold to Henry Weed in 1859, and the ghosts of the dead have been known to haunt it ever since. There’s Matilda, the shapeless and mischievous Shadowman, the screams of Molly about to be strung up (her death was called a suicide), children, soldiers, old ladies – they are said to pop up. Our guide’s name was Maddy, and first she led all 25 of us on a short walk to the cemetery, revealing some of the more morbid history of what would otherwise be a charming neighbourhood. There’s the Hamilton-Turner House that Walt Disney stayed at, the one that inspired the Haunted House at Disneyland. Today it’s an upmarket B&B. People have reported ghost soldiers parading around Madison Square. Many mansions were built on hallowed ground of the removed and forgotten cemeteries. “Wherever you’re staying in Savannah, there’s no place safe from a haunting,” she tells us. Not in a “oooooh” voice mind you, just kind of matter-of-factly. Standing outside Colonial Park Cemetery (my second visit in the day, although night is way creepier) we learn how people were buried in mass graves. Fever induced comas led to premature burial as well. Many were buried alive during the plague of yellow fever, sparking a mass paranoia of relatives worried their loved ones would wake up underground. Bells were attached to the wrists of corpses, with guards on the “graveyard shift” listening for rings in case anyone needed to be “saved by the bell.” When the wind was howling, the bells might ring on their own, but the graves had to be dug up just in case, although the result was often a “dead ringer.” Then came the Union soldiers who camped in the cemetery, taking great joy in using tombstones for target practice, graffiti, or anything else they could think of to upset the surrendered Confederate populace. There’s even a happy ghost story, but things really get interesting when we return to the house, entering through a squeaky iron-wrought gate with a creepy sound straight out of a movie.
Through the front doors, the air is thick and musty. Low-lighting adds the required ambiance one expects when visiting a genuine haunted house, and even the motion-detected infra-red cameras add an unnerving touch. Maddy regales us with the tragic story of the Sorrels, and a few ghost stories from her experience working at the house. Flickering lights, slamming doors, that sort of thing. It’s warm and despite my scepticism, adding the $38 x 25 in my head, not to mention the other group who started in the house before us, I can’t deny a sense of dread and my accelerated heart rate. Old portraits of dead people can do that too. We enter the front salon, where we learn that all the period furniture is not original, save for the two giant mirrors in the front and back salon. Houses can be haunted, but so can objects, and we learn that these mirrors are definitely haunted. Apparitions appear in tourist’s photos, orbs of light, strange shadows. It doesn’t help that the low lighting all but guarantees blurry photos that can let the imagination runneth over. Using flash creates double exposures and weird lights so that’s not particularly helpful. Still, everyone takes photos of the mirror, including myself. I wait until everyone moves into the back salon to get a photo with no tourist reflections in the mirror. I’m the only one in the room, shooting from a low right angle. We continue the tour, learning more about the hauntings and history, descending into a dark basement where we’re handed EMFs – the device electricians use to pick up energy. Paranormal investigators believe ghosts must draw on energy to manifest, which they do through humans, devices or the atmosphere. If the EMG starts flickering (and it’s not close to our phones), chances are something’s going on. Maddy tells us a personal story of hearing laughter in the room, the creepy Shadowman, and how she’s had to run out of the house in fear a couple times when locking up on her own. It’s an impressively understated and believable performance, and her dismissal of “theatrical” haunting nonsense feels genuine. It’s almost as if she doesn’t have to prove anything, because she doesn’t have to (or the operation is slick and well rehearsed). Nobody sees anything in particular. One women thinks she caught a weird apparition, but Maddy quickly points out it looks like someone in the group. Someone’s EMG goes off when we stand beneath the same rafters where Molly was hung in the slave quarters, adjacent to the main house. Well, that was fun, but I’ve got 20 minutes to walk the 20 minutes back to the river to catch the free ferry to my hotel, otherwise it’s an expensive cab ride home. I walk alone through the empty plazas, the streets mostly deserted. I’m a little edgy, but the streets are well lit and after a full day walking back and forth I’m familiar with the grid. I make the ferry, return to the hotel, and look through the photos I took in the house on my phone. And that’s when things go very, very weird.
Remember when I hung back to take a photo of the mirror with no reflections of tourists in it. Something catches my eye in the bottom left corner. No. Freaking. Way. I blow it up. That is a definitely a woman. She would have had to be almost directly in front of me to be in that spot. But I was alone, and there was nobody in the mirror. What’s more, she bears a striking resemblance to Matilda, appears old fashioned, doesn’t resemble anyone who was on the tour, and is looking in the direction of all the people in the back salon. I do believe I have just captured a ghost on film! I email the Ghost Tour folks immediately, who reply the next morning that they’ll check the time stamp to see if I was indeed alone, and whether their infra-red cameras picked anything up. They do three ghost tours a night, I don’t think they’re too surprised by this. Heck, I’m not even the first journalist to capture an apparition in the mirror, although the Lady does look remarkably clear – in that creepy, blurry ghostly sort of way. Combined with the jetlag and the fact I had to get up at 6:30am to give a keynote at conference, let’s just say a blissful night of sleep was not forthcoming.
I won’t get into the politics of being in a blue city in a red state. The lively conversations I had with locals, of all colour, absolutely terrified for the future of their country. The BBQ-sauce, the open carry gun laws, the St Patricks Parade hangover, America’s third largest synagogue, the African American Baptist Church that smuggled slaves beneath its floors, the canons and art and steamships and towering cargo ships that passed along the river on their way to the ocean. There's much to chew on in Savannah, a real southern treat. Weird, fascinating, and a town that refuses to let sleeping ghosts lie.
Chilling Out in: Köycegiz, Turkey
Say what you will about the value of guidebooks, but I’d never have found Köycegiz if I’d had one with me in Turkey. To be fair, this small Aegean town peppered against a large, warm, freshwater lake does get a mention in most Turkish guides - usually a throwaway paragraph with words like “sleepy” and “quiet” and “nice for lunch”. It’s just one of several signposts you’ll pass en-route from the infamous ruins at Ephesus to the Mediterranean beach resorts around Fethiye. But stop inside, look around, and you’ll find it as sweet as the sugar in Turkish tea, as chilled as a penguin guzzling down some flash-frozen baba ghanouj.
I got the hot tip about Köycegiz from a New Zealander named Alison who ran a guesthouse in Selcuk. She had married herself a Turk, settled in for a life of olives and fruit orchids, and was only too happy to share the secret of the lake with me. Since I had no real urgency to be anywhere else, I asked the Selcuk-Fethiye bus driver to let me out on the highway outside the town. A couple of other travellers looked on with mild curiosity, and who could blame them? Why is this guy getting off in the middle of nowhere? Alison suggested I hit a local hostel and after walking through the quiet, sleepy, nice-for-lunch town, I was pleased to find the Tango welcoming and comfortable. Large mattresses were covered in rugs and pillows, interspersed with hammocks, a bar and a DJ booth. There were just a straggling of backpackers, but the owner Sahin assured me things would pick up when the Fez Bus pulled in. The Fez is a hop-on hop-off backpacker bus with the deserved reputation of being a moving party. In anticipation, Sahin had organized a booze cruise on the lake for that evening. Enjoying the calm before the storm, I walked down to the lakefront and was blasted by a fresh breeze, the gentle lapping of water, the view of towering mountains in the distance. The lake, also called Köycegiz, connects with the Mediterranean through a channel called the Dalyan Delta, and cruising through large bulrushes to the sea is a popular activity for Turkish tourists. I see a couple guys playing tavla, which we know as backgammon, and gradually readjusted to the pace of a fishing village where not much happens and people prefer it that way. Here is the real Turkey away from the bustle of the tourist circle, and with it of course, real Turkish hospitality. People smile, invite you for tea, quiz your origins, all with a genuine sincerity and warmth. Sometimes they’ll try sell you a rug too.
Well equipped with a headache the following morning, I awake to find the Tango Inn empty, the Fez Bus departed, and another delightful Turkish sunny day. Hopping aboard a wooden boat crammed with local tourists on their way to the beach, I am the only foreigner and relish the enthusiastic hospitality. I am ploughed with homemade food and polite questions by new found friends. Along the canals, we pass imposing 2000-year-old Lyceum rock tombs carved into the cliffs above us. History is never far away in Turkey. After stopping off for a refreshing dip in the lake, we arrive at a long sandy beach, and the crystal blue Mediterranean. I end up playing Frisbee with a some brothers from the boat, eating local delicacies, enjoying my spontaneous off the beaten path adventure. The boats slowly makes its way back to Köycegiz at sunset, humid wind in my fingertips, the notes of a tanbur floating out the speakers up front. These are the moments in life when you stop, look around, and believe that somehow, everything, for everybody, is going to work out just fine.


Alumni - Miriam Johnson and Victoria Harben, MA Publishing
News from Jargon Media
We just wanted to update you and Brookes on the newest venture that Jargon Media (Miriam Johnson and Victoria Harben) are working on. We are putting together an international literary magazine that we will publish on 1 November 2011.
The Istanbul Review creates a platform for dialogue between authors, new and established, and readers. It gives writers an opportunity to talk about their craft, showcase new work and discuss the philosophical implications of literature and its place in modern society.
Founded by Miriam Johnson, Hande Zapsu Watt and Victoria Harben in 2010, the Istanbul Review began with a simple wish: to bring together writers, critics and those influential people from other walks of life whose lives have been changed by literature and who in turn change the world.
We are committed to literature, the environment and the spreading of literacy across the world. The journal uses only sustainable resources and gives 2.5 per cent of all profits to NGOs working towards spreading literacy.
Submissions are invited for the first annual volume of the Istanbul Review to be published in 2011. We welcome writing in the form of essays, fiction and poetry but not full-length plays or novels, though self-contained extracts are acceptable. The work must be neither previously published nor accepted for publication. All submissions must be received by 1 July 2011.
The Istanbul Review
A Living History of Voices in Ink
Posted on 02 Feb 2011 around 9am


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AMA Guides: Disability v. Impairment
Oklahoma Cases, Statutes and Rules » Benefits » AMA Guides: Disability v. Impairment
THE "IMPAIRMENT" AND "DISABILITY" DISTINCTION IN THE 1977 ACT
The employer urges that the trial judge impermissibly deviated more than 10% from IME's impairment rating because he failed to provide the explanation required by § 17(D) of the compensation law. This issue calls for an analysis of the conceptual distinction between disability and impairment embodied in the 1977 Workers' Compensation Act [1977 Act]. When examining the impact of this legislation, it is helpful first to explore Oklahoma's pre-1977 benefits regime.
The Pre-1977 Disability-Based Compensation Scheme
When first enacted in 1915, Oklahoma's regime for delivery of benefits to an injured worker was designed to restore lost earnings for compensable harm from "hazardous employment". This institutional design established four categories of disability-based [895 P.2d 722] benefits (permanent total, temporary total, permanent partial and temporary partial). The key term "disability" was not defined by statute. The court eventually came to measure it by a worker's capacity to perform "ordinary manual or mechanical labor". An injury to a specific, scheduled member of the body (a classified disability) was measured by the number of weeks in the member schedule, while one to an "unclassified part of the body" fell under the "other cases" clause of § 22 and was compensated on the basis of percentage disability to the body as a whole.
The 1977 Act's Disability-Based and Impairment-Related Benefits Regime
The 1977 Act made two significant changes in the compensation law. It extended coverage to nearly all Oklahoma employees (not just to those in "hazardous employment") and introduced a mixed impairment-related and disability-based benefits regime. The terms disability and impairment were given distinct meanings.
Disability is designed to measure an employee's capacity for work, i.e., the degree to which an injury affects a person's ability to perform any task for which the worker is reasonably suited by training, education and experience. The purpose of disability-related compensation in the 1977 Act is to replace the incapacitated worker's lost earnings for injury to the limbs based on the number of weeks assigned as a maximum for each limb. The Act left intact this (pre-1977) wage-replacement concept of disability but confined its application solely to (1) temporary (temporary total and temporary partial) and (2) permanent total benefits. Permanent total disability is defined as "[i]ncapacity because of accidental injury or occupational disease to earn any wages in any employment for which the employee is or becomes physically suited and reasonably fitted by education, training or experience." In short, a permanently and totally disabled worker within the meaning of the Act is one eligible for wage replacement because of lack of capacity to earn any wages.
Impairment, on the other hand, is a medical condition; it refers to the effect of the injury upon a person's ability to perform basic life functions. The term permanent impairment is defined as "any anatomical or functional abnormality or loss after reasonable medical treatment has been achieved, which abnormality or loss the physician considers to be capable of being evaluated at the time the rating is made." Permanent partial disability means "permanent disability" and is the "same as permanent impairment." This definition not only signifies a complete departure from the old theory of ordinary manual or mechanical labor, but also introduces a new and more specific concept for evaluating permanent partial disability by placing it on a footing absolutely equal with permanent impairment, i.e. loss of bodily function.
The American Medical Association Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment [AMA Guides] provides helpful insight into the impairment-disability dichotomy. An impairment is viewed as a "medical matter", whereas disability is deemed to "arise out of the interaction between impairment and external demands." As used in the AMA Guides, (a) impairment means "an alteration of an individual's health status that is assessed by medical means," and (b) disability, "which is assessed by nonmedical means, means an alteration of an individual's capacity to meet personal, social, or occupational demands, or to meet statutory or regulatory requirements." With the sole exception of scheduled member losses, total or partial, the AMA Guides must be used for rating permanent impairment. In short, permanent partial disability, as distinguished from other payout classes, contemplates recompense for lost physical fitness, though the amount paid the worker must be measured by a percentage age of wages he (or she) would have earned but for the covered injury.
The terms of § 17(D) require that a trial tribunal specifically identify the reason for its award's deviation of more than 10% from the impairment rating by an independent court-appointed physician. Section 17(D), construed together with §§ 3(11) and (13) - the latter two of which define the terms permanent impairment and permanent partial disability - indicates that it is intended to deal with medical permanent partial impairment ratings.
The issue of permanent total disability turns on the evaluation of the worker's present capacity "to earn any wages in any employment for which he is presently suited or fitted by education, training or experience." The determination of a claimant's disability-based benefits presents a fact question for the trial tribunal. Its finding in this case declared Bucek to be totally and permanently disabled. Because § 17(D) has no application to disability-related benefits, the trial tribunal neither grounded its award in the AMA Guides nor was it statutorily required to explain why that award deviated (by 89%) from the IME's impairment rating.
Farm Fresh, Inc. v. Bucek, 1995 OK 44, 895 P.2d 719 (footnotes omitted).