(At the third annual Gitxsan-Carrier (Wet’suwet’en) tribal council convention in 1980, tribal council president Neil Sterritt describes the structure of the land claims office. Its 30 workers are directed by 16 elders from Gitxsan and Carrier villages. This is significant in that the structure is more closely affiliated with the traditional Gitxsan governing system than the Department of Indian Affairs imposed system, which is the tribal council Indian Act model.)
Neil Sterritt, Tribal Council president: The land claims office is many people, it’s actually 30 people in number and in fact is 4,500 people. You have selected about 16 elders from each village who are the true voice who come to us and advise us in the land claims office in terms of what we are doing. The land claims office could do nothing without these people.