A $2.135-million boost in provincial funding for treaty negotiations will help spur business between First Nations and other British Columbians, says B.C. Attorney-General Geoff Plant.

“As we achieve success, as we build certainty, as we break down mistrust, I think that First Nations will become more active participants in the economy,” said Plant, after announcing the cash injection at a recent Vancouver Board of Trade luncheon.

“I think that businesses will begin to work more actively with First Nations, and the result of all that, I’m convinced, is that there’s going to be opportunities for aboriginal British Columbians, but there’s actually going to be opportunities for everyone.”

Contending it’s time to reconcile First Nations’ rights with Crown rights, Plant said the funding boost represents a “significant increase” in his ministry’s capacity to do the hard work necessary to get deals done.

Photo courtesy Kent Kallberg
B.C. Attorney-General Geoff Plant says the real treaty challenge now is getting the negotiating work done.

“Essentially, the money that we’ve announced today will be spent hiring people who will do the detailed work of putting land packages together, providing consultation and advice around tax agreements, negotiating fiscal financing agreements – all of the technical work of putting together a comprehensive final agreement,” said Plant, the minister responsible for treaties.

He estimated the province has spent $500 million on treaty negotiations over the past decade and more. But so far, the B.C. government has only one treaty with First Nations – the Nisgaa Treaty negotiated by the former NDP government in 2000.

“There’s no doubt that it’s been a very expensive process,” said Plant. “That’s why I think it’s time we show that it can produce results – and I think we’re going to get there.”

The B.C. Treaty Commission, which has two provincial and two federal appointees and two elected First Nations representatives plus a staff of 13, was established in 1993 to oversee treaty negotiations. The Nisgaa deal was negotiated outside the process.

According to Plant and the treaty commission, four or five First Nations are close to signing treaties under a six-stage process.

“The real challenge that we have right now in the treaty process is to do the negotiating work that needs to be done to get the final agreements,” said Plant.

But both the treaty commission and the B.C. Business Council have criticized the province, along with Ottawa, for the slow pace of negotiations.

“While it is true that we have never been closer to treaties in British Columbia, it is also true that much of the groundbreaking negotiation is taking place at only a handful of tables,” said the commission’s annual report.

Several B.C. First Nations have launched lawsuits, some of which include private firms as well as the province and Ottawa.

The commission said First Nations face a Catch-22 situation, because they may feel forced to take legal action to protect interests they do not see being addressed at the treaty table.

“We urge the B.C. government to provide adequate resources to treaty tables where First Nations are ready, willing and able to negotiate,” said the commission’s report.

“Specifically, treaty teams should be sufficiently staffed with skilled and experienced people and be adequately supported by provincial ministries.”

Plant said the province’s priorities are to sign treaties and foster economic development opportunities with First Nations through “accommodation agreements” covering each of the province’s industrial sectors.

But Jessica Clogg, a forestry lawyer who advocates on behalf of First Nations for West Coast Environmental Law, said there is never going to be certainty until the province deals with aboriginal land use.

As long as the Crown is intent on extinguishing aboriginal title rather than recognizing it, no progress can be made, said Clogg.

Last week, the province announced that it has signed a forestry agreement with the Kitkatla First Nation, which spans northern coast between Bella Bella and north of Prince Rupert and inland to Terrace. According to a government news release, the deal gives the Kitkatla access to 375,000 cubic metres of timber and $3.98 million in revenue sharing.

The deal brings the number of forestry agreements between the province and First Nations to 69.

Clogg said First Nations have the right to negotiate their own agreements, but in signing the forestry deals, they have given up powerful tools in return for very little.

Despite the number of forestry agreements, the province and First Nations have not signed a single oil and gas deal.

On the same day that Plant announced the funding boost to the province’s Treaty Negotiations Office, a spokeswoman for Treaty 8 First Nations warned of an impending “meltdown” in provincial-First Nations relations in the province’s oil- and gas-rich northeastern corner.

“So far B.C. has brought little more to the table than offers to tinker with the status quo,” said Liz Logan, chief of the Fort Nelson First Nation, during a recent oil and gas conference. “At this point, from what we have been told, and from what we have observed, there is no mandate for the Crown negotiators to conclude anything of substance.”

Logan said B.C. Treaty 8 First Nations are pushing for co-jurisdiction over the management of all resources in the treaty territory because the provincial and federal governments have failed to protect their treaty, a federal document that dates back to the 1800s, and aboriginal rights on the land.

Logan said an interim oil and gas revenue-sharing agreement signed between the province and Treaty 8 First Nations in March failed because they were too far apart and the government’s offer of one quarter of one per cent of revenues was not meaningful. But Plant insisted that talks ended “amicably.”

“Let me be very blunt, the cost of failure in these negotiations will be very real, and it will be borne in large part by (the oil and gas) industry,” said Logan, who is urging the industry to demand that the B.C. government reform the way the province’s oil and gas commission deals with First Nations.

But Plant defended the province’s handling of negotiations with Treaty 8 First Nations.

“We’ve actually done a lot of work with Treaty 8 Nations in the northeast part of the province to put in place arrangements that give them a chance to have their view heard and also allow them to share in the fruits of the economic value that’s produced by oil and gas drilling,” said Plant.

In a report released last May, the Business Council of B.C. criticized the provincial government’s handling of treaty negotiations and called for the province to allocate more resources to consultation with, and accommodation of First Nations.

The BCBC also blasted the province and Ottawa for ignoring treaty negotiations in the Southern Interior, leaving no forum for addressing aboriginal rights and title in a large area where companies operate.

The report said the business community continues to be concerned with the “glacial pace” of treaty negotiations; constraints or delays in obtaining licences, consents or approvals; and the rash of court actions that businesses face without any ability to resolve “the plethora of related issues.”

“Businesses have been very frustrated by the treaty process,” said the report.

But some businesses and First Nations have been successful in negotiating deals directly.

The report praised Calgary-based EnCana Corp. for its relations with the Fort Nelson First Nation in northeastern B.C. Last year, the aboriginal community acquired its own oil and gas drilling rig through a deal with EnCana and Ensign Drilling.

The BCBC also singled out Alcan and Haisla First Nation, located around the company’s aluminum plant in Kitimat, for signing a formal agreement on their relationship after overcoming poor relations in the past.

The BCBC urged all companies to have good relations with First Nations, starting at the chief and chief executive officer level.

Some First Nations have also filed lawsuits to prevent the provincial and federal governments from lifting moratoria on offshore oil and gas development, while other First Nations are concerned about proposed coalbed methane exploration in the Kootenays.

Resort developments also represent a thorn in the province’s side. Last week – after Plant had announced the funding boost – RCMP moved in and arrested three protesters at an occupation on the Sun Peaks Resort near Kamloops. A handful of other protesters left willingly.

The protesters, who included First Nations members and representatives from the Council of Canadians, are opposed to a proposed $285- million real estate project that would expand the golf course to 18 holes from nine.

They had been there since August, after an injunction against a similar protest in 2001 had expired.

Art Manuel, the former chief of the Shuswap Nation Tribal Council, told CKNW radio in Vancouver that the demonstrations at Sun Peaks are far from over. He said eight protest camps have already been set up, and a ninth is in the works.

But Plant dismissed the Sun Peaks protesters’ efforts.

The protest organizers do not represent “mainstream aboriginal opinion” or the majority view of First Nations in their area, he added.

He was referring to the fact that some First Nations – including the Little Shuswap Band, Adams Lake Band and Shuswap Nation Tribal Council – have denounced the Sun Peaks protest, which was supported by the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs.

Plant said the province will do its best to ensure that Sun Peaks’ owners – a Japanese company and former Olympic skier Nancy Greene Raine and her husband Al Raine – use their property rights.

“There will always be some protests, in part because even within First Nations communities, there are sometimes differences of opinion about what should happen,” said Plant.

“What I hope – and believe – is that if we can make the treaty process work, we can get final agreements in the treaty process,” Plant added. “A larger group of people will come to see negotiation as the best way of resolving these things, rather than blockade or litigation.”

When asked how the province can avoid protests in the meantime, Plant said the province can build certainty through treaties, revenue-sharing accommodation agreements, and companies working out the details of specific projects with First Nations.

The Vancouver-based Musqueam First Nation has also launched a lawsuit against the province and University of B.C. over the proposed sale of Crown-owned UBC Golf Course to the university.

The golf course sits on a piece of property near the UBC gates on West 10th Avenue, part of a Musqueam land claim.

(Monte Stewart can be reached at monte@businessedge.ca)