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Singh's right. Spending money for Native to have potable water shouldn't even be a question. There's nothing more of a basic human right than having drinkable water, especially since they've suffered being under the broiling water advisory for YEARS.

However, the problem with the NDP is that everything involving doling out money on social programs is a priority. They, like the Greens, are perpetually lacking in presenting anything close to a sensible, financiable budget during elections. They don't even try. That's why the NDP was never a ruling party (at the federal level), just the occasional kingmaker.

The problem is, it's complicated.

First off, is the legacy of historical damage still scarring aboriginal communities in Canada.

Even disregarding that complexity though, current structure of governance in Canada makes the problem harder to identify and resolve.

Singh's return question is what would you do if Toronto faced the same problem? The answer is the federal government would by and large do nothing, because water supply is a municipal responsibility and the Mayor and city council of Toronto are responsible for fixing it, and thus federal funds don't go in and instead municipal tax money is used to keep the water supply going. Across Canada that model is working pretty decently, by and large.

The real question then is why are reserves having a harder time? Well, afore mentioned historical trauma aside, reserves represent small communities directly comparable in size and make up as municipal communities. However, the reserves are NOT managed like municipalities. Instead Canada still has a two tiered system of governance, one for reserves and another for municipalities.

In term so governance municipalities report to the provinces and the provinces report to the federal government. Reserves report directly to the federal government.

The affects everything related to governance and is responsible for a host of confusion and difficulty.

Services: Education and Health are provincially funded, and so the federal government transfer money to the provinces and tells them to figure out education and health services. Municipalities then just get those services. Reserves however sit outside that, and get entirely different intermediaries.

Taxation and funding: municipal, provincial and federal governments all gather taxes and distribute funds up and down. Reserves only deal with funding though directly to the feds, again cutting out the provincial intermediary.

Both of the above mean making an apples to apples comparison of communities to try and ensure both are treated 'equally' is impossible. It also means that solutions that work on one side don't in the other.

It's a big mess, and just throwing money at the system and saying that will fix it is just wrong. Not only that, it's been TRIED and failed. The above mentioned differences also apply to rules surrounding transparency, accountability and fraud prevention. Meaning there are a great many more loopholes available on the reserve funding side for anyone involved or attached to providing services(be that council members on reserve, or any number of external entities hired in good faith to perform services). That in turn means the amount of money lost to direct and indirect corruption is harder to find/stop.

So fix all that is the next obvious response. The problem is still complex though because when does 'fixing' becoming simply white folks making aboriginals do things the 'right(white) way that was already the source of lingering historical damage I didn't even consider yet...

It's a hard problem to solve and Singh's just trying to score cheap political points peddling easy and false answers to a complex problem.