Since May 2016, WFN and 25 other Self-governing Indigenous Governments (SGIGs) have been part of the Collaborative Fiscal Policy Development Process with Canada. This process was a unique effort that brought together the Government of Canada and SGIGs to develop a new fiscal policy to guide federal officials in negotiating Fiscal Transfer Agreements (FTA).
In March 2019, the new policy was adopted by Cabinet and was reflected in the 2019 Federal Budget. WFN took this opportunity to reopen their current FTA and begin renegotiating under the terms of the new fiscal policy. Af-ter several negotiation meetings, WFN concluded and signed the new FTA on August 27, 2019. The term of the agreement is 5 years from April 1, 2019 to April 1, 2024.
WFN was successful through the negotiation to increase the governance portion of the FTA to $1,835,188 mil-lion per year therefore resulting in an overall increase for a total of $9,175,940 million over a five year term for governance alone.
The Collaborative Fiscal Policy table is still working on developing the methodologies to calculate 8 remaining areas for the new fiscal policy:
1) Economic Development; 2) Culture, Language and Heritage; 3) Stewardship of Lands and Resources; 4) Infrastructure Maintenance and Replacement; 5) Housing; 6)Education; 7) Social Development; and 8) Health.
WFN’s new FTA will have the flexibility to be reopened at our request in order to integrate the new methodologies for the eight areas when they are completed. WFN is continuing to participate in the Collaborative Fiscal Policy Development process with the other SGIGs. When the new annexes are complete will reopen the FTA. The priority at this time is Infrastructure Maintenance and Replacement for fiscal 2019/20.
The remaining following program areas in the WFN FTA will be addressed under the terms of the new fiscal policy are:
- Education Programs
- Administration Of Justice
- Infrastructure Maintenance and Replacement (note: Life Cycle Approach)
- Stewardship of Lands and Resources, and Environmental Management
- Economic Development
In the new FTA, WFN has separated the education portion. This will now fall under a separate negotiation which will start immediately. Once the negotiation is complete an amendment will be added to the FTA. The purpose for separating education is to ensure that eligible students (status non-WFN members) are funded based on the nominal roll. WFN wants to ensure more appropriate education support will be given to our WFN members.The IGA team will continue to negotiate other service areas within the FTA over the coming year.If you would like more information please contact Raf DeGuevara rdeguevara@wfn.ca or Holly Mackenzie hmackenzie@wfn.ca at 250.769.2440