VANCOUVER — The Western Standard has unearthed chamber video footage of the first reading ceremony for the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act — better known as DRIPA.
“Today I am proud to introduce Bill 41, the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. It’s like a dream,” Minister Scott Fraser told the House on the morning of October 24, 2019.
What was once called a “dream” — now widely known, often pejoratively, as DRIPA, including in the premier’s office — has turned into a nightmare in recent months.
As it were, on that fateful day in October 2019, there would be no debate over DRIPA.
This isn’t entirely unusual in itself. As a matter of quorum and convention, most bills in British Columbia’s Legislative Assembly pass through the first reading stage without one.
But what followed next was unusual.
First there was the drum circle.
The sitting kicked off with a blessing from T’Sou-ke Nation Elder Shirley Alphonse, followed by a land acknowledgement and another blessing from Songhees Nation Elder Butch Dick. Then came the Lekwungen Traditional Dancers, filling the chamber with a prayer song and drumming.
Following much drumming, dancing, and ‘land acknowledging,’ the BC NDP House Leader Mike Farnworth moved to adjourn all proceedings — including Oral Question Period — so a parade of indigenous leaders could “address the House.”
Four chairs were dusted off and placed in the middle of the legislature. Then came the indigenous leaders to sit in them.
Seated prominently in the middle of the House were the four indigenous leaders granted the floor: Grand Chief Edward John of the First Nations Summit, Regional Chief Terry Teegee of the BC Assembly of First Nations, Grand Chief Stewart Phillip of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs, and Cheryl Casimer of the First Nations Summit.
The four indigenous leaders were there to, as Farnworth foreshadowed, “address the House.”
But first, Premier John Horgan, voice cracking with emotion, hailed the moment as a proud step that would “help us end discrimination.”
Then leader of the Opposition, BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson, stood to perform a land acknowledgment. He followed that up with a minutes-long speech on how he too was supportive, emotionally so, of DRIPA.
Next, the BC Green MLA for Saanich North and the Islands Adam Olsen — a self-assessed part member of the Tsartlip First Nation — stood to address the House wearing what appeared to be a bandana or do-rag underneath something resembling a Viking hat fashioned out of a hemp rope mop head.
In one particularly memorable touch, Cheryl Casimer began her remarks in the Ktunaxa language. No translation was provided.
The MLAs — whom included no Ktunaxa speakers on record — listened and nodded in approval to words that, for all they knew, could have been literally anything.
The legislation that would later become known as DRIPA was co-developed with the First Nations Leadership Council, committed the province to aligning every provincial law with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, including the highly elastic principle of “free, prior and informed consent.”
But the dream began to unravel in December 2025 with the Gitxaala decision.
The BC Court of Appeal ruled that DRIPA, in conjunction with the later passage of the Clarity Act in 2021, actually incorporated UNDRIP into provincial law with immediate legal effect.
As such, the highest provincial court declared the province’s free-entry mineral tenure system inconsistent for failing to guarantee prior consultation and consent.
Legally, the ruling elevated UNDRIP from aspirational international text to binding provincial statute with immediate force, upending the province’s economic investability and forcing the government into emergency damage control.
That same government, led by Premier Eby, later capitulated entirely in the face of a caucus crisis and the threat of a snap election.
Perhaps it is possible that in the midst of the noise of the ceremonial drum circles and the distraction of outlandish costumes, any room for opposition voices or common sense logic was effectively drowned out.
Nonetheless, the complete absence any of foresight, critical thinking, or disagreement whatsoever is staggering and remarkable in hindsight.
