Officials at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans say they have no plans to investigate allegations of misspending on the Tobique First Nation.

Tina Martin, a band councillor, says the chief and a few other councillors signed a fishing deal with Ottawa despite the community voting no to the deal in a referendum held last fall.

The band now has $7. 5 million. It's building a new fisheries centre and training its people to become commercial fishermen.

Martin says there have been allegations of misspending every since the money arrived. She says some people close to council appear to have been handpicked for jobs and several new vehicles have since shown up on the reserve. "The luxury vehicles, there's one that's an Excursion 2000," she says.

Chief Craig Francis denies the allegations but admits the vehicles were being used for personal use. He says the Excursion 2000 will be parked until it's needed to transport sports fishermen, once a recreational fishing business is up and running. The vehicle cost the band $42,000.

The chief says Tobique didn't sell out to the federal government. He says the fishing money will help his reserve become self-sufficient.

"I'm proceeding with this as a business," he says. "This is solely a business transaction. If it's properly run and managed [it] can generate jobs and income and supplement and help with our backlog, our housing shortage, our social problems our economic problems. The way I look at it, it's a benefit to the reserve as a whole."

Officials with DFO say they're not investigating allegations of misspending. They say the band must account for every dollar spent.

Thirty native communities have now signed fishing deals in the Maritimes. The only hold out in New Brunswick at this point continues to be Burnt Church.