Advice on advisories: treat First Nations as equals

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/10/2020 (1834 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Another week, another First Nation declares a state of emergency due to tainted drinking water in its community.

Last weekend, nearly all of the 300 residents of Neskantaga First Nation, an Oji-Cree community on the banks of Attawapiskat Lake in Northern Ontario, were evacuated 450 kilometres south to Thunder Bay, after hydrocarbons were discovered in the local reservoir.

This is nothing new for Neskantaga. A year ago, the community declared a state of emergency when water pumps stopped working. It has lived under a consistent boil-water advisory since 1995.

It is not alone.

Nearby Grassy Narrows (Asubpeeschoseewagong) First Nation has suffered from mercury poisoning in its water since the 1970s.

Shoal Lake 40, near the Manitoba border, had its water stolen by the city of Winnipeg in 1915, and has been under a drinking water advisory since 1997. (It’s new water treatment plant is supposed by completed in early 2021.)

According to the federal government, 61 First Nations live under long-term drinking water advisories — that’s one-sixth of all First Nations.

Most of the affected are in northwestern Ontario. There are three in Manitoba: Tataskweyak, Wuskwi Sipihk, and Shamattawa.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government claim they have lifted 95 boil-water advisories since taking office in 2015, and promise to lift all such warnings by March 2021.

As Neskantaga evacuees were flying to Thunder Bay, though, Trudeau appeared to step back, blaming travel restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and said his government will work to lift advisories “as soon as possible.”

Trudeau’s promise is not because of kindness or reconciliation or a “nation-to-nation” relationship, but the law.

In 2013, the federal government passed the Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act, which requires it to “develop regulations to ensure access to safe, clean and reliable drinking water; effective treatment of wastewater; and the protection of sources of drinking water on First Nation lands.”

This is not to mention providing Indigenous communities with safe drinking water is not reconciliation; it’s treating people like human beings.

So, what’s the problem? Every week, news comes of another state of emergency, another long-term water advisory, another First Nation in crisis. Boil-water advisories are not solely a First Nations problem, but it sure seems like it.

As of Monday, there are approximately 900 boil-water advisories across Canada, most often in towns or sections of cities. (In my neighbourhood, for example, residents are recommended to run the water for a half-minute before drinking, due to the city’s older pipes and infrastructure.)

The difference is such advisories in cities and towns are usually rectified in days; on First Nations, they last decades.

In 2016, the watchdog group Human Rights Watch performed a study on the water and sanitation issues in First Nations communities in Canada. The report found “a lack of binding water quality regulations, insufficient funding, faulty or substandard infrastructure, and degraded source waters” and “a pattern of overpromising and underperforming on water and sanitation on reserves.”

A frequent argument is First Nations communities are “remote” but, as the report identifies, nearby Canadian cities and towns never face the same amount of advisories.

As the report concludes — and anyone on reserve will tell you — the biggest problem is the draconian control the federal government places on First Nations governments.

Because First Nations live under the Indian Act, which obliterates any ability to control the local economy (including taxing businesses and citizens, not that there is much to tax), leaders cannot use funding from Indigenous Affairs for anything other than in areas dictated by the minister.

First Nations governments must stand by while emergencies go unaddressed or use the money, get more controls placed upon them for “mismanaging funds,” and end up with their community in third-party management.

Anyone who ever says the problem with First Nations affairs is “corrupt chiefs” simply doesn’t know the way things work.

The problem resides in not treating First Nations governments like actual governments. Respecting First Nations communities like any Canadian community expects to be treated. Acknowledging First Nations citizens as human beings.

Another word for that is racism, but I digress.

As the emergency response to the COVID-19 pandemic shows, where there is a will to deal with an emergency, there is a way.

For Canada, there is simply barely any will until people start to die.

niigaan.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca