Not so fast

Page 5

Editorial

You know what's unreasonable?

Cultural genocide is unreasonable. Pretending to be a modern, post-colonial nation while still practising colonialism is unreasonable.

Let us clear up a couple of things about Canada's history.

In the beginning...of Canada... the people of Europe moved into somebody else's homeland and took everything they could get their hands on. They relied on the kindness of the people whose home this land was and had been for thousands and thousands of years, and took their help to survive and flourish.

Then the newcomers herded those same people who were living in this "empty" land that Europe had "discovered" onto the rockiest, bleakest little patches of dust that could be found and sent their children off to have their languages and cultures beaten out of them.

So it wrankles when a minister of the Crown, Minister Ralph Goodale in particular, tries to sell the Alternative Dispute Resolution that deals with claims that spring from the abuse of those children in the Indian residential school system as "humane."

Canada is suffering an arbitrary, self-serving amnesia about the premeditated assault on Indigenous cultures and languages by only compensating for sexual and physical abuse in the ADR. It's business as usual for the federal government by building a system or process that benefits the non-Native majority. The ADR is all about saving money, limiting liability, and it will be done on the backs of the victims.

And Canada is giving notice that there are more money-saving schemes in store for the future.

The minister of Indian Affairs is saying that First Nations people have to start paying their own way on housing, despite it being an obligation of the federal government since the signing of the treaties. Remember, the treaties? Those agreements that allowed the newcomers to access the lands from which they would reap their great wealth.

Why does it seem that it's always the people who benefited the most from these treaties who most resent living up to their part of the contract?

Minister Robert Nault said that expecting Canada to keep writing cheques is unreasonable. Minister Nault, we don't think you appreciate the breadth of what unreasonable can mean.

Aboriginal people have been housed in the cheapest, most inadequate shacks in over-crowded conditions for more than a century, and now they're being told to show a little initiative and pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. That's unreasonable.

To forget or ignore history in the face of the problems that exist for First Peoples in Canada is unreasonable.

For government leaders to fall all over themselves when the wealthiest among Canadians begin to whine about being asked to pay their fair share-that's unreasonable.

To work within a system that is so messed up that getting straight answers to even the simplest of questions on First Nations funding is impossible-now that's unreasonable.

Bloc Quebecois MP Yvon Lubien said last month that trying to get information about which outside consultants were getting what government contracts for how much from the Department of Indian Affairs was like getting answers from the Mafia. Of course, he had the protection of the House of Commons when he said it.

"The billions of dollars they claim they are spending on First Nations go into the pockets of bureaucrats and go to wasteful projects," he said. "They go for travel abroad to see how other governments deal with their Aboriginal peoples. That is where the money goes. There is a system in this department that operates something like the Mafia, where public servants call the shots and do as they please. You can try to get a breakdown of expenditures in contracts given by the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Canada to communications agencies, for example, or management firms. You can try to find out who profits the most from the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, besides the FirstNations. You will see it is not easy. In fact, it is impossible."

Now, let's get reasonable.