Winnipeg Centre MP Robert-Falcon Ouellette visited Dakota Tipi first nation last Friday.

Blanket CeremonyCouncillor Karl Stone arranged the meeting, and outlines what happened.

"We had a really positive impact on the issues that we're trying to get across to the federal government. Our position is to try to unite our Dakota Nations so we can build a relationship with the federal government and resolving some of the outstanding issues, like our sovereignty, which needs to be addressed and needs to be brought to the forefront."

Ouellette informed the community about the new Nation-to-Nation process of working with the Canadian government, and explains what the govenrment had in mind when they initiated the process.

"They didn't believe it meant small reserve communities -- which was really imposed by the Indian Act -- but these larger groupings of people, who share culture and economics, and just an affinity for each other in language between each other, that could work well together."

He provides an example of what can be accomplished for the Dakotas.

"Because the idea, for instance, if you're going to have a group that comes together and they're going to try and work together on their own education system, they can do their education system in their own language: A bilingual Dakota/English language system. And they don't have to negotiate with the Cree and the Ojibway."