Photo: Marina Dodis

CG: Can you explain how the Tsawwassen agreement suppresses aboriginal title rights?

SP: Rather than recognize those rights, the treaty has effectively extinguished them. The Tsawwassen agreement was all about economics, not about aboriginal title and rights interests. It’s a one-time deal only, and the amounts of money that are being offered are woefully inadequate.

CG: Neighbouring First Nations, like the Semiahmoo, have said there are still disputed land and resource claims in this area. Is the treaty situation becoming a matter of first come, first served?

SP: Yes, very much so. Those are the rules of the game. There’s no onus on the Tsawwassen to prove the boundaries of the area they’re claiming. Then you’re given the green light to borrow huge amounts of money that goes to consultants and lawyers and so on. So after you’ve been at the table attempting to negotiate a reasonable and just settlement, 14 or 15 years later you find yourself several millions of dollars in debt and you’re faced with repaying this huge loan. So there’s great pressure on the community to settle.

CG: Tsawwassen is described as unique because of its geographical position encircled by urban development. Do you think they may have felt their negotiation options were more limited?

SP: Yes, there’s no question about it. You can look at that side of the issue; you can say this tiny community is hemmed in by several jurisdictions, and this was an opportunity they couldn’t pass up. Or you can look at the economic opportunism. I was in that community along with several other high-profile leaders, and we spent the entire evening talking about the consequences of entering this agreement and the impact it would have on the rest of us. And it was obvious to us that the Tsawwassen leaders had already made up their minds to do this. But you know it sets a benchmark that obviously the rest of us don’t appreciate.

CG: What will it take to improve this process?

SP: There are two processes currently underway. One that is coming quickly to a decision point is what is known as the New Relationship. The purpose of the New Relationship is to recognize and accommodate and reconcile the aboriginal title and rights of the First Nations in B.C. Now, that process is going into its third year with very little significant progress.

Second, we are in a position to advance a legislative proposal to Premier Campbell and his cabinet. What this proposal calls for is a B.C. Aboriginal Title and Rights Recognition Act, and within that legislation we’re seeking that the government of B.C. and its ministries follow the law of the land and recognize and accommodate our aboriginal title interest, and that resource revenue sharing, shared decision-making and co-management become a legislated responsibility that resource companies are compelled to follow.

And I suppose the other option is getting out on the land and bringing the economy to a grinding halt. And I can tell you with great certainty that poverty and powerlessness ultimately lead to violence, and at that moment the violence is internalized. But there will be a point in time when that violence will turn outward, because we simply can’t go on like this.

According to my understanding, there is very few fertile land in the world. The population is increasing, but the fertile land is decreasing day by day. Canada occupies 7% of the world's land but we have limited fertile land. Tsawwassen land is one of the most fertile lands in BC. If we use such a fertile land for other purposes than farming, there will be negative impact in ecosystem. Infrastructure like an airport, port, housing, roads, railway etc should be constructed on a non-fertile land. We have to think sustainable development. So Tsawwassen Treaty is concern only for business purposes - it only tried to make money by constructing a port instead of farming.

The treaty was driven by the Gateway - the provincial plan to expand the port and connect it with new and wider highways. This ignores the collapse of the US dollar, the steep decline in cross Pacific container traffic, the availability of new routres such as the North West passage and the widened Panama Canal and the key role played by the railways in moving transcontinental freight. All these issues are dealt at length in my blog - stephenrees.wordpress.com and on the Livable Region web site
livableregion.ca.

This is typical of the short term thinking that bedevils our political system. We need to take a strategic view of how our world is changing - and how to cope with that. Unfortunately, the appeals to justice in the TFN process have been ignored by the grab for the quick buck. A sad day for Canada and the Tsawwassen, who both deserve much better leaders with real vision

The TFN treaty was done without proper consideration of the Semiahmoo First Nation treaty, the protection of our Agricultural Land Reserve, or the Environment. This is not about giving TFN its due... its about expanding DeltaPort at the expense of our farmland, the Fraser River estuary, and our air quality in a area that shouldn't have been considered for a port in the first place. Tsawwassen First Nations accepted individual cash payouts from the government for signing the treaty and now we will all have to live with the blight of container sprawl on some of the best farmland and most important wildlife habitat in the world.