The white people came and changed our religion.

Canadians are consumers so they rely on our resources – I would try as much as possible to protect my land rights and not extinguish them.

[Canadians] cherish a country and they cherish their piece of property because it has a value. It is an investment for them. Nitassinan is our homeland, it’s our land, our way of life, our culture. It’s more than a piece of property that you can sell and hope to get a better deal or more money. It’s who we are.

It started in August that people would go back to their villages and they would work until the first freeze and that’s where the stories started to be told in the community. Young people don’t know these stories – in these stories there is education. It teaches where we came from, how animals and plants came here. It also helps young children to believe that they can do whatever they need to – like using a bow and arrow to go hunting. It’s to help young people know how they came to earth.

Drugs and alcohol are the community’s cry for help.

When I look at the eagle feather, that is how much I have to do in the culture [something for every strand of the feather].

We have no land to pass on – the children turn to alcohol out of hopelessness.

The government fails to tell the real story about the Indian people. They don’t tell the fact that this [status] card is only useful on an Innu reserve. If I work outside the reserve I pay taxes just like the other citizens of Canada.

I have to respect the decisions that other nations made – they didn’t sell their land, they just lost it. I didn’t like what the Cree and Inuit did because they sold land that was not theirs – but they were under a lot of pressure from the government.