In 1984, Courchene and the Sagkeeng Band Council refused an order from the Canada Labour Relations Board to reinstate four teachers who were fired for engaging in union activities.
He welcomed a report from the Coopers & Lybrand Consulting Group, which found that federal Indian Affairs officials deliberately ignored regulations for expenditure controls in Manitoba.
A local RCMP official denied that his department was profiling Fort Alexander residents, and said that officers generally entered the reserve in response to calls for assistance.
[5] In October 2000, the Canadian media reported allegations that centre directors, staff members and their spouses had taken a week-long Caribbean cruise with money from their professional development budget.
[6] Other allegations of improper spending were reported in the following weeks, and some executives at Manitoba's other aboriginal treatment centres expressed surprise at the amount of federal money received by Virginia Fontaine.
[7] Courchene argued that the treatment centre was not required to cede its financial records to federal auditors, saying that the institution was an independent contractor in partnership with the government.
[10] The federal government subsequently sued Virginia Fontaine Addictions Foundation Inc. and its directors for the recovery of public funds, and attempted to bring the centre into receivership.
[12] Associate Justice Jeffrey Oliphant of the Court of Queen's Bench of Manitoba issued a scathing indictment of financial practices at the centre on February 8, 2001, and gave the federal government permission to conduct an "unrestricted audit".
[20] Courchene's position was placed under judicial scrutiny in early 2004, after a forensic audit drew attention to "unusual" payments he received from the Virginia Fontaine Addictions Foundation over a 29-month period.