The Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation (ACFN) in Alberta says the province has failed to meet its demands when it comes to its environmental concerns over the proposed Teck Frontier Mine.
“The province inadequately did not fulfill the requirements that were set out in regards to dealing with us under our agreement, said Chief Allan Adam. “We have a mitigation table with the federal government which is just about complete and we had a mitigation table with the province of Alberta which they failed to even enter any kind of discussions.”
The Teck Frontier Mine will cover 10,000 hectares of boreal forest about 110 kilometres north of Fort McMurray.
The ACFN is one of 14 First Nations and Metis communities that have signed participation agreements on the Teck mine.
“We had no choice but to go on with this thing. We were the last nation that didn’t have an agreement with Teck resources,” said Adam. “It’s not like we wanted to pursue this, but we were put in a position of do or die situation and we had to do it.”
The federal government is under pressure from the province to approve it and has until the end of February to make a decision.
But in public letters sent last week to the federal government and to other chiefs, Adam said he’s worried that Alberta’s failure to consult and take meaningful action on environmental concerns ranging from caribou habitat to water issues, could jeopardize the project.
“If the government of Alberta is serious about getting Indigenous communities on board with major industrial projects, it should provide a share of the realized tax revenue from each project.”
Alberta’s Indigenous relations minister says a last-minute war of words with a First Nations leader over a multibillion-dollar oil sands mine is a case of bare-knuckle bargaining.
Rick Wilson says he hopes the spat with Adam doesn’t hurt a federal decision on whether to green light the $20.6-billion mine.
“He (Adam) is a negotiator. He sees a spot where maybe he could get a little extra cash for his First Nation. Can’t blame a guy for that,” Wilson said in an interview Wednesday.
“Not everybody is going to agree to everything …. We all have to have some differences. And Chief Allan is not opposed to the (Teck) project.”
Wilson said there is “a little bit” of a concern that the public disagreement could give the federal government a reason to reject the oil sands project.
“But what I heard from (Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller) this morning, and so many other people I’ve talked to at the federal level, they understand that these are negotiations and that Teck has done 10 years of consultations.”
Wilson, as well as Environment Minister Jason Nixon, have said there have been extensive discussions with Adam about his environmental concerns.
Wilson said he expected the letters would come up. “We’re going to have to address the elephant in the room.”
Kenney has been raising the political stakes of late on Teck Frontier. He has said there is no reason for Ottawa to reject the mine, since it has passed a provincial-federal regulatory review.
The project would create an estimated 7,000 construction jobs, 2,500 operating jobs and about $12 billion in federal income and capital taxes.
In a letter sent to Trudeau last week, Kenney said saying no to Teck at this point “would send a chilling signal regarding federal intentions on all future oil sands or natural resource development projects.”
Alberta Opposition Leader Rachel Notley told a news conference that Adam’s letters show Kenney’s United Conservative government have failed to deal in good faith with the ACFN.
“If this project does ultimately end up being in jeopardy, the majority of blame can be laid squarely at the feet of Jason Kenney and the UCP for engaging in an arrogant, disrespectful and frankly sloppy failure to do their job,” said Notley.
With files from the Canadian Press
For people like me, who find hectares hard to visualize, 10,000 hectares is 38.6 square miles. That is, It is 38.6 sections of land. That’s more than a township, which is only 36 sections. It is 100 square kilometres. And that is how big they say this mine will be. But they will probably want to expand it.