Consider that on December 9, 2009, a whistle-blower from the Peguis aboriginal reserve in Manitoba sent a brown envelope to all three national political parties (Conservatives, Liberals and NDP) and our non-profit organization, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
In it were details on how the chief and band council from her small reserve of 3,700 were making between $173,030-$251,747 per year, tax free. For someone off reserve and paying income taxes, that was the equivalent of approximately of about $295,000 - $440,000.
In addition, the politicians’ annual travel “expenses” ranged from $32,151–$58,984.
The person who leaked the information was crying out. She was angry with the sky-high salaries and poverty in her community.
While each of the three main political parties in Ottawa sat quiet about the information they received, our non-profit organization was the only one to speak out. And boy did we ever.
We released the information to media outlets nation-wide and did countless newspaper, radio and TV interviews. Our message was simple – Canadians needed to push their federal politicians to finally act on stories like this or we would continue to hear more like it for years to come.
After all, this wasn’t the first time people had heard of chiefs and councillors living high on the hog while many band members suffered and had no idea what was going on. Not surprisingly, the comment sections for news stories posted online were overwhelmingly full of angry posts.
Thankfully, grassroots band members not only heard the news, but also spoke out. We received calls and emails from band members across Canada who wanted either to leak pay documents from their reserve or to get our help to find out what was going on in their band council office.
Thanks to these additional whistleblowers, we helped expose more instances of wild reserve salaries in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and continued to lobby the government to put chief and council pay information online for every reserve in the country. After all, the federal government already had the data; it just needed to change the law so it had the authority to post the “private” information online.
Once posted online, reserve politicians would be brought in-line with federal, provincial and municipal politicians who already have their pay information posted on the internet. Even more importantly, transparency would help the many good reserve politicians out there, who weren’t making outrageous sums, but were being painted with the same brush.
Thankfully, a politician in Ottawa took action. Saskatchewan Conservative MP Kelly Block tabled a private members bill that would put reserve politicians’ salary information on the internet.
Shortly after her bill was tabled, we got our hands on data from the federal government that showed all reserve politicians’ salaries from coast to coast. There were no names attached, but pay data proved what we had said all along – there were many other reserves out there with outrageous salaries.
The data showed around 50 politicians from tiny reserves nation-wide were making more than the Prime Minister. The news created another media storm.
Back in Parliament, Ms. Block’s bill passed second reading – with the support of the Conservative Party and 15 Liberal MPs who broke ranks to vote for it. Clearly, many politicians in Ottawa were finally ready to do something.
Although the triggering of the 2011 federal election killed Ms. Block’s bill, the government has reintroduced an even better bill; one that will also put entire reserve audited statements online. The bill should hopefully pass sometime this spring.
Transparency won’t solve all the problems on reserves, but at least taxpayers and band members will know more about how funds are being spent. It just goes to show what a single letter can help accomplish.
Colin Craig is the Prairie Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation
