Six Nations Elected Council (SNEC) received an update on the First Nations Drinking Water Class Action Settlement on Monday.

Rod Whitlow, Six Nations Environmental Lead, spoke on the national lawsuit and whether or not individuals from Six Nations would meet the threshold to qualify in this settlement.

“I’ve asked a lot of questions to the experts and delegates over so many years about if individual households on Six Nations meet that threshold to apply for compensation under this class settlement. The answers that I got consistently were 'yes.'"

“Theoretically, we do have individuals that from the period of 1995 to June of 2021 they definitely meet the threshold,” he continued.

Whitlow spoke on the low media coverage that Six Nations receives on boil water advisories, saying this is because a lot of those advisories are open ended. He added that there's a perception that because Six Nations has a state of the art water treatment facility, there are no drinking water advisories.

There is an upcoming deadline on Dec. 3 for First Nations communities as a whole to opt-in to the class settlement. Six Nations not opted-in for the settlement to date.

Coun. Nathan Wright spoke on this and was eager to acknowledge the short time period there is between now and Dec 3, saying that SNEC would need to make a decision one way or another to allow residents to apply for this settlement.

Whitlow did note that regardless of SNEC's decision to opt-in or not to the settlement, individuals may still qualify for compensation and can apply online.

The issue will be addressed again before full council at the next general council meeting on Nov. 22.

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