Not going quietly

Resistance to the proposed move of the infamous Kashechewan reserve could put native issues in the national spotlight

Philippe Gohier, Macleans.ca .January 3, 2007

Their water was filthy. Their community was susceptible to flooding. Their housing was beyond decrepit. And so, for a brief period in the fall of 2005, the sickly, rash-ridden residents Kashechewan found a place in the public consciousness.

Soon, the northern Ontario reserve may return there. And in what might just be an election year, it threatens to bring other native issues with it. 

A year after Kashechewan's woes came to light, Alan Pope, a former Ontario cabinet minister hired as a special adviser to the Minister of Indian Affairs, issued a report recommending the community be moved some 450 kilometres south to the outskirts of Timmins. Pope's report considered the alternatives, including leaving it where it is. But in the face of a crumbling infrastructure and a staggering 87% unemployment rate, the last best hope was apparently to shut the whole thing down and start anew.

"The benefits of such a relocation are clear," Pope said. "This will offer the greatest advantage of improved economic and individual opportunities."

But the relocation of native reserves to urban areas raises at least two delicate questions that have become the subject of debate. First, do the residents actually want to leave? And second, do their new neighbours want them?

When the federal government recently commissioned a poll on the latter question, it produced fairly disconcerting results.

The survey, conducted among non-aboriginals in eight Canadian cities located near native communities, found that 51% of respondents were opposed to the creation of urban reserves; only 42% were in favour.

What's more, Kashechewan's deputy chief, Philip Goodwin, told The Globe and Mail that many Kashechewan residents are reluctant to move closer to Timmins and prefer the option of simply moving to higher ground.

"Lately I've been hearing a lot of people [talk] about moving up the river," Goodwin said, contradicting Pope's analysis of local sentiment. "There's not too many people who are interested in going down south, but the answers will be at the end of February."

Those answers will come from the community-wide, door-to-door canvassing the council plans to undertake later this month - which, according to Goodwin, will dictate its formal response to Pope’s relocation proposal.

Should the council reject the proposal, Kashechewan would join two other high-profile native issues that remain unresolved. And combined, they could mark the rare occasion on which a federal government is put on the hot seat for its aboriginal policy.

First, there is the previous government's Kelowna Accord - the implementation of which was made one of the Liberals' top priorities at their recent leadership convention.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said his government is committed to the "principles and objectives" of the Accord, which calls for $5.1-billion in targeted funding to reduce the gap in quality of life between aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities. But its absence from the Conservatives’ budget last February has left him open to criticism from its supporters.

Last spring, Canada's western and territorial leaders unanimously endorsed the deal. And this past October, former prime minister Paul Martin - who negotiated the Accord - presented a private member’s bill aimed at forcing the Conservatives to implement it. The vote passed handily - garnering the support of the Liberals, the Bloc Québécois and the NDP, but not the Conservatives. 

Then there are last year's clashes over disputed land in Caledonia, Ontario, which invoked memories of Oka and Ipperwash. With 1,000 land claims still outstanding, the possibility looms large that another of them could devolve as Caledonia has.

"Any one of them could trigger the same reaction," Ontario regional chief Angus Toulouse has said. "That's the unfortunate thing - we're going to see much more of that. There is a sense nationally and regionally that there is this frustration."

Native policies have rarely emerged as major election issues, and an expected campaign this year is more likely to focus on the environment, Afghanistan, and – at least inside Quebec - the fiscal imbalance. But the lingering confusion over Kashechewan, along with pressure to implement the Kelowna Accord and the simmering anger over the land claim in Caledonia, could finally push such issues into the political mainstream.