Payments to survivors of native residential schools are being held up because of a Regina lawyer's eye-popping legal bill, Â鶹´«Ã½ has learned.
About 80,000 people had been set to receive up to $24,000 each in compensation.
That money has been on hold because of a dispute between Regina lawyer Tony Merchant and the federal government over his hefty legal fees.
"He wants $49 million. I've said he is not going to receive any of that money without following through on a verification process. We have an obligation to the former students and to the taxpayers," Indian Affairs Minister Jim Prentice told Â鶹´«Ã½.
Merchant's law firm claimed to represent 10,000 victims. The government wanted to examine Merchant's books. He refused, claiming lawyer-client privilege.
"We want to make sure the work was done," Prentice said.
The federal government recently launched an appeal regarding Mr. Merchant's legal fees. Legal maneuvering between Merchant's firms and the federal government could hold up compensation for former students indefinitely.
"I'm glad they are making him do that but they shouldn't hold up the payments for everyone else," said Rosalind Caldwell, who went to a residential school.
"The effects that have stayed me is hearing the girls at night -- even the big girls -- crying," she recalled.
Her brother suffered sexual abuse during his stay in one. "He never lived long enough to see his money," she said.
A group representing survivors say the delay victimizes them once again.
For their part, Merchant's son Evatt -- Merchant and his wife, a Liberal senator, are in Mexico -- said Prentice is targetting his father for political reasons.
"We're Liberals and the government currently isn't," he told Â鶹´«Ã½.
Evatt said the family law firm will not open its client records without a court order.
With a report from CTV's Robert Fife
