Setting National Goals for First Nations

The fact that the plight of aboriginal Canadians still has to be singled out for attention in the early 21st century is a clear sign that we have far to go.

This is the final article in a four-part series that outlines the crisis of confidence in national governance and the urgent need for Canada to develop clear long-term national goals for which our federal government is directly accountable. Part 3 discussed a new approach to the formation of a national energy and environment strategy. The final section proposes a bold new approach to addressing Canada’s intolerable mismanagement of aboriginal affairs.

In this series, I have been writing about Canada’s inability to set clear, long-term national goals against which to measure our success in a number of key policy areas. Nowhere has this been more true than with aboriginal Canadians.

The fact that the plight of aboriginal Canadians still has to be singled out for special attention in the early 21st century conclusively demonstrates the urgent need for outside-the-box thinking and new institutional structures to support good governance. We have to move beyond the occasional bursts of outrage over news reports citing that extensive federal expenditures on aboriginal education appear to have produced no discernible improvement, that aboriginal health care is substandard and housing conditions have worsened, that incarceration and suicide rates are shockingly high among aboriginal Canadians, and that nearly 40 per cent of water systems on native reserves pose high levels of risk.

Why is Canada's Aboriginal incarceration so high? Read one experts analysis of the abhorrent situation here.

Chief of the Assembly of First Nations Shawn Atleo’s proposal to do away with the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and the dysfunctional legislative framework of the 1876 Indian Act is encouraging. This would mean that band councils would be primarily responsible to their citizens, rather than to the minister of aboriginal affairs. Aboriginal communities would establish new governance entities and assume responsibility for the long-term management of their local economies and the efficient and effective delivery of services to aboriginal Canadians.

But while repealing the Indian Act is a good step, a comprehensive framework providing consistency in the structures and operations of aboriginal governance entities is also required. Too much internal fragmentation will undermine the collective effectiveness of aboriginal governments in justifying the extensive fiscal transfers and other investments required to bring public services and the standard of living of aboriginal Canadians to acceptable levels.

New fiscal-transfer arrangements should be collectively negotiated with the federal government, while maintaining the shift of responsibility to aboriginal governments. It is important that we reduce the amount of back-and-forth red tape that currently exists between bands and federal bureaucrats, as it obscures accountability. These fiscal-transfer arrangements would be managed openly and accountably through the proposed arm’s-length national commission, which would also be responsible for other intergovernmental transfers such as health, education, social services, and equalization.

Assembly of First Nation's Chief Atleo on Energy, Mining and Canada's Indigenous Communities.

Furthermore, the proposed Canadian infrastructure financing authority would be responsible for leveraging the investment needed to advance high-quality infrastructure for aboriginal communities, just as it would do for the rest of Canada. Our federal leaders would be held accountable for our clear national commitment to provide equal opportunities and an acceptable standard of living for all aboriginal Canadians, and would have to be vigilant in ensuring that aboriginal governments’ expenditures were effectively devoted to this end.