JFC it's THE RIGHT THING TO DO. This is the 21st century. EVERYONE in Canada should have access to drinkable water. "You can't make me" is the weakest argument.
I wish I could upvote more since this is exactly what I was going to say. This is infuriating.
I'm Indigenous and shit like this is why Native people, Native leaders and Native groups are so ready to protest against government for everything.
On the one hand, we try to take over mining, forestry, hydroelectric projects and direct money towards our communities but government blocks us, slows us or discourages us from going that way. We either aren't allowed to deal directly with companies .... or companies are just given full board to do whatever they want without us.
Then on the other hand, we beg for money just to make our communities functional and this is the response we get. Part of the agreement and arrangement the federal government has with First Nations and in our many treaty agreements is that we agreed that Canada would take the land and they in turn take care of us. Generally that has always been the agreement.
So we aren't allowed to govern ourselves or the land we live on, we aren't allowed to help ourselves and no one wants to help us.
The same colonizer crap that always been there is still happening today. They would rather us leave, disappear or just die so that the land can be emptied and taken over by their big corporate friends.
I am truly sorry for what our governments have done to your people and their half-assed reparations. This shit needs to change.
"a matter of good governance rather than legal duty."
You know what? Good Governance should be a legal duty. What the heck is this argument? Do folks who live in Toronto have to worry about not getting clean water because Canada has no legal obligation to provide it to them either?
I honestly wonder why the federal government is pursuing this. Getting First Nations communities on water has been an ongoing project of theirs. Either the left hand isn't talking to the right or this is "I'll do it but not because I have to".
From the article it feels like a worse variation of "I’ll do it but not because I have to”.
More like, "I'll do some of it, at my own pace, because doing all of it now is too expensive." Of course that wouldn't trump the fundamental human rights that are at issue here - but if you win on the claim that there aren't any such rights applicable, then the above is much easier to win ...
Of course I might just be being a tad too cynical here.
They really need to raise taxes. It would be unpopular, but everyone's tired of them already, so now's the moment.
Sorta like lame ducks who can do the right thing by their conscience as they are no longer burdened by popular mandates or seeing re-election.
In the case of Toronto presumably water is a municipal responsibility... Reserves are a federal responsibility though so you'd think they would be responsible here. The government has actually been putting in a ton of money on this issue and as the article says the number of boil water advisories is down by like 2/3 since the Liberals came to power. So also kinda weird argument by the justice department here.
How is it not a legal obligation? Aren't reserves technically federal land under the law? If my landlord didn't provide me with drinkable water I'm pretty sure that would be a legal issue.
Wow. Fuck everything about this. Clean water is a human right.
Okay: What. Da. FUQ??
The government has an obligation to take care of all of it’s citizens, First Nations or not.
I want everyone to have access to clean potable water. But in my community, that's the manicupalities responsibility, not the federal government. Genuine question, why is that different for first Nations?
Another genuine question. Why are so many first Nations without it, if they're all seperate communities with separately managed water systems?
Treaties.
Treaties for the first thing, and also just an abstract moral idea that we don't leave people behind.
For the second thing, self-perpetuating poverty and trauma.
The treaties the federal government has say they will maintain water infrastructure?
Don't get me wrong, they should, and we shouldn't leave people behind. I'm just trying to figure it all out
Hmm. I'm actually not sure. There's a bunch of treaties, and each says a bunch of things. I don't think it ever comes down to provinces to supply things for First Nations, though, which is kind of what you suggest when you call them a municipality.
Lawyers are the least moral people
I mean, it's an adversarial system. They'll be the first to tell you they don't agree with their clients, they just represent them as part of a process that's ultimately supposed to shake out to good outcomes.
Oh hell nah. We must force the government to clean up the mess it caused after it forced first nations to live on remote areas.
The government of Canada doesn’t provide me with clean water either. My local municipality does with my taxes.
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