FLETCHER: Why B.C. is surrendering Crown land, cancelling environmental reviews

Tom Fletcher grew up in the Peace River region and has covered B.C. politics and business as a journalist since 1984.The B.C. NDP government took another step in its urgent push for more electrical power last week, with a second call for independent power projects in as many years.The Site C dam on the Peace River, bitterly opposed and then grudgingly completed by the NDP, is only now coming into full operation. And it’s not enough to keep up with demand, as industrial power applications pile up and B.C. is forced to import electricity from the U.S.Meanwhile, the province pushes ahead with policies that require even more electricity. Canada’s most aggressive electric car mandate is about to take effect in B.C., despite the lack of thousands of charging stations — or the power to run them. On July 29, Premier David Eby announced a $200-million contribution to deliver electricity to the Cedar LNG project, the second natural gas export facility for the northwest coast and the first majority owned by an indigenous community, the Haisla Nation..As LNG exports finally begin, B.C. cities have begun banning natural gas from use as home and commercial heat, creating another jump in electricity demand (not to mention already-astronomical housing prices). The negligible impact this would have on world greenhouse gas emissions remains a taboo topic.Behind all this is Mark Carney’s federal government, which has committed to increasing the industrial carbon tax to further discourage oil and gas use. It is also planning to go around its own self-created wall of environmental regulations for projects the cabinet deems to be in the national interest. And it has set up a $10 billion Canada Indigenous Loan Guarantee Corporation to provide ownership stakes for those projects given the national interest blessing.The latest B.C. clean power call is a repeat of the 2024 exercise, where BC Hydro awarded 10 power purchase contracts for mostly wind farms with substantial indigenous ownership. How is that first round going? .Documents filed with the B.C. Utilities Commission present a familiar story.“BC Hydro failed to consult DRFN on both the Stewart Creek Wind Project and Taylor Wind project,” says a March 2025 letter from the Doig River First Nation, one of several such objections to the contracts. The Stewart Creek wind farm is a joint venture with the West Moberly First Nation, whose overlapping territorial claim with the Doig River group was an issue during construction of Site C.These First Nations are both signatories of Treaty 8, signed in 1899 to cede land to the Crown except for hunting and fishing rights, but overlaps and disputes persist across the province, treaties or no treaties. This is the Gordian knot that has confronted B.C. and Canadian governments for decades.With last year’s round of fast-tracked power projects bogged down in the existing legal and regulatory systems, this spring Eby’s government pushed through a way to exempt them for politically selected projects, similar to the federal plan..Last week’s commentary described the “land use planning” announcements that the B.C. government is using to cede large areas of Crown land to indigenous people. Government policy is now to surrender Crown title rather than go to court to defend the right to act in the national interest after sufficient consultation with affected First Nations.“Land use planning” leads not only to ceded Crown land, as has been done in Haida Gwaii and other regions of B.C., but “shared decision-making” where the statutory authority of the Crown is shared with the government’s selected First Nation.Then the government borrows more money to finance indigenous ownership stakes in a project it now has a veto over approving. This creates a situation where the First Nation could demand a bigger ownership stake in exchange for its regulatory approval. .This isn’t just a risky move. In some countries it may be illegal. In Britain, for example, the Bribery Act went into place 15 years ago to prevent bribery of domestic or foreign public officials who have influence over environmental or other permits.Under shared decision-making of what is historically the statutory authority of the Crown, is the indigenous partner then a public official? At some stage, that question may be raised in a Canadian court.Tom Fletcher grew up in the Peace River region and has covered B.C. politics and business as a journalist since 1984. He lives in Victoria.tomfletcherbc@gmail.com X: @tomfletcherbc