Aboriginal housing campaigner Sylvia Isaac says she has seen no sign that Stephen Harper cares about low-income people.
October 9, 2008
Conservatives ignore aboriginal poverty
Why should First Nations people expect a better deal with your party?
Joyce Murray
Liberal MP, Vancouver Quadra
“The Kelowna Accord lives on in the Liberal platform. We’ve maintained the commitment to it. Aboriginal people are a fast-growing demographic, and both for humanitarian and economic reasons, we need to bridge the gap between their health and education outcomes and those of nonaboriginal people. The Liberals have long had a very balanced approach, which includes a sound economy. It’s part of Liberal values to have a country that includes its more vulnerable people and find ways to have a fair deal.”
Libby Davies
NDP MP, Vancouver East
“The Liberal platform seriously underfunds the hard-won Kelowna Accord. So we think that our commitment, which is part of the balanced budget, is a much stronger commitment to First Nations communities. We’re saying $5 billion over five years. We also want to move much more expeditiously on a comprehensive land-claims policy. I think commitment to a community economic-development plan through infrastructure programs that respect First Nations governance models is something that is very strong with the NDP.”
Blair Wilson
Green MP, West Vancouver–Sunshine Coast–Sea to Sky Country
“The Green party is the only party that has any credibility when it comes to environmental stewardship. We’ve got a number of reserves across this country that have dismal water quality. The environmental record of the Green party and the push for clean water is what resonates with First Nations. Our big focus besides environmental stewardship is promoting and increasing the investment in our economy. One of the things the government has to do is to promote alternate sources of energy and create jobs at the local level.”
Kimball Cariou
Communist party candidate for Vancouver Kingsway
“The Communist Party was the first political party in Canada to recognize the inherent national rights of First Nation peoples and to call for their right to self-determination and self-government. We’re the only political party in the history of this country that based its policy right from the beginning on the fact that capitalism in Canada…was built on the theft of aboriginal land. We’ve maintained a consistent position for over 70 years of support of aboriginal struggles.”
Standing in the midmorning breeze with a Canadian flag draped over her shoulders, Sylvia Isaac worried about the prospect of the Conservatives winning this federal election.
“This country is going to the dogs,” the Carrier Sekani woman and board member of the Pacific Association of First Nations Women told the Georgia Straight at Vancouver’s Grandview Park on October 4.
Isaac joined antipoverty and housing activists in a gathering at the park to call attention to the plight of homeless aboriginal people, who were overrepresented in the 2008 homelessness count in the Lower Mainland.
Later that day, other advocates stood at the corner of Main Street and 36th Avenue to ask federal politicians to make housing for all a central issue in this election.
“They don’t even care about people who are middle class,” Isaac said of Conservative Leader Stephen Harper and the Conservative party. “They just care about high-income people, and people of low income are forgotten.”
On September 29, the Ottawa-based staff of the Make Poverty History campaign launched YouTube videos of leaders of the Liberal party, NDP, Bloc Québécois, and Green party answering a set of questions on how they intend to tackle poverty (www.makepovertyhistory.ca/ontherecord).
According to Dennis Howlett, Canadian coordinator for the global antipoverty campaign, Harper didn’t make himself available.
Two of the five questions asked of the federal leaders dealt with their plans for aboriginal people and, specifically, what they intend to do with the Kelowna Accord. The landmark agreement among federal, provincial, and Native leaders committed $5.1 billion over five years for various aboriginal programs.
“It was an important step forward to addressing aboriginal poverty,” Howlett told the Straight of the Kelowna Accord. “It was a real shame…to have it just cancelled when the Conservatives got in.”
All four opposition leaders promised on YouTube to go ahead with the deal that outlined a 10-year plan to bridge the standard-of-living gap between Native and non-Native Canadians by 2016.
The Kelowna Accord provided for $1.6 billion in housing-related initiatives. The agreement was concluded on November 25, 2005, after 18 months of negotiations. A few days later, the Liberal government of then–prime minister Paul Martin fell. After forming a minority government in February 2006, the Conservatives ignored the accord.
When the issue of the Kelowna Accord came up in the House of Commons on April 11, 2008, Hansard records that Conservative Cariboo–Prince George MP Richard Harris dismissed the agreement as a “bogus $5-billion press release”.
Hansard transcripts from May 28 this year also show that Chuck Strahl, the minister of Indian affairs and Conservative Chilliwack–Fraser Canyon MP, likewise disparaged the Kelowna Accord, calling it a “press release” with “nothing in there that said how we were going to change the system to make it work”.
On June 18, the Kelowna Accord Implementation Act—a private member’s bill introduced by Martin that was supported by the Liberals, the NDP, and the Bloc—received royal assent.
The next day, Liberal Vancouver Quadra MP Joyce Murray stood in the House of Commons to demand the implementation of this law.
“It’s not unusual for citizen groups to take the government to court when they feel that the laws are not being properly applied,” Murray told the Straight about what may happen should another Conservative government choose to ignore the Kelowna Accord. “That’s happened in cases with respect to the environment and species at risk. The government has been sued for ignoring its law.”
Patrick Stewart chairs the Aboriginal Homelessness Steering Committee, which has been working since 2000 to address Native housing concerns in Metro Vancouver. He said dealing with the federal government on this issue hasn’t been easy.
“We used to have to fight with the Liberals, but at least they were willing to sit down and talk about it,” Stewart told the Straight. “With Conservatives, it’s very difficult even to meet with them. They just closed the doors when they got into power. We noticed the difference right away because ministers all of a sudden couldn’t come to a meeting, couldn’t say things, you know.”
The state of Native housing
> About one in six First Nations homes are overcrowded.
> Overcrowding in First Nations homes is almost double the Canadian rate.
> About one in three First Nations people consider their water supply unsafe for drinking.
> Almost one in 30 First Nations people live in homes without hot running water.
> Almost half of First Nations homes are contaminated by mould.
> Six percent of on-reserve houses are without sewage services.
> Most First Nations people spend more than 30 percent of their income
on rent.
Source: Assembly of First Nations
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