RC118 MayJune 2025 - Magazine - Page 17
MICHAEL FOX (PRESIDENT OF ICE INDIGENOUS/MODERATOR): When it comes to
the conversation around economic reconciliation there are di昀昀erent
visions and versions of it across Canada. Why does it matter and how
is it going to make a di昀昀erence for both Indigenous and mainstream
Canadians?
CHERIE BRANT (PARTNER AND NATIONAL LEADER, INDIGENOUS LAW, BLG): When I think
about economic reconciliation, the 昀椀rst thing that comes to mind
for is community. It’s not lost on me that I’ve always been focused
on bringing the economy to Indigenous communities. But actually,
when I grew up, the focus was around Indigenous individuals trying
to get access to the economy that was outside their communities.
Incredibly, 50 years later, we’re bringing the economy to Indigenous
communities. And that to me is what reconciliation is all about, trying
to 昀椀nd a way to do that. If I think about the question from a legal
perspective, I think about the possibilities of moving away from the
structures with respect to the duty to consult. The duty to consult
has really just always been a minimum standard, that minimum
threshold. Starting there, we can see that with reconciliation, we can
create all sorts of di昀昀erent types of partnerships. So,
move away from the duty to consult and focus on
partnerships that are going to look to create better
economic outcomes for communities.
HILLARY THATCHER (HILLARY THATCHER, MANAGING DIRECTOR,
INVESTMENTS, CANADA INFRASTRUCTURE BANK): Economic
reconciliation to me is about economic inclusion.
For the last couple of decades, we’ve worked in
the energy space in Ontario and we saw that shift
happen with the Green Energy and Economy
Act, but it wasn’t happening across the nation,
and it wasn’t happening for a variety of reasons.
Industry wasn’t there. Partnering with an
Indigenous community is a lot of work, it’s building
relationships that takes time. But we’re seeing
more and more when Indigenous communities are
included in project development, whether it’s clean
power or trade and transport, roads, rail, you get projects built better.
They’re built on time, and they’re built with local Indigenous workers.
It saves money, it and helps the environmental approvals process. No
longer do you do a desktop study to build a major transmission line
and get it wrong because you actually don’t know the land. When you
work with your Indigenous partners, they can tell you, “You need to
follow this route because if you go this way, you’re going to be in a
swamp.” So working with Indigenous communities means that you
get projects built better, and we’ve seen this for the last couple of
decades. And so we need to continue to do more to make sure that
communities are included in Canada’s economy.
CINDY WOODHOUSE NEPINAK (CHIEF CINDY WOODHOUSE NEPINAK, NATIONAL CHIEF,
ASSEMBLY OF FIRST NATIONS): I think we need to discuss what economic
reconciliation is not. It’s not keeping First Nations out of the banking
system. Many Canadians don’t know this and they’re shocked every
time I talk about it, but the fact is that as First Nations members, [the
government] number us, in addition to our social insurance number.
So, if you want to buy a house and you go to the bank, they’re going
to tell you as a First Nations person, “Well, go and ask for a ministerial
loan guarantee from Ottawa.” This is how ridiculous it is, and I think
that we can do better as a country. We can work better and absolutely
昀椀nd a way to o昀昀er a昀昀ordable loans. We’re moving, we’re moving in a
good way, but we could be moving a lot faster together.
MICHAEL FOX: What are the trends, in terms of Indigenous participation,
in infrastructure development across Canada?
HILLARY THATCHER: We’re certainly seeing a lot more industry partners
looking to partner with Indigenous communities. They’re seeking
local Indigenous nations and the opportunity to learn from
community and 昀椀nd economic partnerships and equity partnerships.
We saw in the last Federal budget, a national loan guarantee program.
The budget before that, the CIB was given the authority to lend
directly to communities for their equity stakes in projects. And
communities, by and large want to be equity owners in major projects
that are happening on their territory. What we’re seeing across the
country right now is a great need to increase our renewable energy
generation. We’ve seen calls for power from various provinces, and
all of them have Indigenous components and requirements. Projects
are being built in partnership with Indigenous communities and
independent power producers, which are going to result in not just
more megawatts in the system, but in Indigenous communities having
an economic stake. They’re going to see returns to their communities,
often regulated returns, which will mean reinvestment in communitybased businesses, and improvements in the well-being index across
the communities as well.
“Projects are being built in partnership with Indigenous
communities and independent power producers, which are
going to result in not just more megawatts in the system, but in
Indigenous communities having an economic stake.”
RENEWCANADA.NET
CHERIE BRANT: From a legal perspective, the trend has been for individual
First Nations to bring forward their issues and bring forward the
ways that they’re seeking to be consulted and accommodated. But
now the trend has been to look at these opportunities from a collective
perspective. Move away from individual impacts and take it up a
level and think about the broader picture, and work towards collective
transactions where First Nations can come together to work on major
projects. However, I think it does create di昀케cult questions that need
to be answered around, how will those communities partner with
each other? We’ve spent so many years of being subject to divide and
conquer politics, that the question becomes, how do you bring those
communities together that were once looking to compete with each
other, and are now trying to 昀椀gure out how to partner with each other?
CHIEF CINDY WOODHOUSE NEPINAK: I have to lift up the First Nations Major
Projects Coalition and Chief Sharleen Gale for pushing the recently
announced $5 billion Indigenous Loan Guarantee Program. Five
billion is a really good start, but we need more investments across this
country to close the infrastructure gap, to close the gaps that exist in
this country, to make sure that there’s big projects happening across
this country, and that First Nations are included. And I think that the
loan guarantees are so important. And so, with your Premiers and
your Members of Parliament, we ask that you raise the topic when it
comes to First Nations, that [governments] up their investments in the
loan guarantees to $100 billion and not just $5 billion. A good start,
but we have a long way to go for it to be impactful in our country.
And I think everybody will bene昀椀t.
MAY/JUNE 2025 – RENEW CANADA 17
