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Abstract
The default prevention and management policy (DPMP) is a federal policy that was ostensibly designed to address debt and default in First Nation communities in Canada. The policy works through various levels of external intervention into First Nation finances. According to research findings presented in this article, when First Nations are under the policy a new form of deficit is created rather than improved: Housing stock and water infrastructure becomes much worse off than for First Nations who have never been under the policy. This article puts infrastructure to work as method (Cowen Citation2020) to explore how intimate geographies of infrastructure and “infrastructure denial” (Curley Citation2021), such as housing and water systems on reserves, connect socioeconomic policy frameworks with theories of settler colonial dispossession.
做为一项国家政策, 违约预防和管理政策旨在解决加拿大“第一民族”(First Nation, 印第安人)的债务和违约问题, 采取了对“第一民族”财政的各种外部干预措施。研究表明, 违约预防和管理政策非但没有改善财政, 还产生了新形式的赤字：采用该政策的“第一民族”住房存量和水基础设施状况, 显著低于未采用该政策的“第一民族”。通过基础设施(Cowen 2020), 本文探讨了密切相关的基础设施地理和“拒绝基础设施”地理(Curley 2021)(例如, 保护区的住房和供水系统), 如何链接社会经济政策框架和移民殖民剥削理论。
La política predeterminada de prevención y gestión (DPMP) es una función federal que fue ostensiblemente diseñada para hacer frente a la deuda y al cumplimiento en las comunidades de las Primeras Naciones del Canadá. Esta política opera a través de varios niveles de intervención externa en las finanzas de las Primeras Naciones. De acuerdo con los resultados de la investigación que se presentan en este artículo, cuando las Primeras Naciones se encuentran bajo los términos de esta política, en lugar de generar mejoras, se crea una nueva forma de déficit: El parque de viviendas y de infraestructura hidrológica se deteriora mucho más, respecto de aquellas Primeras Naciones que nunca han estado bajo esta política. Este artículo pone a trabajar a la infraestructura como un método (Cowen 2020) para explorar el modo como las íntimas geografías de la infraestructura y de “la denegación de infraestructura” (Curley 2021), tales como los sistemas de vivienda y agua en las reservas, conectan los marcos de la política socioeconómica con las teorías de la desposesión colonial de los pobladores.
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Acknowledgments
Thanks to journalists Patti Sonntag and Ryan Moore for shepherding this research alongside me and helping to shape a decade of data collection into an important story.
Notes
1 This compound phrase describes the formal and legal designation of state-recognized space for First Nations in Canada. It embodies both the invention of the “Indian” by colonial authorities, as defined in the Indian Act (1985), as well as the invention of the reserve, also regulated by the Indian Act.
2 The data on Bands under DPMP and related intervention policies comes from access to information requests. Some of these files include A-2016-01115, A-2015-00511, A-2015-01156, A-2018-00043, 2021 03 10 ISC request A-2019-00452, A-2018-00079_2018-08-07_15-31-23, ISC-A-2020-00053, and 2021 02 23 ISC-2019-00452. The entire data set included 547 First Nations.
3 Data analysis by Patti Sonntag showed that First Nations with no DPMP had average rates of 36 percent of homes needing major repairs in 2006. This figure improved marginally by 2016, decreasing to 33 percent. Under comanagement, the percentage of houses needing major repair in 2006 was 45 percent and this number increased to 49 percent in 2016. For First Nations under third-party management, the percentage of houses needing major repairs in 2006 was also 45 percent but it rose to 60 percent by 2016. Data on DPMP came from ATIPs listed in note 2, with housing statistics provided by Statistics Canada for 2006 and 2016.
4 Data analysis by Patti Sonntag showed that when First Nations managed their own finances without DPMP, 14.2 percent were under BWAs. When First Nations were under comanagement and third-party management, respectively, the average percentage of First Nations experiencing a long-term BWA increased to 29.4 and 27.6 percent. Data for this research were provided by ISC and Statistics Canada.
5 IIJ and Yellowhead Institute, where I was research director, signed a partnership agreement to work together on this research. Special thanks to Patti Sonntag, Martha Troian, and Karyn Pugliese for initial conversations, support, and leads on the topic.
6 See Housing Highlight Tables, Statistics Canada, Dwelling condition by housing tenure, % change 2011 to 2016, major repairs needed, Canada, provinces and territories, 2011 and 2016 censuses—25% Sample Data, available at https://tinyurl.com/yevnwd6x.
7 Most funding to Bands and groups are federal transfer payments, but also land claim settlements, self-government agreements, their own source revenue, and a handful of other sources. According to INAC, from 2011 through 2015, the majority of 550 First Nations and Tribal Councils were under “fixed” funding that renewed on an annual basis (ATIP AI-2014-01082 / PS: Funding Information for First Nations). I could not obtain an updated list from ISC, but the situation has likely shifted with the 2018 introduction of ten-year funding agreements.
8 If a Band has access to its own source revenue (OSR), it appears to increase their ability to retire debt. Although this subject requires its own study, OSR is income derived from for-profit ventures or revenue-sharing partnerships with industry and government. OSR can support debt retirement, but it can also keep Bands out of debt, as Norma Girard, Band councillor of Northwest Angle (NWA), explained. For example, Casino Rama funding (distributed to all Ontario First Nations by Rama First Nation) was how NWA covered a shortfall in infrastructure and education funding, saving them from third-party management imposition. It is important to note that only 19 percent of Bands have access to revenue sources on reserve, with noticeable differences in access to OSR according to the size of the First Nation and proximity to revenue activities (First Nations Financial Management Board Citation2020).
9 The ISC Web site states that DPMP dates to 2011, but accounts of third-party management go back much further, to at least 2001 (Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada 2011; ISC Citation2013a, Citation2013b; Directive 210: Third Party Funding Agreement Management, accessed March 24, 2021, https://www.sac-isc.gc.ca/DAM/DAM-ISC-SAC/DAM-CORP/STAGING/texte-text/tpf_1325169634832_eng.pdf). The earliest reference to default management dates to the Intervention Policy introduced in 2001 (AGC Citation2003), followed by the National Third Party Managers Policy, introduced in April 2003 (AGC Citation2003). In 2006, the Intervention Policy was introduced (renamed Funding Arrangements: Intervention Policy in 2008), consolidating previous intervention policies. A Companion Initiative was introduced alongside it, to develop the capacity of recipients under intervention (INAC Citation2007), followed in June 2011 by the Default Prevention and Management Policy, in which the capacity development was now embedded. The Directive on Third Party Funding Agreement Management was also released in 2011 with the introduction of the DPMP.
10 Debt reduction plans have tended to reallocate 10 percent of “revenues” targeted toward debt repayment (AGC Citation2003) and managers were initially instructed to deposit these “surpluses” into the Minister’s account and not to creditors (Choken v. Lake St. Martin Indian Band Citation2005). Today, Band funds are held by a bank and the account is controlled by the manager.
11 The name of this department changes frequently. Until 2011, it was Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC), and then it became Aboriginal and Northern Affairs Canada (AANDC), before becoming INAC again, this time Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada in 2015. In 2017, it split into two departments: Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) and Crown Indigenous Relations (CIR). Most people still refer to both departments as INAC.
12 For example, read McAuliffe’s (Citation2021) work on the General Assessment Tool.
13 Full coverage of infrastructure costs (100 percent) is limited to educational facilities. But according to OFNTS (Citation2018), even this figure is based on INAC assessment of need, not actual costs.
14 Major capital represents around 26 percent of the infrastructure budget and funds major construction or repairs. Minor capital represents around 38 percent of the budget and funds minor repairs, renovations, and upgrades.
15 See also AFN (Citation2018) for a critique of the remoteness index.
16 For example, the ten-year funding grant, starting 1 April 2020, promised in the budget that, “funding for core programs and services provided through the 10-Year Grants” should be escalated annually to “address key cost drivers including inflation and population growth” (Government of Canada Citation2019).
17 See note 4.
18 A water treatment plant was built by the government in the late 1970s for use by the non-Indigenous teaching staff at school and non-Indigenous medical and nursing staff at the clinic.
19 ISC 2018, Short-term boil water advisories for First Nations in Ontario from 2014 to present day (retrieved via the Access to Information and Privacy Act).
20 This is an alias to protect the identity of informant, as required by Quebec law under the Youth Protection Act (see https://www.legisquebec.gouv.qc.ca/en/document/cs/p-34.1).
21 These data are based on calculations made using ATIPs on DPMP listed in note 3.
22 These data are based on calculations made using ATIPs on DPMP listed in note 4.
23 These data are based on calculations from only the StatCan data from 2016.
24 In 2017–2018, INAC suspended requirements that Bands pay DPMP consultants out of their Band funds and began to allocate funding in contribution agreements to cover DPMP costs. The policy has still not been updated to reflect this political announcement, however. An announcement was expected in the fall of 2022.
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Shiri Pasternak
SHIRI PASTERNAK is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminology, Toronto Metropolitan University, Toronto, ON M5B 2K3, Canada. E-mail: shiri.pasternak@torontomu@ca. Her interests include land policies, colonial fiscal relations, and abolition geographies.