Just days after the new NDP government said it would work to implement a declaration that ostensibly gives First Nations in B.C. a veto over projects like the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled no such veto exists.

“Overall, the decisions are positive for project development in Canada,” said Robin Junger, an expert in aboriginal law for McMillan LLP and former head of the B.C. Environmental Assessment Office.

On one hand, David Eby, the NDP’s new attorney general, confirmed last week what Junger has previously said to be the case – that his government doesn’t have the legal authority to deny permits for the pipeline expansion.

Those are statutory decisions made by civil servants, not political decisions to be made by cabinet ministers.

On the other hand, last week Premier John Horgan issued a mandate to Scott Fraser, minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation, to work with First Nations “to establish a clear, cross-government vision of reconciliation to guide the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).”

That declaration has a clause that states that indigenous people have the right to “free prior and informed consent” on development projects within their asserted territory.

On the surface, that sounds like the NDP would be handing the Tsleil-Waututh of Burrard Inlet a veto, since they deny the federal government’s and Kinder Morgan Canada’s right to expand the pipeline in their territory – the Burrard Inlet in Burnaby.

But as the federal Liberals discovered when they too promised to implement UNDRIP, actually giving it legal force would require a constitutional amendment, which is why the federal Liberals abandoned it.

Two Supreme Court of Canada decisions issued on July 26 made it abundantly clear that, while the federal government has a duty to consult, that does not mean that First Nations can veto a project.

In one ruling, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that regulators like the National Energy Board (NEB) can represent the federal Crown in executing the duty to consult First Nations, but that those consultations must be real, not lip-service.

In the Clyde River Inuit case, the Supreme Court ruled that the NEB has the authority to represent the Crown in executing its duty to consult, but that, in that particular case, it had failed to do so properly. The court ruled the NEB’s consultation failed to properly address the Clyde River Inuit’s concerns.

The other case, involving the Chippewas of the Thames First Nation decision, is particularly relevant to the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. In that case, the court ruled that the consultation with the Chippewas had been adequate.

The Chippewas were objecting to a reversal and expansion of a pipeline owned by Enbridge. The Supreme Court ruled against the Chippewas in that case and in doing so affirmed that, provided consultations are adequate, First Nations don’t have the legal authority to stop developments in their territory.

“The duty to consult does not provide a ‘veto’ for indigenous peoples over Crown decision,” Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP explains in a legal brief on the two cases.

So what does that mean for the NDP’s promise to implement UNDRIP? Junger said it is clear that it has no legal force.

“This is the law,” Junger said. “No elected person can change the law by statements.”

“Courts have interpreted Section 35 of our Constitution as saying there’s no veto. So I think don’t any government would have the power, even by legislation, to make that change. It would have to be a constitutional amendment. You can’t make it law by saying you endorse it.”

—Business in Vancouver