[IPSM] Tom Flanagan says "Selling reserve land could help solve poverty" for Native communities..

[nora butler burke]

  Selling reserve land could help solve poverty: professor
Thursday, November 16, 2006 CBC News <http://www.cbc.ca/news/credit.html>

One of the only ways to address poverty on native reserves is to enhance 
property rights, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's former senior campaign 
adviser said Wednesday night.

The system in place now is stopping aboriginal Canadians from improving 
their economies, said Tom Flanagan, a University of Calgary professor 
and co-editor of  /Self Determination:The other path for Native 
Americans/, a new book that takes a hard look at property rights on 
reserves.

The value of property on native reserves has gone up significantly, 
especially on the outskirts of cities like Calgary, he told a meeting 
held at the Ottawa press club.  

Yet people on reserves live in poverty and their homes are falling 
apart, added Flanagan, whose 2000 book, /First Nations? Second 
Thoughts/, called native reserves dysfunctional although he admits he's 
never been to one.

Under Canadian law, many people on reserves face restrictions when it 
comes to selling or leasing land but Flanagan believes some of those 
should be lifted.

Aboriginal people should have the right to sell some of their land to 
business developers, who would make better use of their property and 
create jobs for native people, he said.

"I don't think native people have much choice in the matter because they 
are maybe three per cent of the Canadian population," he added. "They 
are surrounded by western capitalism everywhere."
That comment angered Wayne Courchene, an adviser to the Assembly of 
First Nations. He said Flanagan's views are narrow-minded and don't take 
into consideration the traditional connection aboriginal people have to 
their land.

"I was outraged by the remark," he told CBC News. "I didn't think it 
reflected what a lot of Canadians feel."

Flanagan, whose work also questions why First Nations should live in a 
tax-free environment with free housing, stressed that he's not advising 
the government on aboriginal issues.