Fiddling While Attawapiskat Freezes

Are the federal government and the Assembly of First Nations just playing out the clock until the nation's attention moves on to other issues?

Nearly two weeks after NDP MP Charlie Angus thrust the Attawapiskat crisis into the national consciousness, little has been done to help the remote northern Ontario community beyond the efforts of the Red Cross. Native writer Richard Wagamese has some pointed words in The Globe and Mail for the federal government and the Assembly of First Nations, both of whom seem more willing to plan conferences than see about setting up houses in Attawapiskat. "The real shame of Attawapiskat is that the people who knew these conditions existed never told Canadians about them," writes Wagamese. "It’s Mr. [Shawn] Atleo’s job as AFN national chief to know if his people are living under deplorable conditions. Each elected chief in the assembly has a responsibility to let him know. It’s then his responsibility to tell Canada about it and demand action." The same can be said for the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and the prime minister – they certainly knew of the conditions at Attawapiskat and on dozens of other reserves across the country.

Wagamese suspects that the feds' uninspiring response so far is because they'd rather "ignore and blame" while the AFN wants to perpetuate the status quo to keep itself relevant, regardless of Atleo's pledge to "smash" the status quo. We'd like to disagree with Wagamese, but until we see action – not just words and promises – from the AFN and the federal government, we can't.

The National Post's, John Ivison proposes a beautifully simple way to ease some of the problems faced in aboriginal communities in northern Ontario: Roads. "Most of the real basket-case reserves have one thing in common - no permanent road transportation link," notes Ivison. Jean Charest's government has paid $800 million to help connect Cree communities along the Quebec shore of James Bay to the rest of the province, but the Ontario government has no such plan to bring northern transportation into the mid-20th century. Roads make it easier to bring goods in and out of remote regions, and make resource-based industry far more viable in previously untapped areas. Plus, building the roads would require hiring a bunch of people in the area – a mini-stimulus project that would leave long-lasting benefits. "Building roads over muskeg would be expensive," says Ivison. "But so is flying in supplies and flying out sick people and prison inmates." Roads might not be as sexy as other suggestions – scrapping the Indian Act, relocating reserves closer to major cities – but they would have real, tangible effects on communities that have been left to fester for far too long.

The Montreal Gazette's editorialists have had enough of the "distinctly unhelpful" finger-pointing over Attawapiskat, telling all the relevant parties – from band leaders to Bob Rae to Stephen Harper – to shut their traps for a minute. Of course, that doesn't stop the editorialists from blaming Aboriginal Affairs for doing "a singularly wretched job over too many years - including, it should be noted, during decades when the Liberals were in power." For example:

A British Columbia band with just 16 status members, for instance, received $18 million over a three-year period late last decade, while a Quebec reserve with nearly 3,000 residents received only $5 million more. In the one case that amounted to $1.1 million per band member; in the other, roughly $8,000 per member.

The department has also been wretchedly slipshod in tracking the reserves' finances, allowing many to run up crippling debts without timely intervention. And this has happened even though the department is the fifth-largest bureaucracy in the country, whose full-time staff has nearly doubled over the past 15 years.

Other examples include the fact that we're even having this discussion. Reforming the way a massive government department operates won't be popular and isn't going to happen overnight. But as we've argued before, the Harper government can leave a legacy for generations of First Nations people by tackling the Indian Act and its attendant bureaucracy with the same political capital and determination as it has their misguided tough on crime agenda. It would be refreshing to see this government concentrate their efforts on this most shameful of crimes - the squalor that Canada has allowed First Nations citizens to live in, both on and off reserve. Adding insult to injury, the crime bill may well exasperate the abhorrent incarceration rates First Nations people already experience in this country.