AANO Committee Report

Aboriginal: Persons of First Nations, Métis and Inuit ancestry.

Bilingual: In the case of Nunavut, the English and Inuktitut languages.

Comprehensive land claim agreement: A modern treaty that defines a government-to-government relationship between the Aboriginal signatory, the relevant territorial government, and the Government of Canada.

Devolution: The process of transferring province-like authority to the territorial and Aboriginal governments in the North, including control over such areas as health and social services and the regulation of lands and resources.

Governance: Includes comprehensive land claim and self-government agreements, regulatory regimes, devolution, resource revenue sharing and fiscal arrangements among federal, territorial and Aboriginal governments in the territories.

Impact Benefit agreement: A confidential agreement negotiated in the context of resource development between a company, the relevant provincial or territorial government and affected Aboriginal organizations.

Net fiscal benefit: The extent to which territorial natural resource revenues resulting from devolution are offset by reductions in the Territorial Formula Financing grant.

Procurement: A government policy which seeks to attain value for money, public access to information on government contracts, and fair opportunities for suppliers to compete for government contracts.

Public-private partnership: A cooperative venture where there is an allocation of the risks inherent in the provision of a public service between the public and private sectors.

Resource revenue sharing: In the case of devolution, a resource revenue sharing agreement sets out how revenues from the collection of royalties and fees through resource extraction are to be shared among federal, territorial and Aboriginal governments.

Revenue-generating (fiscal) capacity: A measure of the potential revenue that could be raised if each territory applied tax rates comparable to those of the provinces.

Self-government agreement: An agreement that allows for power-sharing arrangements between territorial, federal, and Aboriginal governments in law making and administration of human services.

Territorial Formula Financing: The main federal funding program that supports territories, intended to ensure a standard level of public services that is comparable to that offered in the provinces.