MONTREAL - Decades of stop-and-start negotiations between Ottawa and the Quebec Cree ended Monday with the unveiling of a $1.4-billion agreement to launch the northern First Nation toward self-government.
The deal reaches back to settle billions of dollars in lawsuits and puts into action a 1975 treaty between the two sides that stalled shortly after it was signed.
The agreement running through 2027 will give the Cree control over millions of dollars to improve local services ranging from sewers and roads to economic development projects and policing. Much of the work is expected to start in the next five to 10 years.
The Cree will also begin negotiations with Quebec and Ottawa to create a new form of regional government.
Longtime Cree leader and former grand chief Billy Diamond, who signed the original 1975 treaty with then-Indian affairs minister Jean Chretien, lauded the deal to finally put those words into action.
"It beats blocking roads and railroads," Diamond said shortly after the announcement.
"You don't have to block railroads. You stay at the negotiating table. This is the only way you can deal with government right now."
The agreement is subject to ratification on both sides, including a vote among the 16,500 Cree in a referendum that is expected to be complete by the fall.
Lawrence Cannon, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Quebec lieutenant, said the agreement corrects decades of federal inaction with the Cree.
"It allows us to resolve differences that have persisted for 30 years," Cannon said.
"Under this agreement, the Cree nation will assume the responsibilities of the federal government that have not been fulfilled in 30 years."
Cree Grand Chief Matthew Mukash said the long delay in finally moving forward on the treaty was triggered by a host of factors.
"We've had differences with the government of Canada for many years," Mukash told a news conference Monday.
"Every time we thought we were close to an agreement there would be a change of leadership. That slowed negotiations."
Cree leaders praised federal negotiator Raymond Chretien -- former prime minister Jean Chretien's nephew -- for sweeping aside decades of mistrust since his appointment to the post in 2004.
They also credited the Conservative government and Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice for sticking with the Liberal appointee.
"Raymond took a different approach to the negotiations," said Cree negotiator Bill Namagoose, who spent 18 years at the table and watched negotiations stall seven times.
"Rather than come in as a defence lawyer for the federal government, he came in as a problem solver. That approach really changed the dynamic of the negotiations."
The deal will be put to a referendum in the Cree communities in northern Quebec and the 10 per cent of the Cree population that lives outside the area.
Raymond Chretien says he is particularly pleased with the lengthy time frame of the agreement and the cordial relations that have been restored between the Cree and Ottawa.
"The atmosphere was polluted, there wasn't the confidence between the Cree and the federal government that there should have been," Chretien said.
"We have settled the recriminations of the past 30 years, and we've built a framework for the next 20 years."
The Cree reached a settlement with Quebec in 2002 in the "Paix des braves" deal. The province agreed to pay the Cree about $70 million per year through 2027. In return, the Cree dropped lawsuits to allow Hydro-Quebec projects to go ahead.
Former Quebec premier Bernard Landry, who signed the 2002 agreement, said leadership questions have often hindered negotiations with the Cree over past decades.
"It takes a strong, national leadership, not eight village chiefs who each come with different demands," Landry said.
"That really hindered our efforts."
Native leaders expect the federal deal to pass easily in the referendum, unlike the Quebec agreement, which faced heated opposition within the Cree community.
The Quebec agreement led to the diversion of a major river and new hydro development.
"This agreement is not controversial, it doesn't deal with a project, there's no exchange for signing the agreement," said Matthew Coon Come, a Cree adviser and former grand chief.
Chief Losty Mamianskum of the Whapmagoostu First Nation says the deal should bring concrete benefits to his isolated community on James Bay.
His community is the northernmost Cree community and the only one that doesn't have a road to the south. He hopes to build a small harbour to reduce isolation, to complete a water and sewage project and launch economic development projects.
