OTTAWA — The regional chief for British Columbia said Wednesday that governments should not speed up major projects at the expense of First Nations rights, warning that the projects will be slowed down by court challenges if First Nations are not consulted from the start.
“We’re asking the government to follow your own laws,” Terry Teegee said Wednesday, citing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that the federal government adopted.
The government of Prime Minister Mark Carney introduced major economic legislation last week. The bill has two parts — one to break down federal barriers to internal trade and the other to fast-track major projects. It sets out five criteria to determine whether a project is in the “national interest.”
Those criteria include the project’s likelihood of success, whether it would strengthen the country’s resiliency and advance the interests of Indigenous Peoples, and whether it would contribute to economic growth in an environmentally responsible way.
But First Nations leaders say their interests weren’t considered when the legislation was being drafted and that they were given just one week to review a briefing document on the bill.
“It’s probably going to take a lot longer to get approval for some of these projects because we’re going to end up in court,” Teegee said. “This is where we end up.”
The national chief of the Assembly of First Nations agrees.
“It’s not about the bill itself. It’s about the process. And I think that ramming something through when you should be hearing from Canadians, from industry, from First Nations … is the wrong way to go,” Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak said.
“You don’t want to end back up in court. You don’t want to have civil unrest. Why not just invite us to the table?”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 11, 2025.
Alessia Passafiume, The Canadian Press
