Montreal Lake Cree Nation joins call for provincial government to shut down liquor sales during COVID-19

A First Nation in northern Saskatchewan is calling on the government to shut down liquor sales across the province.

Chief Frank Roberts of the Montreal Lake Cree Nation said his community has been having difficulty shutting down house partiesand that closing down liquor stores would help.

"There's lots of passing around of whatever it is that they're drinking," said Chief Roberts.

"If any one of them was affected with a virus, it would spread like wildfire."

Almost three weeks ago, the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations (FSIN) declared a state of emergency and also asked for the province to suspend alcohol sales.

On Mar. 25, Premier Scott Moe released an updated list of business that would be closed in the face of the pandemic.

He said closing liquor stores would drive more people toward addiction services, which could overwhelm the health care system.Moe also said shutting down publicly-owned liquor stores would just drive more people to privately-owned businesses.

Despite an existing ban on the First Nation, Roberts said he was concerned that liquor stores in the area were selling to bootleggers.

"It's not everybody that's doing it but it's a big concern when people start to mingle and gather," he said.

Roberts said it's hard to keep people from gathering together at the best of times.

"It's been very, very difficult for our community members because we are social people," he said.

"We like to visit and especially at times of funerals and, you know, times of need, we're not able to do that now."

Montreal Lake opened a crystal meth treatment facility in October 2019 to deal with a mounting addiction crisis on the reserve. It also opened a meth detox facility in January.