Showing posts with label treaty status card. Show all posts
Showing posts with label treaty status card. Show all posts

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Treaty Status Card Black Market

There is a lot of talk when it comes to benefits for First Nations people who hold a status card, especially from people who benefit the most from treaty cards, many people talk about "...How Indians dont pay taxes and that thier tax dollars are being used by the Indians..." .
Well this is what I see as a Treaty Card Holder:
1. First Nations People pay Taxes just as much as the non-treaty card holder - and the tax dollars that Treaty Card holders pay goes right into the pockets of the Government, because Treaty Card Holders will probably never see Tax- Back Dollars every fiscal period. Treaty Card holders cannot under Law claim any GST or PST, unless every receipt of purchase is collected throughout the year, and is not possible for a number of reasons.

2. There a few names for Treaty Card Holders that are used:
"Indian": When people have to pay money to First Nations people, for example
when they have to pay for equity status
"Aboriginal ": When people talk about all Native people and would like to create
jobs especially when applying for grants
"First Nations": When People need something from the reserves or native business
....There are more names but I cant write them here.

3. Non-Treaty people will pick up Treaty Indians anywhere and take them to a Band
controlled store, give the Treaty Indian money and ask him to buy Cigarettes and Gas at a cheaper price and often times the Treaty Indian will be asked to find his way home with nothing.

4. There is a family of White people on my reserve who have always worked for the band as far back as I can remember, one of them was working at the Band Office as a Band Membership Clerk and she made Treaty Cards for herself and some of her relatives, this is to get tax breaks.

5. The treaty card comes with a number assigned to native people.

Around the country non -status people are beginning to claim Aboriginal Heritage as a way to get equity money from the government - some people are calling themselves "Metis" or "non-status" just to dip into the Education Dollars, housing or other benefits allotted for Aboriginal People.
The Treaty Card is fast dissappearing into history and now it is worth just about the same as the paper it is written on, pretty soon it will end up in a museum display case with the words " ...as long as the Sun shines, the grass grows and the rivers flow..."