• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
  FEATURED
BP Predicts Faster Oil and Gas Decline as Clean Energy Spending Hits $1.1T in 2022 January 31, 2023
Canada Needs Oil and Gas Emissions Cap to Hit 2030 Goal: NZAB January 31, 2023
Ecuador’s Amazon Drilling Plan Shows Need for Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty January 31, 2023
Rainforest Carbon Credits from World’s Biggest Provider are ‘Largely Worthless’, Investigation Finds January 31, 2023
Danske Bank Quits New Fossil Fuel Financing January 23, 2023
Next
Prev

As Canada Spends Billions on Pipelines, First Nations Communities Still Wait for Water

December 11, 2020
Reading time: 2 minutes

/Pixabay

/Pixabay

14
SHARES
 

Despite being one of the wealthiest nations on Earth and having an abundance of fresh water, Canada can’t seem to find a way to secure clean water for First Nations communities—though it will move heaven and earth to pipe its oil and gas to market.

In a recent op-ed in the Toronto Star, Brandi Morin, a French/Cree/Iroquois journalist and human rights activist, asks how it is that Canada can “commit billions of dollars to oil pipelines” but can’t find the means to provide safe drinking water to First Nations communities that need it, despite endless and fervent promises to do just that.

  • Concise headlines. Original content. Timely news and views from a select group of opinion leaders. Special extras.
  • Everything you need, nothing you don’t.
  • The Weekender: The climate news you need.
New!
Subscribe

Having committed itself in 2015 to ending the water crisis currently afflicting First Nations communities across the country by March 2021, Ottawa now admits it will miss that goal. In one community—the Neskantaga First Nation in Northern Ontario—citizens were evacuated last month to Thunder Bay, where they remain displaced today, due to toxic water. The Neskantaga boil water advisory has been in place in since 1980.

Such failures put Canada decidedly on the wrong side of a 2019 United Nations Water Development report, which affirmed safe drinking water and sanitation as fundamental human rights.

While the Trudeau government has cited COVID-19 travel barriers as one of the reasons Ottawa has once again failed to deliver on its clean water promise, the lack of clean water has actually made the struggle against the coronavirus all the more difficult for First Nations.

And even before the arrival of the pandemic, life without safe water in First Nations communities was harrowing, writes Morin, citing a 2016 Human Rights Watch report revealing that contaminants in the water supplies on some reserves included “coliform, E.coli, cancer-causing trihalomethanes, and uranium.” 

After “years of advocacy from the communities after industrial pollution poisoned their main water system, the English-Wabigoon River in the 1960s and 1970s,” the feds are funding a C$19.5-million methylmercury poisoning treatment centre in the Grassy Narrows and Wabaseemoong First Nations in Northern Ontario. They’ve also managed to lift 97 long-term water advisories in Indigenous communities. But 59 advisories persist, meaning that thousands remain without safe water.

Meanwhile, those communities that do still possess safe water sources feel threatened by the industrial development the Trudeau government is warmly promoting. Case in point, writes Morin, are First Nations communities along the planned route of the Trans Mountain pipeline.

Morin notes that Ottawa has ponied up an estimated C$12.6 billion to build that pipeline, against the estimated $3.2-billion cost of fixing the on-reserve water crisis.

“Even though Trudeau has said, time and again, that his first priority is reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, his actions speak far louder,” Morin concludes.



in Canada, Climate & Society, Climate Impacts & Adaptation, Community Climate Finance, Energy Politics, First Peoples, Fossil Fuels, Health & Safety, Jurisdictions, Legal & Regulatory, Oil & Gas, Pipelines / Rail Transport, Water

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

Mike Mozart/Flickr
Ending Emissions

BP Predicts Faster Oil and Gas Decline as Clean Energy Spending Hits $1.1T in 2022

January 31, 2023
322
Gina Dittmer/PublicDomainPictures
Canada

Canada Needs Oil and Gas Emissions Cap to Hit 2030 Goal: NZAB

January 31, 2023
196
CONFENIAE
Ending Emissions

Ecuador’s Amazon Drilling Plan Shows Need for Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty

January 31, 2023
61

Comments 1

  1. Christopher Byrd says:
    2 years ago

    Liberal Party – live up to your promise – fix the First Nations water problems before pushing the Trans-Mountain pipeline.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

Mike Mozart/Flickr

BP Predicts Faster Oil and Gas Decline as Clean Energy Spending Hits $1.1T in 2022

January 31, 2023
322
Ken Teegardin www.SeniorLiving.Org/flickr

Virtual Power Plants Hit an ‘Inflection Point’

January 31, 2023
125
RL0919/wikimedia commons

Danske Bank Quits New Fossil Fuel Financing

January 23, 2023
2.4k
Gina Dittmer/PublicDomainPictures

Canada Needs Oil and Gas Emissions Cap to Hit 2030 Goal: NZAB

January 31, 2023
196
Doc Searls/Twitter

Guilbeault Could Intervene on Ontario Greenbelt Development

January 31, 2023
132
/snappy goat

Rainforest Carbon Credits from World’s Biggest Provider are ‘Largely Worthless’, Investigation Finds

January 31, 2023
94

Recent Posts

CONFENIAE

Ecuador’s Amazon Drilling Plan Shows Need for Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty

January 31, 2023
61
Victorgrigas/wikimedia commons

World Bank Climate Reforms Too ‘Timid and Slow,’ Critics Warn

January 31, 2023
42
United Nations

Salvage of $20B ‘Floating Time Bomb’ Delayed by Rising Cost of Oil Tankers

January 27, 2023
121
@tongbingxue/Twitter

Extreme Warming Ahead Even as Worst-Case Scenarios Grow ‘Obsolete’

January 23, 2023
341
Rachel Notley/Facebook

Notley Scorches Federal Just Transition Bill as Fossil CEO Calls for Oilsands Boom

January 23, 2023
313
EcoAnalytics

Albertans Want a Just Transition, Despite Premier’s Grumbling

January 23, 2023
323
Next Post
Wilson Hui/Flickr

Trans Mountain Poised for Tree Clearing Despite Promise to Protect Burnaby Salmon Habitat

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}