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A First Nations transparency bill slated to pass the Senate Thursday has attracted new controversy after a Senate Liberal accused the Conservative MP behind the legislation of acting like a “white man.”

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Both parliamentarians come from Saskatchewan and both are Cree. Conservative MP Rob Clarke is now calling on Senate Liberal Lillian Dyck to publicly apologize and withdraw her comments.

Dyck says she doesn’t consider her comments offensive.

During Senate debate on Tuesday, Dyck suggested Clarke hadn’t shown enough respect when he testified about his bill, which would require First Nations bands to publicly post their bylaws; would eliminate references to residential schools in the Indian Act; and would require the government to report to the House of Commons on efforts to replace the Indian Act itself.

That, for a First Nations man, is not traditional First Nations behaviour. It was not at all. It is what we would call … white man behaviour, and you can be insulted by that if you like



Clarke’s private member’s bill arrived in the Senate from the Commons, where it had passed, before the First Nations Education Act which has been a lightning rod for debate in the aboriginal community, got to the upper chamber. (The Senate has now started what’s known as a pre-study of that legislation.)