http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/
Beneficiaries of the Robinson-Huron Treaty have not seen annuities go up since 1874
Twenty-one First Nations in northern Ontario are taking the federal and Ontario governments to court in Thunder Bay, Ont. on Monday to demand an increase to their annuities, which have not been raised in over 140 years. Since 1874, beneficiaries of the Robinson-Huron Treaty have been collecting $4 annually.
The treaty was originally signed in 1850. It stated that payments were supposed to increase if the resource revenues generated from the territory produced such an amount as to enable an increase without incurring a loss, according to Serpent River First Nation Chief Elaine Johnston.
“So Canada and Ontario receive revenues from the land that we agreed to those treaties,” Johnston said. “But we haven’t seen a recognition for that.” Now First Nation leaders who are part of the treaty spanning north of Parry Sound to Sudbury and west to Lake Superior are taking legal action to order an acknowledgment of a century-old promise.
Holding out hope for nation-to-nation relations
“Many citizens in each of our communities continue to call into question why the amount is only $4 when they hear news reports of many of the multinational corporations that operate within the territory obtain significant quarterly profits,” said Duke Peltier, chief of Wikwemikong Unceded Territory, who is leading the annuities claim.
“Unfortunately, at times the courts are the only mechanism that exists for Indigenous people to advance our petitions to the Crown, and we still hold out hope that the desire for nation-to-nation relations is something that the government wishes to advance in a meaningful way outside of the courts.”
For the rest of this article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/robinson-huron-treaty-annuities-claim-court-case-1.4303287