It can be pretty hard for grassroots band members to get information from their reserves.

And I'm talking basic information such as the pay levels for chief and council as well as audit information. If you want to step inside the unfortunate world many band members live in for a moment, take a look at this letter - 

/media/Squamish Council.pdf

It was sent to us recently from someone who is a member of the Squamish First Nation in British Columbia. 

In the letter, band officials suggest they can't disclose the exact pay amounts of chief and council as it's private, only a range can be disclosed. Get a load of this nugget from the letter: 

“We are prohibited by law to disclose the specific salaries of individuals, as this is personal information that can only be released with the consent of those individuals. Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada (AANDC) is also prohibited by law to make such a disclosure without consent.”

However, that simply isn’t true. In fact, the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development requires bands to disclose annually amounts paid to its politicians - along with the entire audit.

Consider what Bill C-27 notes about the current requirements for bands: 

“submit to AANDC annual audited consolidated financial statements for the public funds provided to them. These include salaries, honoraria and travel expenses for all elected, appointed and senior unelected band officials. The latter includes unelected positions such as those of executive director, band manager, senior program director and manager. First Nations are also required to release these statements to their membership.”

These requirements are not new. In fact, many of these salary disclosure documents are routinely leaked to organizations like ours by fed up band members. That’s how we came across documents like this and this.

The band's letter also suggests C-27 (reserve transparency bill) will increases the heavy reporting burden on reserves. Back in reality, all it does is require bands to put reports online (ones that they already have to produce each year.) Geez, even not-so-tech-savvy guys like me can figure out how to put stuff online. It's hardly a laborious task. 

Tisk tisk Squamish crew...why the chicanery?