Ministers responsible for indigenous affairs in the territories and provinces, and leaders from national indigenous organizations met with the federal minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs in Ottawa Friday to discuss how governments can improve the quality of life for indigenous peoples in Canada, and advance the process of reconciliation.

The Federal, Provincial and Territorial Indigenous Forum, which will happen annually, replaces the Aboriginal Affairs Working Group. The major difference is that the federal government is now actively involved.

Deputy premier Elaine Taylor was present on behalf of the Yukon, and called the meeting “historic,” because it was the first time the federal government was at the table with ministers from the provinces and territories in charge of indigenous affairs in their respective jurisdictions.

“Now the feds have come to the table, so this is an opportunity to really engage with Canada on issues important to indigenous peoples and all Canadians,” said Taylor.

The primary focus of the FPTIF is to find ways to close the socio-economic gaps between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples.

This means reducing the number of indigenous children in the child welfare system, bringing down rates of poverty, improving the delivery of health services, and preventing violence against indigenous women and girls.

The group discussed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action, which aim to redress harms caused by the legacy of the residential school system, and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), which Canada officially adopted last month.

Under UNDRIP, governments are required to secure “free, prior and informed consent,” for natural resource development on traditional territories.

The group also agreed to work together on the National Inquiry of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.

“The national inquiry that the federal government has committed to proceeding with is of utmost importance to Canada and of great importance to the Yukon,” said Taylor, who has been in charge of this file as minister responsible for the Women’s Directorate.

Taylor said other jurisdictions have recognized the Yukon for its work hosting a regional roundtable on the issue in Februrary, and a family gathering last December.

“The fact that we have come together with Yukon First Nations, Yukon women’s organizations, municipalities, RCMP and with families as well, is something that is fairly new to other jurisdictions,” said Taylor.

The forum was co-chaired by Northwest Territories Premier Bob McLeod and Carolyn Bennett, the federal Minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs, and was attended by representatives from the Assembly of First Nations, Métis National Council, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, Indigenous Peoples’ Assembly of Canada and Native Women’s Association of Canada.

Yet some were displeased with the structure of the forum, saying that the First Nations themselves should be involved in these talks.

“These organizations are off-shoots of the colonial sphere, this is the white way of doing things, the colonizers way,” said Stephen John Ford, a constitutional and criminal lawyer working out of Toronto and a citizen of Mohawk (Tyendinaga) First Nation.

“It is the people and the people alone who have the final say, but they’re not included in this anywhere.”

Ford said that a better approach might be to have “confederacies of communities” represented.

There are 633 recognized First Nations communities in Canada, and many of these communities are parts of larger nations, such as Cree and Mi’kmaq.

Ford called also called for more transparency.

Neither transcripts nor detailed results from the forum are available to the public.

Taylor said the Federal, Provincial and Territorial Indigenous Forum reflects what the Yukon is doing, but on a national level, and views it as a positive step in building relationships.

“In the Yukon, we work individually with Yukon First Nations and self-governing First Nations through intergovernmental forums, and of course working on a day-to-day basis on implementing those treaties,” she said.

“This is really another organization working collectively on the national level on issues similar to issues in the Yukon.”