It’s not often an MP visits our nations. And even more rare when one comes to the annual general meeting of Naut’sa mawt Tribal Council.

So, history was made on Feb. 12 when MP Rachel Blaney, the newly elected member of Parliament for North Island-Powell River stopped in to say a few words to the gathering in Parksville.

The backstory to this is that Rachel is the partner of Darren Blaney from Homalco First Nation. The day was also the couple’s wedding anniversary, so they were spending extra time at Tigh-na-mara resort in order to take advantage of Valentine’s Day two days later.

Rachel and Darren Blaney

Chairman for the day was Chief Gordon Planes of T’Sou-ke. He asked Darren to introduce his wife Rachel and invited her to say a few words

Rachel said that she was honoured to be asked to speak and felt it was a real honour to do this work and to meet with representatives of the eleven member nations.

Doug White Sr. of Snuneymuxw told Rachel that it was an honour to have her at the AGM and that the tribal council had never had an MP attend a meeting before. He also said that that he was pleased that she is working from within our nations, for our nations.