By CHRISTINA BLIZZARD
Nov. 15, 2006
If you listened carefully to Premier Dalton McGuinty and his minister responsible for aboriginal affairs, you started to get the drift about what is happening with the Caledonia stand-off -- if, when and how it will end. If ever.
McGuinty raised eyebrows yesterday when he mused that
"We are caught up in a police action here which apparently we are going to have to maintain indefinitely," McGuinty said in a scrum before a caucus meeting.
"Fundamentally this is a dispute between the Six Nations community and the federal government and until they come to the table with a determination to resolve it, we are going to be caught on the ground there."
Whoa. The cost of round-the-clock policing in the troubled disputed territory is already at $25 million -- and climbing. That's on top of the estimated $20 million it cost to buy the land and compensate the developers, Henco Industries. And now we're hearing there's no end in sight?
Well, I'm sure glad my backyard doesn't back on to the muddy wasteland that the native protesters are holding hostage. The premier added that after a recent meeting between federal Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice and David Ramsay, who has responsibility provincially for native affairs, the feds are, "more impressed with the urgency of the situation, and I think we will see more urgency to resolve the situation." Well, perhaps the feds will just "resolve the situation," by sending cash on a daily basis to pay for the cops. But I don't think so.
A TRADE-OFF
Ramsay provided a tantalizing glimpse at how he sees a resolution coming about. Reading between the lines, it seems as though he is talking about a trade-off. There are 29 other land claims outstanding in the area. So you trade one here ... and pick up another there.
"We are talking about 29 separate parcels of land there that are in dispute," Ramsay said. "We think there are some very easy wins there. There are some we can have resolution on very quickly, that the federal government looks like they are going to accept, and I think if we get movement on those I think it can help expedite the overall discussions on all the outstanding pieces of property there," he said.
Fair enough. Give and take. That's how reasonable people reach agreement on thorny topics. But what then? This stand-off has so far cost almost $50 million. Not just that, it has plunged the lives of the people living in the nearby subdivision into a living nightmare. Children are scared to go to school. Noisy demonstrators keep them living in fear and many cannot sleep at night. Their homes are valueless right now. Who wants to buy a house that backs on to a muddy wasteland dotted with half-built homes?
Progressive Conservative leader John Tory said he has pleaded with the premier to sit down with community leaders in
"I think the fact it may go on for some time is evident to all of us, and it is one of the reasons why I have suggested Mr. McGuinty should be sitting down with the first nations leaders and saying, while the land claim discussions are happening, we would appreciate it if you would work with me to get off the land in an orderly basis and to allow the rule of law to be restored in Caledonia, until the land claim is resolved,'" Tory said.
That hasn't happened. It won't happen. Politicians of all stripes are terrified of that two-word phrase, "native-stand-off." They all remember Ipperwash, the shooting death of protester Dudley George and its aftermath.
How was Ipperwash resolved? It wasn't. The provincial park is still closed -- yet another land claim that will, tragically, likely never be resolved.