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Jason Teakle
BRANT NEWS
Inspired by Attawapiskat First Nation Chief Theresa Spence’s ongoing hunger strike, some Brantford residents are joining Canadians in a fasting campaign being held in solidarity with indigenous peoples.
Brant NDP member Marc Laferriere recently launched the online Fast4Change campaign to support the development of a more positive relationship between First Nations peoples and the Government of Canada.
“I don’t think it’s controversial to say there can be an improvement in the relationship between First Nations and the Government of Canada,” Laferriere said. “Something like Fast4Change can be very inclusive for folks that agree with that. A rolling hunger strike where people take 24-hour blocks to fast could create these conversations in communities across the country.”
Laferriere said since the online launch more than 50 people – including residents of Manitoba, Quebec and Ontario – have signed up to fast on a day of their choice.
A grassroots campaign called Idle No More has held protests across the country in recent days, following Spence’s decision to begin a hunger strike on Dec. 11. The campaign was born, in part, because Spence said she is willing to die if the federal government does not show increased respect for First Nations treaties.
Spence recently began living in a teepee on Victoria Island in the Ottawa River, which is considered traditional native territory. A rally was recently held on Parliament Hill in support of Spence.
Laferriere said the Fast4Change campaign allows everyone to become involved in a conversation about better respecting First Nations peoples.
“I thought about how people can participate in various communities if they couldn’t make it to Ottawa,” Laferriere said. “It will put conversations out there with people they know, too. We’re not asking anybody to fundraise, we just want to spread the word. This is about rights, respect and relationships. What we are looking to do is to raise awareness that there is amazing potential for a better relationship between First Nations and the Government of Canada. It is possible.”
Rev. Jon Massimi of Counterpoint Church, an extension of Grace Anglican Church, said he joined the Fast4Change campaign because building relationships with First Nations peoples is not just a “native issue.”
“After speaking with (Laferriere) and doing my research, I discovered that this is more than a native issue,” Massimi said. “It is one that all Canadians should concern themselves with. I believe the role of government is not just to govern, but to care for and support the most vulnerable in our society. I see our native brothers and sisters being the vulnerable at this time. Some are living in sub-par, third-world development conditions. We can’t sit back when there are people in our country living this way.”
Visit www.fast4change.com for more information.
I understand people want to help indians living in poor conditions on Indian reesrves but people also need to understand some history.
The Indian chiefs and headmen negotiated and made treaties with the Crown. The Indian chiefs and headmen ceded land to the Crown but chose the land they wanted hold back (i.e. reserve) for the Indian bands. That is the reason we call them Indian reserves.
To obtain the land from the Indians, the Crown paid lump sums of money and/or goods to the Indian bands and promised small annuities to the Indian bands and to individual Indians.
In the treaties, the Indian chiefs and headmen gave up “all right and title” to the land the Indians ceded to the Crown outside of the reserves.
According to the treaties, the Crown promised the Indians they could hunt and fish in the areas the Indians had ceded to the Crown until the Crown leased or sold the land for development.
And, in those treaties, the Indians promised not to interfere with development on land the chiefs and headmen had ceded to the Crown.
In some, but not all, treaties the Crown promised a school and/or a teacher on each reserve. In a couple of treaties the Crown promised a medicine bag on each reserve.
The Crown did not promise in any treaty to provide, pay for and maintain infrastructure like roads, bridges, houses, treatment plants, community centres, healing centres, bingo halls, hockey rinks, old age homes, band offices, etc. or to pay for services like policing or to pay for social programs on Indian reserves.
Nevertheless, the Canadian federal government (the big Crown) now sends about $11 billion of money from taxpayers per year to pay for and maintain infrastructure like roads, bridges, houses, treatment plants, community centres, healing centres, bingo halls, old age homes, hockey rinks, band offices, etc. and to pay for services like policing and to pay for social programs for Indians the Crown did not promise in treaties for Indians on reserves.
In addition, the provincial governments (the little Crowns) are providing millions of dollars from taxpayers to pay for projects on Indian reserves even though Section 91 part 24 of the Canadian Constitution says the Canadian government is responsible for “Indians, and Lands reserved for the Indians”.
Furthermore, companies that are developing land outside of Indian reserves are now paying money directly to Indians on reserves even though those same compmanies pay taxes to the Crown it is already sending some of that tax money from companies to Indian reserves.
The Crown and the rest of us are sharing with the Indians and are providing far more money than is required according to treaties to pay for infrastructure, services and social programs for Indians the Crown did not even promise in treaties for Indians on reserves.
But do we hear a thank you? No, we only hear demands for more.
So, how much more should the Crown and the rest of us pay beyond the requirements of the treaties?
If the Indians in the Idle No More movement really want the Crown to live up to the treaties, the Indians had better careful what they are wishing for. If the Crown were to actually abide by the wording in the treaties, it would have to stop paying more than is required in any treaty with Indians and stop paying for the infrastructure, services and programs the Crown did not promise in treaties to pay for on Indian reserves.
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Chief Spence from the Attawapiskat Cree Indian reserve on the west side of James Bay is on a hunger strike on Victoria Island in the Ottawa River and she is demanding to talk to PM Harper and the Governor General nation-to-nation about Indian treaty rights.
Well, the Crown didn’t make treaties with Indians nation-to-nation.
The Ojibwa in general, for example, could be considered an Indian nation.
But Crown did not make one treaty with the entire Ojibwa nation.
The Crown made the 1850 Robinson Huron Treaty with some Ojibwa bands. The Crown then made the 1850 Superior Treaty with a different group of Ojibwa bands. The Crown then made other treaties with even different groups of Ojibwa bands and so on.
The same sort thing occurred with the Cree. The Cree are spread around Hudson’s Bay and James Bay through northern Quebec and northern Ontario. The Crown made different treaties with different bands of Cree. The Crown did not make one treaty nation-to-nation with the entire Cree nation.
So the treaties the Crown made with Indians were not actually made nation-to-nation.
Here is something else to think about.
Chief Spence is the elected band council chief of the Attawapiskat reserve with 1,864 people that is one Cree band under one treaty, Treaty 9.
Chief Spence is basically the equivalent of a mayor of a small village and she is not even the oveall leader of all the Cree bands that signed Treaty 9.
Chief Spence is not the leader of the entire Cree nation and, as I said above, the treaties the Crown made with Indian bands were not actually made nation-to-nation.
So, what gives chief Spence the mandate to demand to speak with PM Harper nation-to-nation to discuss the treaties?
And, why should chief Spence be able to discuss treaties other Indian bands from other Indian nations like the Ojibwa made with the Crown?
And, if Chief Spence can get an audience with PM Harper to discuss the treaties, why do Indians need Shawn Atleo who is the Grand Chief of the Assembly of First Nations? In fact, why would Indians even need the Assembly of First Nations?
And, if all of the mayors of cities across Canada were to go on hunger strikes and demand to speak with PM Harper, would he be obliged to meet with each one? Give me a break.
And, if Chief Spence can go on a hunger strike to demand PM Harper and the Governor General talk personally with Chief Spence, maybe Brantford mayor Friel should go on a hunger strike and demand to speak with PM Harper and the Governor General about the illegal occupation of the Kanata site by the Mohawk Workers and Six Nations protests and inference with development in Brantford.
The Indians already get far more than is required in treaties to pay for and maintain infrastructure and to pay for services and to pay for social programs the Crown didn’t even promise in treaties to pay for on Indian reserves. What are the Indians doing with all of that money?
The Harper government wants to pass a law that would force Indian chiefs on reserves to divulge their salaries and incomes publicy. The chiefs don’t like it.
I have a feeling the Indian Idle No More movement is more about getting more money than it is about treaty rights and I have a feeling Chief Spence’s hunger strike is more agaisnt divulging Indian chief income than about treaty rights.
In my opinion, Chief Spence is grandstanding and people shouldn’t be taken in by it.
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According to the Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development there are 1,864 Cree people living on the Attawapiskat Indian reserve.
Page 4 of the Attawapiskat financial statement for the year ending March 31, 2001 shows the following Revenue (Income) and Expenditures.
Revenue
Aboriginal Affairs Canada – $17,064,573
Health and Welfare Canada – $1,340,026
Casino Rama – $3,401,784
Province of Ontario – $4,730,435
Contracting and user fees – $1,297,410
Attawapiskat Trust Distributions – $961,868
Mushkegowuk Council – $270,493
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. – $403,986
Other – $4,844,313
Total – $34,314,888
Expenditures
Total – $31,174,847
Annual Surplus – $3,140,041
In addition, the Attawapiskat reserve has recived $10.5 million from the DeBeers Diamond mine outside of the reserve. That money is held in trust.
About 100 Cree work at the DeBeers mine and Attawapiskat also has $325 million in contracts with DeBeers to supply services to the diamond mine.
Nevertheless, in the fall of 2011, Attawapiskat Chief Spence declared a housing emergency.
Consequently, the Canadian federal government arranged for a third-party manager for the reserve. The third-party manager arranged to send supplies, to pay $50,000 to repair the healing centre for temporary shelter and to send 22 new modular homes to the Attawapiskat reserve at an additional cost of $1.2 million.
How come money from the Attawapiskat $3,140,041 annual surplus or from the $10.5 million in the trust fund could not have been used to repair and provide housing?
Pictures of some the houses showed parts of walls ripped off inside, broken windows, holes through the walls to the exterior and some mold. Who is damaging the houses and why are they damaging houses provided by the government? Why aren’t Cree people in Attawapiskat keeping the houses in good repair?
On Indian reserves, the band get houses from the Federal government but the band then takes over the houses and people pay rent to the band government. How come money from the rent was not used to repair houses or to provide new houses as required?
Who owns the companies that have contracts with DeBeers? Where is that money going? How come the band council doesn’t collect fees or taxes from those contracts to help the needy and fix or replace houses?
The Attawapiskat reserve has an indoor hockey rink and they bought a Zamboni for about $80,000. Why did they spend money on an indoor hockey rink and a Zamboni if they had a housing crisis and needed money to repair or replace houses?
There is a lot of money going to the Attwapiskat reserve and a lot questions about how the money is being used.
Maybe people should be asking why there is poverty on the Attwapiskat reserve, where all of the money is going, whether they need more money or whether they just have to use the money they are getting properly.
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Some Indians in the Idle No More movement have been blocking roads, highways and rail lines and some have been talking about sovereignty.
Well, here are a couple of interesting excerpts from Treaty 9, which covers Attawapiskat and which is one of the 11 numbered treaties from northwestern Ontario across western Canada into northeastern BC.
It says “And the undersigned Ojibeway, Cree and other chiefs and headmen, on their own behalf and on behalf of all the Indians whom they represent, do hereby solemnly
promise and engage to strictly observe this treaty, and also to conduct and
behave themselves as good and loyal subjects of His Majesty the King”.
It also says “They promise and engage that they will, in all respects, obey and abide by the law; that they will maintain peace between each other and between themselves and other tribes of Indians, and between themselves and others of His Majesty’s
subjects, whether Indians, half-breeds or whites, this year inhabiting and
hereafter to inhabit any part of the said ceded territory; and that they will
not molest the person or property of any inhabitant of such ceded tract, or of
any other district or country, or interfere with or trouble any person passing
or travelling through the said tract, or any part thereof, and that they will
assist the officers of His Majesty in bringing to justice and punishment any
Indian offending against the stipulations of this treaty, or infringing the law
in force in the country so ceded”.
Those or very similar statements occur in all of the numbered treaties.
That basically means the Indians in those treaties agreed by treaty to become subjects of the British Crown so they cannot claim sovereignty and they agreed to obey the laws of the Crown so they should not be blocking roads, highways and/or rail lines.
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