The federal government is demanding the Attawapiskat First Nation pay back $1.8 million after an audit determined the band could not account for the money that was supposed to be spent on housing.
The audit was completed in April of this year, and was recently posted on a government website.
h/t Orville
Good luck with that!
“The follow-up audit found that 54 per cent of the transactions under examination had either incomplete or no supporting documentation.”
Of course every Chartered Accountant would look across his desk at the client and tell them:
It’s kind of like Revenue Canada; if you don’t have a receipt you can’t claim a deduction…
A building receipt isn’t flying the contractor to a Polynesian island, for a tropics vacation to the indigenous peoples conference, on how to parlais the grass skirt dancers into your hut.
Cheers
Hans Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group ‘True North’
You do realize that fish broth was made from priceless local ATTTAPIS-CAT CAUGHT fish.
Very rare, and in short supply.
Reason:
The fish are inactive and hibernate when the local fishermen get out of bed. Around noon.
The First Nation leaders behave like Third World corrupt leaders. This has been known for years and yet not much was done about it.
Watch for the phoney outrage. As the saying goes, you know you are on target when the flak starts.
File this one under “snowball’s chance in Hell”.
So, I suppose now the taxpayers will pay for lawyers to negotiate with the government for funds to pay back the money they owe.
Whatever the case, you know the Chief and her corrupt fellow Band politicians won’t end up paying anyone a cent.
The answer is really simple: reduce the outgo to that reserve by 2 x the missing amount and keep reducing it by that same shortfall until suitable records are produced. Hunger, Shame are great motivators. It won’t last long.
“snowball’s chance in Hell”
Agreed, it’s unlikely that the funds will be recovered.
I’d settle for having the corrupt Chief and Council members removed in disgrace. I’m not familiar with the legislative framework that creates and empowers Band Councils, but I’m sure there’s a non-electoral mechanism to remove them for incompetence or malfeasance.
Although it’s equally unlikely that the Federal Government has the political fortitude to actually do their job in cases like this. I know that Provincial Governments don’t in the case of corrupt municipalities.
This one’s going into the media blackout pile.
Imagine what you know would happen to you if you stole $1.8 million of the Federal Government’s money.
Now bask in the reality that -nothing- is going to happen to the skanks who stole this money. Nothing whatsoever. Let it really sink in.
Don’t bother phoning your MP this time. It wouldn’t matter if every single person in Canada phoned their MP. Nothing will be done. Nothing.
Because we are suckers. Yes, we are.
Nothing to see here. What business is it of the Canadian government what oppressed people do with the reparations they receive from the government for theft of their land? If trips to vacation destinations ease the pain of exploitation and racism, we should encourage them to go more often. Receipts? A bourgeois concept.
This one’s going into the media blackout pile
I predict a different scenario:
“Mean Harper Government duns starving, freezing Indians for $1.8M.”
Notice how the left-wing CBC has not reported on this story.
Don, unfortunately the rest of the tribe have been in hunger, and will continue to be that way, meanwhile Chief Spence and her larcenous boyfriend feel no shame, so I doubt your recommendation will work.
I farm in Sask this past spring a fellow drives in asking ” I see you have muskrats and was wondering if I could trap them?”
So we start talking about wildlife etc. He then tells me that he traps at the (name withheld) reserve! I ask “isn’t there anyone there who can do the trapping? he shakes his head, pauses, then tells me “they pay me well”.
Yeah, there’s hope alright
In the science of Economics I believe that’s called specialization. The trappers and the reservation Indians are both doing what they each do most efficiently.
“It went to buy fish broth; ”
Mupffffffff bwaaaaahahaha , duh-oh!
Awwwww Kate – I gotta remember not to have a mouth full of coffee when I browse some of these one-liners
“…The First Nation leaders behave like Third World corrupt leaders…”
Or Senators, or the Ontario Liberals, or, or, or….
Cut off their funding!!! What’s not to like with that. They should have sufficient funds to stay alive until spring.
@Mike:
And as of now, they still haven’t.
They’re Indians …. what did anyone expect? We get immigrants from all over the world who had it worse than our very Indians, they would not behave this way. …. sell out their own people with other peoples money … What goes on in the Indian industry makes me vomit. Most cultures try to improve … not the Indians … why should they … no one expects anything from them but what we see here.
“Imagine what you know would happen to you if you stole $1.8 million of the Federal Government’s money.”
Yes,I’d get about ten years to practice my country song writing in Kingston or Dorchester.
That little sitzpinkler Charlie Angus seems to be unusually quiet these days ?
“…And so this points to a real failure of the co-management system.”
Ya think?
But, but it’s not taxpayers’ money and it’s racist to ask how it’s spent (a rough paraphrase of the quote from the Onion Lake Cree “Nation” chief).
Well, they say that “that which cannot go on, won’t”. I suppose that someday this charade will run its course and a government will have to bite the bullet and change the rules. A system by which the funding is routed around the band chiefs and band councils, directly to the indians themselves seems worth a look. Naturally, the vested interests will scream blue murder but since the conservative government is doomed anyway (according to the papers) maybe this is the year to do it. Who knows. Maybe the government is not as doomed as all that. Maybe this would make them less doomed.
Tribalism, nepotism, greed and corruption are a ‘tradition’ in some aboriginal bands. A tradition that predates the first European immigrants.
I had hoped that this government would have used the majority we gave them to solve this problem once and for all. They could have convened a select committee comprised of the successful aboriginal band leaders like Clarence Louie the chief of the Osoyoos Indian Band in British Columbia’s Okanagan. Give them the task of creating a new “Indian Act” and then make it law. No, it wouldn’t be perfect, but it would show leadership, and that’s what’s sorely lacking in this current government.
And what exactly made it your land??Who gave you the land?Get into the real world,every country in the world was taken from someone and the strongest won the land.Tough bananas you were not strong enough to defend the land.You were given land for nothing to do with as you please and you still cannot manage it.The settlers of Canada brought it into the 21st century despite you wanting to live in the past.Grow up and become partners of this land with other Canadians instead of dreaming of killing buffalo and trapping beaver.
Watch this story fade from the news. Nothing will be paid back. The government doesn’t have the balls to enforce the directive and the band can’t be made to suffer for greed of the leadership. Chief Spence will be a victim with the full support of the CBC and anything else will be racist. Can’t win unless we get politicians with some backbone and that’s just not in the cards. Yet.
“Now bask in the reality that -nothing- is going to happen to the skanks who stole this money. Nothing whatsoever. Let it really sink in.”
Nothing? I see them having to face a sentencing circle of their paid stooges.
peterj, it’s time to dust off Jean Chretien’s White Paper which he had tabled as Minister of Indian Affairs under Pierre Trudeau.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1969_White_Paper
Table it and see the Liberals vote against it and howl, then introduce a new paper written by Bernard Valcourt. Pass it and implement it. Easy Peasy.
Table the changes proposed by Chretien?
Why that would be an extremely partisan thing to do and it would certainly accentuate any divisions in the party.
That would be dirty pool and something the party of Leisuresuit Larry would never do….
Now that I have expounded on a bit of tongue in cheek.
I think that is a capital idea with the added benefit of outing the poverty industry practitioners for who they are both inside and outside of the reserves. I would love seeing Leisuresuit Larry talk himself into a corner trying to impersonate a leader of a federal political party using his collection of modified campus pickup lines for the downtown Toronto urbanite cougar set.
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“phantom says… Imagine what would happen to you if you stole $1.8 million of the Federal Government’s money.”
never mind stealing. just try not paying your taxes and see what happens… you know… that levy that our aboriginal brethren don’t have to fork out.
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Of course let me complete the circle and inject “root cause” into the discussion.
I’m guessing 1.8m buys a lot of fire water.