Tories tepid on reserves' water

Enlarge Image

At left, Lucas Rae plays with the treated water in his home on the St.Theresa Point First Nation last year, when the family was getting by with just a few buckets of fresh water a day. At right, Lucas turns the taps in his new bathroom under construction. (JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS) Photo Store

The two replies

OUR Government is strongly committed to the health and safety of all Canadians. That is why we are working with First Nations to improve water and wastewater systems on reserves across the country. We have made important and strategic infrastructure investments to support First Nations in operating their water and wastewater systems... however access to clean and safe water remains a serious concern.

Our Government remains committed to introducing safe drinking water legislation that will be designed to give the same protection to First Nations that other Canadians have.

Our government is also planning investments in nine water systems in Manitoba where the system had a high design risk and high overall risk rating. We recognize more needs to be done, especially in areas like monitoring and training. And that is why our government is investing in the Circuit Rider Training program to train and certify First Nation operators and managers. We continue to work with Island Lake First Nations to address the needs of their communities. We recently provided funding to support Island Lake Tribal Council in conducting a survey of houses to determine necessary retrofits for water service. This data will help my department, Island Lake Tribal Council and the four communities in working together to plan for future water service requirements.

-- Email statement from the office of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Minister John Duncan, Oct. 26, 2011

-- -- --

Our Government has made important and strategic infrastructure investments to support First Nations in operating their water systems. We have also committed to introducing legislation to give the same protection to First Nations that other Canadians have when it comes to accessing safe drinking water. Work is currently being done in partnership with Island Lake First Nations to address the needs of their communities through a survey of houses to determine necessary retrofits for water service. Our Government remains committed to working with First Nations and the province of Manitoba to take action on this important issue.

-- Email statement from Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, Nov. 2, 2011

Related Items

1. Slideshows

   • The fortunate few

2. Articles

   • Public shock, anger over issue evaporate
   • Reserve wrestling with grief
   • Dutch device may fix water problems
   • NRW - why no outrage?
   • The waiting game
   • Lottery for a life

3. Columns

   • Access-to-info system still stinks, two years later

4. Links

   • No Running Water: An in-depth investigation of water issues on Manitoba reserves

Why are thousands of Manitobans using slop pails instead of flush toilets and hauling drinking water from town pumps instead of turning on their kitchen taps?

Ask the province's 11 Conservative MPs that question and you'll get the same answer.

Silence.

There has been virtually no progress in the last year bringing modern sanitation to the 1,400 First Nation homes that lack it, meaning easily-preventable -- and costly -- illnesses such as influenza, diarrhea and skin rashes run rampant, and Third World conditions prevail in communities a few hundred kilometres north of Winnipeg.

Households of a dozen people or more share a slop-pail toilet, human waste is dumped in garbage piles behind homes, and many residents get by on less clean drinking water than international aid workers recommend during disasters.

Given current federal capital budget projections, it's a problem that federal staff admit won't get solved any time soon.

It's not clear if any Manitoba MPs in the government have visited any First Nations homes without indoor plumbing since the issue began making national and international headlines a year ago. It's also not clear whether any government MPs have raised the issue at national caucus meetings, with Prime Minister Stephen Harper, or during budget discussions.

Telephone calls and emails to the province's 11 Tory MPs over three days last week went largely unanswered.

Staff at Portage-Lisgar MP Candice Hoeppner's office called to say she was not available for an interview, and staff at Kildonan-St. Paul MP Joy Smith's office said the same.

Staff at the office of Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, the Provencher MP, emailed a statement echoing a similar email from federal Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Duncan's office late last month when the minister cancelled a seven-minute telephone interview with the Winnipeg Free Press.

No one from the offices of the remaining eight Manitoba Conservative MPs responded at all to requests for interviews.

Two of Manitoba's Conservative MPs, Winnipeg South Centre's Joyce Bateman and Elmwood-Transcona's Lawrence Toet, have only been on the job six months. But others, including Winnipeg South MP Rod Bruinooge and St. Boniface MP Shelly Glover, have some knowledge of aboriginal issues, as both are Métis and both previously served as parliamentary secretary to the minister of Indian Affairs.

Other Tory MPs who did not respond include Steven Fletcher (Charleswood-St. James-Assiniboia), Merv Tweed (Brandon), Robert Sopuck (Dauphin-Swan River-Marquette) and James Bezan (Selkirk-Interlake).

"That's just unacceptable," said Churchill NDP MP Niki Ashton, whose riding includes the Island Lake area and Oxford House First Nation, where hundreds of homes still lack modern sanitation. "It shows how off the radar screen such a critical issue for our own province is."

Northern Grand Chief David Harper, originally from the Island Lake reserve of Garden Hill, has estimated it will cost rougly $66 million to bring pipes or trucked water to all 800 homes in Island Lake that need it. That cash would also pay for renovations to each home to install toilets and tubs. In coming days, a much more precise needs and cost assessment is slated for completion by the Island Lake Tribal Council, using federal funding.

In a wide-ranging interview last month, regional staff from the Manitoba office of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada said Island Lake's four reserves are all slated to get major capital cash for new water and sewer pipes over the next three years. Regional director Anna Fontaine said it is too early to tell how many of the 800 homes will get indoor plumbing under those projects.

In all, roughly $40 million has been set aside for water and sewer projects on Manitoba reserves in preliminary capital budgets for the coming three years. But that cash must be spread out over the province's 60-plus reserves, many of which have aging water and sewage treatment plants recently rated a "high-risk" to human health. Nine of those plants are on Ottawa's to-do list.

Federal Aboriginal Affairs staff say that within existing budgets, the indoor plumbing crisis at Island Lake and beyond will not get solved in the next five years.

maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 7, 2011 A3