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Audit results are ‘appalling’

NANAIMO – Re: Idle No More protest set for Maffeo Sutton, Jan. 8.

To the Editor,

Re: Idle No More protest set for Maffeo Sutton, Jan. 8.

If the Idle No More movement could be more specific than “the catalyst for strengthened relations” or “moving forward in a good way,” it might be worth some attention. Obnoxiously blocking highways and rail lines won’t garner much respect.

Even worse, to be inspired, even in part by Theresa Spence of the Attawapiskat reserve, is shocking given what I’ve read about that person since she created a reserve housing crisis in 2011.

The results of an audit of Attawapiskat by accountants Deloitte and Touche are an appalling history of bookkeeping that was incomplete, insufficient and inaccurate.

The band received $104 million in funding from 2005 to 2011 but had an operating deficit above eight per cent of its total annual operating revenue. More than $8.3 million was earmarked for housing maintenance with little or nothing to show for it. Even more damning is that expenditures were made without available funds which means that Spence was blowing money the band didn’t have because she knew the government would bail her out, which it did.

Then there’s what Spence and her hangers on call a “hunger strike” which realistically is more like a detox diet.

Now the latest antic in this travesty. A letter from Spence to the Queen no less, wanting her to order the Governor General to a meeting with native chiefs.

There is just no end to the gall.

Jim Corder

Nanaimo