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Reconciliation is dead and Jason Kenney helped kill it
66 Plays4 years ago
How did reconciliation die? Arresting peaceful land defenders so a corporation could build a pipeline through unceded Indigenous territory at the end of RCMP-held assault rifles didn’t help but Jason Kenney played his part too. He stoked the flames of petronationalism for political gain and continues to use the time-tested settler tactic of divide and conquer. We get into the specifics of Kenney’s reconciliation strategy with Rob Houle.
For full show notes visit https://www.theprogressreport.ca/reconciliation_is_dead_and_kenney_helped_kill_it
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Transcript
Introduction and Treaty 8 First Nations' Dissatisfaction
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey folks, Duncan here with a bit of an intro before we kick this pod off. A lot has happened since we recorded this really awesome interview last week on this file. So I'm just going to kind of summarize a couple of news stories that you're going to need to know about kind of coming into this pod and things that you should know about going out of this pod. So Treaty 8 First Nations walked out of a meeting with Jason Kenney.
00:00:23
Speaker
They did this ostensibly over child care, but there's a lot of chatter that this might be related to the unsatisfaction with the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation, which is something we go into a lot of detail into on this pod. The
Blockade by Cousins of Witsuitin and Militia Harassment
00:00:38
Speaker
morning of February 19th, a group calling itself the Cousins of Witsuitin set up a blockade on CN rail tracks just outside of Edmonton.
00:00:46
Speaker
They were soon handed an injunction or a lawsuit. It's still a little foggy about what actually happened and then more disturbingly a group of like literally Volunteer militiamen, you know a mix of yellow vesters and united we roll people showed up to actually like harass and tear down the blockade That these folks had set up and that is I just want to point out like literally, you know 1930s Italian Feshismo shit
00:01:14
Speaker
And finally, and hilariously, the Liberals also just announced that they will be delaying their promised bill on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, something that's usually called UNDRIP, and they're delaying this bill as a result of the ongoing solidarity blockades and actions that have sprung up across the nation in regards to the assault and invasion of Wet'suwet'en territory by the RCMP.
00:01:40
Speaker
And so that's just a few of the things you gotta know going into this pod, but enjoy it. It's a lot of fun. It's, well, maybe not fun is the wrong word, but it's a lot of good information in here, and I hope you like it.
Guest Introduction: Rob Hoole on Indigenous Politics
00:02:07
Speaker
Friends and enemies, welcome to The Progress Report. I am your host, Duncan Kinney. We're recording today here in Amiskwichiwa, Skigam, otherwise known as Edmonton, here in Treaty 6 territory. And today, we're very lucky to have Rob Hoole in studio with us. Rob, welcome to the show. Thank you. Great to be here. Thanks for the invite.
00:02:25
Speaker
Yeah, Rob is a writer, a researcher, a historian, a political dude. He is from Swan River First Nation in Treaty 8 territory. He has worked in Treaty number 6 for a number of years and has married into Treaty 7. Rob, thanks so much for coming on the show.
00:02:40
Speaker
Thanks, Duncan. It's great. Great to be here. And it's a great opportunity to have a chat with you about many different indigenous political things. Yeah. Like there's two, I think, big news stories that have popped up just recently that I think set the stage for our conversation that I just, we would be remiss to not talk about. And that is,
RCMP, Wet'suwet'en Territory, and Resource Projects
00:02:58
Speaker
you know, the ongoing issue with the RCMP invasion of what's so it's in territory and the like resulting blockades and direct action.
00:03:07
Speaker
the movement of direct actions that has kind of taken place all over the country in solidarity with the Wet'suwet'en. And then I think the Alberta context in that is not only our pension, the AIMCO being involved in that project, in the Coastal Gaslink Pipeline project, but also Chief Alan Adam of the Athabasca Chippewan First Nation.
00:03:28
Speaker
Um, writing a letter to both Jason Kenney and the federal environment minister saying, uh, you probably shouldn't approve this, uh, this giant oil sands mine that we previously were pretty in favor of because of all these reasons. And, you know, I think, you know, I reached out to you to have you on this pod after a thread you wrote on Twitter talking about, you know, Alberta's indigenous opportunities corporation.
Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation Explained
00:03:54
Speaker
Yep. The AOC. Yep.
00:03:56
Speaker
And this project, this is a Kenny baby, right? He talked about it on the campaign trail. He quickly put it into law when he won government. And this Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation is fundamentally at the core of what Chief Alan Adam is angry about in regards to this Tech Frontier Mine. And it is just emblematic of this toxic petro-nationalism that Jason Kenney is all about.
00:04:20
Speaker
that really plays into like what's happening with the Wet'suwet'en. So I think it's worth just hearing straight from the horse's mouth, straight from Jason Kenney, what his goals are with indigenous people and what this Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation is all about. Very great start to an important relationship between Alberta's new government and our First Nations.
00:04:42
Speaker
who, I always say, their ancestors were Alberta's first entrepreneurs. And while there's been a lot of great progress to celebrating our First Nations,
00:04:52
Speaker
The truth is that there are still too many Aboriginal Albertans who live in poverty who have not enjoyed the prosperity of this province. And our government is determined to work collaboratively with our First Nations to change that, to ensure that Aboriginal Albertans are full partners in prosperity. That's why we will be creating the new Indigenous Opportunities Corporation backstop initially by a billion dollars of support from the Alberta government
00:05:21
Speaker
to promote financial participation in and an ownership stake in major projects that can help to lift people from poverty to prosperity. Friends, today, Alberta is making history. Today we are recognizing that we must be partners in prosperity with our First Nations in the responsible development of the resources that lie below the lands that were first inhabited by today's
00:05:48
Speaker
indigenous people. For too long, our indigenous people have not benefited fully from the enormous value of the resources in Alberta. Happily, many First Nations have participated in the development of those resources. And increasingly, under strong leadership, we see Alberta First Nations moving forward as partners in prosperity
00:06:17
Speaker
by embracing enterprise and partnerships with resource companies. Our indigenous people were the first entrepreneurs in the North American continent. It was their ancestors who first plied the rivers of what is now Alberta in their canoes, those canoes often sealed by bitumen. We are creating what I think will be a game changer in
00:06:47
Speaker
indigenous crown relations and our ability to get our resources to market. With the recent adoption of the Alberta indigenous opportunities corporation, backstopped by a billion dollars of the faith and credit of the Alberta crown to facilitate aboriginal financial participation in and
00:07:07
Speaker
co-ownership of major resource projects. I truly believe that it is a moral obligation of this generation of Canadians to ensure that our Indigenous people benefit materially from the responsible development of the resources that lie below the lands that their ancestors first inhabited.
00:07:31
Speaker
Alberta has already been. One of the many ways in which we have been a great example of social mobility and progress is through the inclusion of our Indigenous people and resource development with by far Canada's highest levels of employment and incomes for Indigenous Canadians, thanks in large part to the progressive and visionary leadership of our resource companies. But we
The Moral Obligation of Indigenous Co-ownership?
00:07:56
Speaker
have only just begun. We need to move beyond.
00:07:59
Speaker
contracts and benefit agreements to facilitating actual ownership stake for our First Nations, and we are determined to do that. And I believe this will be the game changer in getting market access for our world-class resources. And so the Prime Minister and I are agreed that First Nations should have substantial equity ownership position in the Trans Mountain pipeline,
00:08:27
Speaker
And we're keen to work with Ottawa to make sure that this happens. And this is one of the reasons that we've created the Indigenous Opportunities Corporation.
00:08:35
Speaker
We've also created the Indigenous Legal Defense Fund to give a fair voice share to the vast majority of Western Canadian First Nations who are in favor of responsible resource development, but too often have been crowded out and left aside when it comes to debates on energy and the environment. And so this is a fund that will help to bring the voice of pro-development nations into our courts because they have a right to assert
00:09:03
Speaker
their right to economic development, to be partners in prosperity, to move their people from poverty to prosperity. I would say it is somewhat ironic that governments and energy companies alike are finally embracing First Nations co-ownership of resource industries at a time when those industries are facing dramatic challenges and sustained attacks, both at home and abroad.
00:09:31
Speaker
Okay, where do you want to start? Well, it's it's got a very conservative feel to it very possessive
00:09:44
Speaker
Again, our First Nations, our Indigenous Albertans, Indigenous Canadians, it whitewashes the fact that we don't exist within those kind of constructs, that there are sacred agreements and covenants that put us outside of the Canadian mechanism as something different. But then again, the usual approach of governments that don't really
00:10:08
Speaker
Respect your rights is that they'll say you're just like everybody else and and you're not special and that's what you get from Some of that stuff.
Critique of Kenney's Indigenous Economic Ideology
00:10:16
Speaker
I mean it is dripping in seller colonial ideology, right? Like he says our indigenous people our first nations four or five times
00:10:23
Speaker
He says Alberta's first entrepreneurs to describe indigenous people a bunch of times, which strikes me as a very interesting reframing of indigenous people in their relationship to the economy and trade.
00:10:40
Speaker
that is probably much more, uh, that is not necessarily in line with reality. Um, you know, the, the moral obligation that like settlers have, I mean, we have a moral obligation as settlers to indigenous people in Alberta, and it's in the context of all the treaties that we signed, right? Like, um, it's, it is, uh, I mean, I'm not going to do a Zizek impersonation, but it is, you know, that there is a lot of trashcan ideology happening here.
00:11:08
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, and that that's kind of um again the the old style old stock way of approaching indigenous people and and and I think that's tantamount to some of the stuff that he learned in his federal political days from mr old stock himself, uh, mr harper and
00:11:29
Speaker
And it's just a transference of that. And the thing that should really piss people off is that behind all of this rhetoric and ambiance is the speaking points and the talking points about him and his indigenous friends and how he grew up. And he went to school with all these people and they were best buddies and whatever else. But you can't be best buddies with someone when you're
00:11:53
Speaker
actually discrediting and just valuing them as a person and their rights as indigenous people, right? Yeah. I mean, if the whole system is built on oppression, you're not working to overturn, overcome that oppression. Giving indigenous people an ownership stake in a pipeline is a pittance, right? When you look at the amount of economic activity, the amount of just straight up cash sellers have extracted from
00:12:19
Speaker
you know, the traditional territories of so many indigenous people, like here's a 10% in a pipeline, like who gives a shit, right? And like, and if we're truly looking at indigenous self-determination in regards to their own prosperity, like why not just give them their land back?
00:12:39
Speaker
Yeah, their land and their resources and or acknowledge and respect the the agreements and the treaties as they're written and as they're interpreted in oral history. It was never supposed to be a land transaction. It was supposed to be a sharing arrangement and and as you start to understand how we got to where we were with those agreements and those arrangements and the
00:13:04
Speaker
200 plus years of economic trade that happened before those Covenants and those signed documents and entered into treaty and whatever else
00:13:13
Speaker
you start to understand how the process was actually very, very manipulative and pulled the rug out from the people that were negotiating at the time and cut them a very raw deal. So let's get into the details of this, you know, Indigenous Opportunities Corporation, right? I mean, Jason Kenney, I mean, the vast majority of what he was talking about in those clips was this Indigenous Opportunities Corporation. He clearly sees this as a linchpin of his, you know, quote unquote, you know, reconciliation strategy.
00:13:44
Speaker
Let's get into the details of this thing. What do you think it's supposed to do? What is its stated purpose? Who is behind it? Who's serving on the board? Let's get into the details here.
00:13:54
Speaker
Yeah, so it is a it is a crown corporation enshrined through legislation, which is different than although the head of the Canadian Energy Center was misspoken when he said that they were a crown corporation. They are not their private entity. This entity, this organized AIOC is actually a crown corporation, which means it has a connection to the crown.
00:14:14
Speaker
and a real connection. And if you look into the legislation and Bill 14 that was drafted, and you start to read into the details, there's some indemnity clauses in there that aren't usual in other pieces of legislation, which speaks to a much broader purpose. And then there is a caveat in there that it outlines exactly that it is a Crown Corporation and has certain duties that the Crown would have. And one of those duties that Chief Allen Adam alludes to is a duty to consult.
00:14:43
Speaker
So once you start to look at the broader picture, start to look through the details and read between the lines, you start to see there's some sort of plan or strategy here. And this Crown Corporation has earmarked for it $24 million over four years, which works out to $6 million operating.
00:15:01
Speaker
per year. That isn't designed to do something. There's no details on what it will do. Hold meetings? I mean, they certainly didn't spend it on the fucking website. That's for sure. No, no. And it's definitely not on the website, which is a big letdown. It's not for grants, as far as we can see, because that's not that much money, especially it's not a billion dollars backstopping grants or whatever else. And then they have an interim executive director.
00:15:31
Speaker
whose name is Mark Mitchelles or something to that effect. No one, I've never heard of him or run into him in any of my professional days and whatever else. And then they have, they just announced their board of directors. And that's, that was one of the things that you were talking about on Twitter was, was that this board of directors, who was on it, how it was composed, you had some concerns. Well, what were those?
00:15:55
Speaker
well it's definitely falls short from a game changer as as the premier alluded to uh... it's more of the same
00:16:04
Speaker
board construction that we've seen from governments time and time again. The minister, when they were doing the parade around selling the idea, was promising that there would be a majority indigenous board. And what we have here is not that case. We have three indigenous people on a board of eight, so vastly outnumbered. I think I made the point on Twitter that we couldn't even get parity for an indigenous focus entity. So how do you expect
00:16:33
Speaker
a board that is a minority indigenous to have any effect or change in the systems and structures that exist. And it's definitely not going to change any aspects of the game as far as we can see right now. And as a
AIOC and the Trans Mountain Pipeline
00:16:46
Speaker
crime corporation and written into the legislation is this ability to essentially have the minister of indigenous relations tell the AIOC what to do. They're allowed to issue directives. You know, it's not independent, it's not arm's length in any meaningful way. And it certainly seems to be
00:17:02
Speaker
an extremely political project that Jason Kenney, that's why he's built this thing, right? I mean, he mentioned it in those clips. It seems like it's explicitly built to backstop an eventual purchase of a portion of the Trans Mountain Pipeline by indigenous groups.
00:17:18
Speaker
Yeah, and the people that are appointed on there have a background in oil and gas and resource extraction in the province. There's no connection to green energy as far as I can see or indigenous people can see when they start to look at the structure. So then it seems to be leaning in one direction, which is more investment into a dying industry that even the premier most recently
00:17:47
Speaker
Admitted that the industry got it. We got a transition at some point. So he said Jason Kenny wants to To phase out the oil sands you heard it here first. Yeah, so with these people that are on there now having all that background It's contrary to what the minister was also saying when he was parading the idea around is that oh, you know renewables will be part of this this corporation
00:18:12
Speaker
without the experts within the board to even determine what good renewables would be investable, doesn't seem like that's a reality or in the future.
00:18:22
Speaker
And it looks to me like it's a blunt weapon kind of being constructed to have indigenous people, you know, own a portion of say the trans mountain pipeline, maybe eventually the coastal gasoline pipeline, and use that as a rhetorical tool to be like, look, indigenous people are fine with it, you know, to not actually recognize that like an indigenous nation, like say the Tsleil-Waututh,
00:18:45
Speaker
at the terminus of the Trans Mountain Pipeline, that's their territory. They've lived there forever. Their neighbors don't get a vote on whether that project goes through their territory, their land. Imagine, it's like living on a block and all the houses around you got sold.
00:19:01
Speaker
Um, you're under no obligation to also sell your house, right? Like it's not an election. It's not first past the post. These are, especially in BC, right? These there's, there's, there's never been treaty. There's never, this is like unceded territory. Uh, and it just seems like a rhetorical tool that's being built to be like, look, indigenous people think it's good. Build it.
00:19:23
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, and from the evidence in the courts and things like that, there's definitely been this trend in the later days of this country around if you get Indigenous allies on board, you can start to force things through. And I think it speaks a lot to
00:19:43
Speaker
this old stock mentality that the premier and the people in this government have of well if we get enough of our indigenous friends on board then we can ram it through anywhere and in that clip there was a point around getting our resources to market well the thing about that is alberta being where we are situated we have to go through other indigenous people's territories to get any of our resources to market and
00:20:12
Speaker
I think the approach of things like the AIOC will be that, well, if we get enough indigenous people participating within our province and other provinces, then it makes it maybe a more legally sound argument to ram things through, which of course leads to just long-winded legal battles and lawyers getting paid at the end of the day. I'm just going to
Chief Alan Adam's Criticism of AIOC
00:20:34
Speaker
read a bit from this letter from Chief Alan Adam to all the chiefs meeting with Premier Kenny.
00:20:41
Speaker
Dear Chiefs, I am writing you in advance of the All Chiefs meeting with Premier Kenny on February 12th regarding a pressing matter. Over the past several months, Athabasca, Chippewa, and First Nation has continued to push Alberta to mitigate some of the environmental and social impacts of the tech frontier project that fall outside of tech and the federal government's control.
00:20:59
Speaker
The Athabasca Chippewa and First Nation is the closest nation to the proposed project, and issues like threats to water levels on the Athabasca River, bison habitat, and migratory birds are all very important to us. We have a similar table with Canada where they have dealt with our concerns constructively. Tech has also been very good at cooperating with us to address these concerns, but they can only do so much.
00:21:17
Speaker
Throughout this process, Alberta has made it clear that they will not fulfill their duty under Section 35 of the Constitution to consult and accommodate. ACFN is a supporter of the Tech Frontier project. However, Alberta's refusal to work with us respectfully jeopardizes the project's federal approval.
00:21:36
Speaker
putting jobs and benefits for our nation and all Albertans at risk. Premier Kenny has been vocal in the media, blaming Canada for delaying the project. However, the truth is that it is Alberta's refusal to cooperate in good faith that puts the project at risk. Instead, Alberta has told us repeatedly that they would rather deal with us through the Indigenous Opportunities Corporation.
00:21:57
Speaker
Setting aside Alberta's failure to consult, here's why this is a bad idea. And then it's like literally like 12 things. Yeah. And then of the highlights, um, of the highlights from this, I think it will just highlight a handful of them.
00:22:12
Speaker
The fund is marketed as a way for nations to get out of poverty. However, it requires a $20 million upfront payment by the nation in order to apply. For many nations, this amount is out of reach. For nations fortunate enough to be able to reach the $20 million threshold, all the program does is back loans. Some nations do not need the support, and the Alberta government has no plans to assist nations in that position. The only thing the Alberta government is offering in this case is debt.
00:22:41
Speaker
This money can also be only used to invest in oil and gas projects, activities that contribute to the climate crisis and are increasingly viewed by institutional investors and central banks as soon to be stranded assets. Investors around the world are fleeing these types of companies, which is why the Alberta government wants us to give them your money.
00:23:00
Speaker
This fund is essentially a way for the government to take money intended for First Nations and funnel it to their friends in the oil and gas sector. Like, boom. I mean, there's all these other things, but it's like, I mean, there it is, right? And then finally, I mean, there's more, but I think this final point is a point that we also wanted to talk about too. And that this fund will pit First Nations against one another by giving nations outside of Alberta access to capital to develop oil and gas projects on your traditional territory.
00:23:30
Speaker
And this is also the converse, right? Like this, this fund will enable, you know, First Nations based in Alberta to invest in projects that are going through other nations territory and other parts of Canada. I mean, he doesn't say that, but that's, that's also the converse is also true, right? Yeah. The legislation is written so that it can be malleable and also on the AIOC website, they make reference to
00:23:55
Speaker
what their mandate and what the possibilities are, and that is one of them as well. But the caveat on that is that it requires a First Nation from Alberta to have at least 25% invested in that project already, which again, like the Chief said, $20 million is the key in the door first, and then
00:24:20
Speaker
before you can even talk about accessing anything else. You need to have that upfront 20 minutes or go into debt like he says. Another interesting point within that letter is the reference to the Alberta Lottery Fund and a large portion of the lottery fund, 30% of the lottery fund is funded through First Nations Gaming in the province.
00:24:44
Speaker
When they passed the budget, they took all of that money and put it into the GRF, the General Revenue Fund. It's just their money now. It's their money now. So people, organizations, charities that were relying on that lottery fund are kind of in limbo. And then the First Nations who had been receiving that FNDF allocations and things like that, they're also up in the air in limbo. And then it depends on whether or not this money
00:25:10
Speaker
will simply be used to fund the operations of the AIOC because it was bringing in around 30%, which can be upwards of 250 to 500 million a year, which again, translates to over four years, a billion dollars backstopping indigenous investments.
00:25:31
Speaker
yeah like the the lead the part of the letter of chief alan adams letter that deals with this is uh... now there are credible suspicions that the kenny government is planning to divert this money specifically this alberta lottery fund money towards programs that only support the oil and gas sector like the indigenous opportunities corporation like we've we've seen this in regards to other parts of jason kenny's strategy to write like it taking them uh... the teacher's pension away
00:25:56
Speaker
And kind of having proxies in the media and back channel government and government officials back channeling to reporters and colonists that That they're going to be investing that money in oil and gas like Post-secondary's. Yeah, exactly. Right like just recently blackrock Blackrock, you know, like one of the largest investment firm on this planet, you know trillions of dollars under control announced, you know a project where they'll no longer be investing in oil sands projects like like the the writing is on the wall here and um
00:26:26
Speaker
And not to mention that conventional oil and gas in this province essentially hasn't made any money over the past decade. It is a, yeah, it is, it screams of like Jason Kenney rating, you know, the public treasury in order to prop up his friends in oil and gas and indigenous peoples. And indigenous peoples. And it makes it even more troubling when it is.
00:26:49
Speaker
indigenous people who again has a moral obligation to help, yet we remain at the margins of every aspect of social health, education, making small incremental steps forward, but again, lacking the real investment in time that it's required to bring us back up to equity where we existed when this whole relationship started before colonization and things like that really took over.
00:27:19
Speaker
Yeah, and it is really indicative of Kenny's, this Indigenous Opportunities Corporation is the linchpin of Kenny's strategy for dealing with Indigenous people, right? That and this legal challenge. Yeah. Argument which is again, you know, part of this divide and conquer strategy, right? Like, this legal fund is going to fund, it's like $10 million set aside, it's supposed to be able, it's supposed to fund the legal challenges for
00:27:45
Speaker
essentially for First Nations to sue other First Nations about resource projects, right? Yeah. So if now that Chief Alan Adam has posted this objection letter, if a First Nation was invested in this oil sands project, either neighboring or anywhere else within the province, and didn't like that this was happening, they could then access this $10 million fund to sue another First Nation
00:28:09
Speaker
to try to get them to stand down or back off or file injunctions or things like that. Or to get recompense for lost value, whatever, right? Yeah. Essentially, it's a legal harassment fund where provincial dollars are going to go to First Nations who are willing to sue other First Nations. Yeah. This, again, draws back to the federal strategy of previous governments around dividing and conquering around
00:28:36
Speaker
pipeline corridors and things like that and working on the consultation aspect and not necessarily the accommodation aspect and then getting people to sign on board and then taking those documents and those support letters to court and saying well we have all these people with us these kind of hand-picked naysayers don't really matter because it's in the public good that we continue to carry these projects forward.
00:29:01
Speaker
Yeah,
Wegxit and Treaties in Alberta's Potential Separation
00:29:02
Speaker
and I don't really have a good segue to get into this, but I think one of the things we have to talk about in this conversation is Wegset. The movement, if you want to call it that, to separate Alberta, maybe Saskatchewan from Canada. And the reason why Wegset is a thing is because, I mean, Jason Kenney has been fanning the flames of Wegset. You know, he swears up and down that he is committed a Federalist, but he is
00:29:29
Speaker
Continually talks about Western alienation and definitely feeds the kind of like Western Canadian victim complex. He's one of its chief kind of proponents. But the reason why Wegset is something that we got to talk about is because the one thing that like the Alberta political and media class have not dealt with in the context of talking about Wegset
00:29:47
Speaker
is what happens to the treaties in the context of WAGS-IT. Because, I mean, if we were to just, you know, if those treaties were signed with the Crown, like before Alberta was a province, what happens if Alberta separates from Canada?
00:30:07
Speaker
Yeah, so because of the first treaty in kind of Alberta, there's a sliver of treaty number four down in the southern part of the province. But then the major one is treaty number six, which of course stretches from the
00:30:22
Speaker
Rocky Mountains all the way to Manitoba. It was signed in 1876, some 29 years before the province was created and established. So there are international agreements and covenants and something that the crown and especially the British monarchy was doing all over the world when they were going around and
00:30:46
Speaker
colonizing all these different places and taking different territories and resources. They were signing treaties all over the place because within the international context and within the authority of the church and the state and things like that, you needed to do this with indigenous peoples in order to have access to the lands and resources other than
00:31:07
Speaker
outright destroying them, which other countries have done and tried to do. United States, for instance, just straight up murdered a good chunk of all the indigenous people in there. Here in Canada, they kind of kindly, gently murdered
00:31:22
Speaker
Swaths of indigenous people very very polite of us. Yeah, very very polite So they exist in an international context. So so once You start to break these international covenants international law has stipulated that once that starts to happen then once you break an agreement like any other contract
00:31:44
Speaker
It becomes null and void. And then the goods or the lands or the resources that you are trading within that contract or that agreement go back to the original owner. So in that sense. Title would revert back to the original owner. Title would revert. And we see that in BC because there is no treaty or ceded territory. Chilcotin said that Aboriginal title still exists here because there was no treaty, there was no negotiations, there wasn't any of that stuff. There was no fight. There was no battle. There was no fight, yeah.
00:32:12
Speaker
So it reverts and it still exists there. And again, here in Alberta and Saskatchewan and other parts of the country that have treaty, the crown and provinces have relied a lot on the written word of the treaty. But again, other cases in BC have said, well, you have to interpret the oral as well. And it's also important, and I mentioned it earlier, to connect to the historical relationship, the economic relationship that existed some 200 years before
00:32:39
Speaker
the treaties happened. So again, if we exit was to be authentic and real and understood what they were actually talking about, then what we're talking about is in order for Alberta to separate and become its own country, then you need to start negotiating and first revert the lands back to the original holders, and then we can start to negotiate what it looks like moving forward.
00:33:02
Speaker
Yeah, that's totally what's on their brain. That's exactly how they're approaching it. Yeah, and they would have absolutely zero fucking leverage with the indigenous nations who would have the title to the land. The fact that as an absolutely foundational part of any type of separation talk has to deal with the fact that
00:33:25
Speaker
indigenous people are here, they never went away, they like they live here, their territories, their nations are still here. I mean it speaks to the just like overwhelming whiteness and like how you know powerful the settler colonial mindset is when we talk about issues like these, but like if you were listening to this and you know are in the media or know someone is in the media and you are talking about wags it in any way like you have
00:33:49
Speaker
have to bring up treaties like you have to uh it is it is a golden opportunity to talk about not only is it is is this i mean i believe that wakes it is just an extremely cynical ploy by jason kenny to like create enemies and to keep people mad and angry and fearful
00:34:05
Speaker
for a government that needs to create these enemies in order to have kind of a planned populace. And I think if the separatist movement in Canada and Alberta ever gained any actual real power, was ever actually able to do anything, I think the conservative movement would actually do its level best to quash it. But sometimes these things get out of their control.
00:34:28
Speaker
Sometimes politicians stoke things that they grow out of their control. This this has the possibility of growing into that and it's it's worth talking about um You know this this context of treaty though. I mean jason kenny doesn't seem to have a very firm understanding of the treaty relationship either well, I I think he probably does in a sense of he takes the approach that they're frozen in time
00:34:56
Speaker
uh... frozen in eighteen seventy six eighteen
00:35:00
Speaker
79 and 1899 in terms of treaty number eight They're frozen there and and you see it in some of his speaking points as well, right? Their ancestors took these resources and stewarded these lands. Well Yeah, and also us today because we're still here. We didn't go anywhere. You didn't you didn't go extinct Yeah, we didn't stop stewarding the lands. We didn't stop accessing the resources we didn't stop doing some of those things because like
00:35:28
Speaker
Chief Adam and other nations in the North are very involved in the developments and have agreements and things in place. I mean, Chief Adam has like a street, like he's got a company, oil sense service company that's worth like tens of millions of dollars. Yeah. Yeah. So they are actively participating, but you see it in the rhetoric of the government on
00:35:46
Speaker
while their ancestors were and and we're trying to bring these new indigenous people these new age indigenous people up to speed with the rest of society right which again if i was friends with mr kenny i would take a slight to some of those comments because it speaks to indigenous people again being behind everything else when in reality
00:36:08
Speaker
we were far ahead of everybody else when contact first happened. I remind the listeners that people weren't bathing in Europe at that time of contact. The only reason settlers were able to come out here or explorers were able to come out here and not die was by the grace of the indigenous folks who were here at the time. I mean, one way that one way I think we can understand a bit of get a bit of insight into Jason Kenney's relationship to treaty
00:36:37
Speaker
Is uh is a story from late 2018 where this is before he was premier, but he was He was uh, he was giving a speech to the rural municipalities association of alberta and he was talking about Opening up hundreds of thousands of acres of crown land for sale to farmers This is up in in tree territory. I think I think there's a bunch of men and I tear farmers up in this part We're on the high level area. Yeah and uh
00:37:07
Speaker
And the backlash to this from Treaty 8 was like, you can't just sell it, man. If you're going to sell Crown Land, especially that much Crown Land, there's processes and consultation and this, that, and the other thing that you have to do because we manage this land as well as part of a Treaty thing. And this quote from Kenny, I think, is extremely emblematic.
00:37:26
Speaker
This is not land in a reserve or treaty area, it's crown land, and it's land that belongs to Albertans, which is not being put to economic use right now," Kenny said. The whole province was built on converting crown land into productive economic use, and the notion that all of northern Alberta should suddenly be turned into a park runs contrary to our entire history as a people.
00:37:48
Speaker
I mean that, I mean that first sentence, right? This is not land in a reserve or treaty area. I mean, it is clearly land in a treaty area. Like all of Alberta is treaty land. Yeah. Yeah. And it is land within treaty number eight. So I don't know. Specifically. Yeah. And I don't know if he hasn't looked at a map recently or, or I know he has a ministry of indigenous relations that produces treaty maps. So maybe he can pick one of those up and see that it is all treaty territory.
00:38:16
Speaker
I mean, but the backlash from the Treaty 8 Grand Chief Arthur Nosky was swift and other chiefs in Treaty 8 territory were like, no. And I think that that is a real interesting peek into what his real understanding of Treaty is and how he views Indigenous people and why everything he's doing around Indigenous people is focused around
00:38:39
Speaker
economic development, and that is his only lens, and economic development in this case means oil and gas, and that his only lens of reaching out to indigenous people and building a relationship is constructed and centered around pulling dinosaur sledge out of the ground for cash. Yeah, and it's connected to some of their
00:39:03
Speaker
narrow understanding of treaty and the frozen in time approach and then on top of that
00:39:10
Speaker
piling on the NRTA of 1930, which a lot of people don't understand, don't talk about, don't know a lot about, but it is essentially the unilateral arrangement between the provinces and the federal government of the time to transfer the ownership, air quotes, big air quotes, of all resources, live game and things like that in the Western provinces to the provincial control.
00:39:41
Speaker
And this, I mean, this natural resource transfer agreement is something that, I mean, not a lot of white people know about, not a lot of white people or sellers are considering this, but this is essentially the foundational document that allows an oil company to go onto treaty land and just take whatever the hell they want. Yeah. And it authorizes, and Chief Adam alludes to it in his letter, the roles of the provinces in stewarding these resources as well. And again.
00:40:10
Speaker
When they passed it in 1930 through legislation, indigenous people couldn't even hire lawyers at the time. So there was no mechanism for them to battle this and they definitely weren't involved in any of the consultation around it.
00:40:26
Speaker
It was a movement for people like Mackenzie King to transfer and take a federalist approach to constructing a country at the time. It created a lot of the rhetoric that you hear nowadays.
00:40:41
Speaker
especially in this province, other provinces like Saskatchewan and Manitoba have taken a more liberal approach where they've got resource revenue sharing agreements and things like that in place to try to calm some of these fires and these fights. But here in Alberta, they've always taken a very line in the sand, letter for letter, black and white approach to the NRTA and what their perceived obligations and ownerships are within that framework.
00:41:09
Speaker
Yeah, let's just kind of say it in plain language. The Natural Resources Transfer Agreement was this thing that was viewed by Alberta conservatives and oil and gas millionaires as this foundational document, as this thing that allowed Canada to finally become a proper federation and where provinces had the ability to control their own resources.
00:41:33
Speaker
And they think that it erases treaty. Yeah. And that, yeah. And then that this, this, this document erases, you know, the documents that were signed earlier and agreements signed earlier between treaty people, but like, like, what is the like whole depth of a plow thing? Right. Like, like I'm pretty sure oil and gas is, uh, that we're drilling holes that are, that are far below the depth of a plow. And then like our treaties, I can't remember which treaty has that language in it, but like, it's pretty much.
00:41:57
Speaker
all the number of trees in the area have some reference to farming and the depth of a plow. Tree number eight speaks specifically to hunting and farming implements, right, and some of those relationships develop from there.
00:42:16
Speaker
So, and it's very important that outside of that concept, context is also the oral interpretation. And then it's also important to recognize the people that weren't at treaty and people like Sylvia McAdams talk about the role of the women and how Indigenous people are matriarchal in nature. There were no women at the negotiations. So there are stories in oral history about
00:42:41
Speaker
the negotiations happening, the conversations happening, people leaving, indigenous leaders leaving the conversations for hours at a time, and then they would come back and they would have a different kind of conversation after that. That was because they were going back to report back to their bosses and then getting better directions about what to ask for. Again, all of this stuff
00:43:02
Speaker
surprisingly didn't make it into the written text of the treaty and things like that, but um, there's definitely More to treaty than just the way it's written and the way that mr. Kenny and others see it But the legal implications of of the natural resources transfer agreement are huge, right? Like if canada has been illegally, uh, you know pumping oil out of the ground for the past 90 years. Yeah since 1930
00:43:30
Speaker
It would seem that reparations are possibly in order, profit sharing, actually just forfeiture of lands and forfeiture of infrastructure. I mean, you pull on the threat of Canada too hard and you kind of quickly run up against these examples of like, oh, wow, we really did kind of just create this country out of sticky tack and string and that
00:43:58
Speaker
that you pull on it too hard and it all falls apart. Yeah. Once you start to delve into conversation pieces around Indian monies and money and resources gained from indigenous territories and the role of the crown in managing those funds and things like that. Then you talk about the NRTA and how it started to remove some of those lands and those territories unilaterally.
00:44:24
Speaker
selling them off, giving permits away, extracting resources. We're talking about billions and trillions of dollars that indigenous people, if they still control those territories, would be in charge of. And that's kind of what's always hampered any kind of legal approach or challenge of the NRTA, is that in this Canadian court context, it is the
00:44:53
Speaker
big game it's the Stanley Cup final it is the one to take it all and in order to put for First Nations put all their eggs in that basket and to challenge it it's very daunting because then you would undo a lot of the work and a lot of the victories that have been done or achieved to date so it's it's always this tedious speaking point but it's also something that needs to be
00:45:19
Speaker
talked about and managed and under the treaty relationship with provinces rather than having to always fight it out. And I think this is, this leads us nicely into the final thing that I want to talk about, which is the ongoing struggle with the Wet'suwet'en people and the solitary actions that are happening across the country, right?
Coastal GasLink Pipeline Conflict
00:45:40
Speaker
Like we are recording this in advance. We are not, you are not going to get the latest news, unfortunately, on the Wet'suwet'en by the time you hear this.
00:45:46
Speaker
But, I mean, the context, the very brief context is that there is a natural gas pipeline that is getting built through Northern BC. It is going through the traditional terrors of the Wet'suwet'en people, and the Wet'suwet'en have said no, the hereditary chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en have said no, and have set up essentially a blockade. That blockade was kind of violently torn down by the RCMP.
00:46:10
Speaker
and construction was followed right behind it. So I mean, as you're hearing this, they're probably in the middle of trying to construct this natural gas pipeline project. This natural gas pipeline project connects to an LNG project that's supposed to be 30 to $40 billion that's being built on the coast of Northern BC.
00:46:27
Speaker
And the Alberta hook on this is that AMCO, our pension manager, Crown Corporation in this province, has announced on Boxing Day, you know, one of the big news days of the year, that they were investing four and a half billion dollars of workers' pension money into this coastal gasoline pipeline. This coastal gasoline pipeline that increasingly looks like if it does get built, will be built at the end of a gun.
00:46:53
Speaker
And then the following kind of reaction from indigenous movements across this country that have shut down ports, that have shut down highways, that have shut down railroads, that have shut down the government of British Columbia. I mean, what's your take on all this and where are you at?
00:47:13
Speaker
Well, it's also important to note that CGL is a subsidiary of TransCanada and the CGL pipeline ties into the existing TransCanada pipeline, natural gas pipelines that exist all throughout Alberta and other provinces as well and down into the United States. And it also ties into, I think they have agreements in place with some First Nations to give them natural gas.
00:47:37
Speaker
So again, that would have been through IBAs and things like that. A very, very, very complex issue. We've seen something like this similar with the I Don't Know More movement around the unilateral imposition of resource development and change in the rules and things like that. And then again, it's with younger people and younger generations becoming more aware of indigenous rights and what this country is built upon, the foundation of treaty and indigenous rights and the agreements.
00:48:06
Speaker
It's only a matter of time before you continue to see some of these push backs and these actions. And particularly there is some chatter on Twitter around understanding the issue and as complex as it is, there's some speaking points from the elected council or the members that support the elected council. There's agreements in place. There's also some Twitter chatter around
00:48:33
Speaker
for changing the alignment of the pipeline to go around traditional territories and not go right through that we're given.
00:48:43
Speaker
And one thing that's being missed in all of this conversation is that consultation is fantastic, but consultation is meaningless without accommodation. Um, so what the hereditary chiefs of the wet sweat and we're looking for was that accommodation effort from CGL and others and the governments, um, to say, well, we're, we'll consult and we'll talk about this project and the benefits of the project, but there has to be some accommodation as well. And in the terms of, of,
00:49:13
Speaker
Chief Adam's letter, we're seeing that, again, there's a lack of accommodation in their request to the provincial government. And that is something that has changed recently with this new government, the Liberal government, and especially with the transbound pipeline, is that there was a lot of pushback on that.
00:49:33
Speaker
The consultation, the courts ruled was meaningless. It was basically just note-taking exercises, which again is an old-school approach to consultation, and whereas, well, we'll just talk to you, but we don't really have to do anything. Well, now the courts and now this government has said, well, no, you have to do some sort of accommodation.
00:49:50
Speaker
in order to get things moving forward in the right direction. So I think we're only going to continue to see some of these actions, and it's about time. And I think in particular with BC, like many people who were watching the unveiling of the UNGIP legislation and things like that, I was excited and heartened to see that kind of approach, but now
00:50:14
Speaker
With what's happening, it seems like it was all just for show because it doesn't amount to changing anything. And what's the purpose of doing anything if you're not going to change, uh, change the relationship and their conversation around reconciliation is dead and things like that. I
Direct Action and Wet'suwet'en Solidarity
00:50:30
Speaker
say that it, it's not dead because it never existed and never started in order for reconciliation to start, you have to stop violating people's rights. And that obviously has not happened since.
00:50:42
Speaker
the apology in 2008 and, and even stretching out to today. Yeah. Like, I mean, we were bringing back full circle to the intro, right? Whereas like if reconciliation is dead, you know what killed it? I mean, you say it never existed in the first place. Totally fair. I mean, I think there's no better kind of visual representation of reconciliation being dead than the RCMP dismantling
00:51:03
Speaker
the sign that said reconciliation on the Wet'suwet'en blockade. I mean, I am extremely heartened right now. I believe in a diversity of tactics fundamentally, right? Like I'm incredibly happy to see like a true working class people's movement happening and real momentum behind kind of say Bernie Sanders campaign in the United States, but I'm also
00:51:24
Speaker
Like what's going on right now when you're blockading train tracks and roads and ports, that is just as important, if not more important than any election, right? That has more democratic content than any policy book, right? And it is training more people, getting more people involved in actual democracy than like knocking on a door. Not to say that you shouldn't do those things. I just think that those things have like higher value.
00:51:48
Speaker
And that these blockades and these direct actions have more potential to make the world a better place than the fanciest best speech ever delivered by any politician ever. Fundamentally, direct action is the way forward. It is the way things improve.
00:52:05
Speaker
And, you know, white people are going to collect their tongues, the powers that be, the people who benefit from the status quo will clutch their pearls. But, you know, fundamentally, like, fuck them, right? Like, this is how progress is made. Any kind of final thoughts before we close it out? Well, and it's important to remember that all of these things that are happening, the blockades, the railways being shut down and things like that,
00:52:32
Speaker
That's not our doing that's not indigenous peoples doing We did not ask for the railways to be built through our reserves we didn't ask for for our lands to be taken away at bottom barrel prices for Railway companies to steamroll steam engine through and things like that That was done for canada's ease and and leaders at the time to make money and whatever else so again it it when you start to look at all these
00:53:00
Speaker
complexities in the relationship between Canada and indigenous people. You have to remember that, and the listeners have to remember that it's not our doing. We didn't do any of this stuff. It was all created for us by people who thought that they knew better. And now what we're seeing is the ramifications of all those poor decisions and poor choices and poor economic investments and whatever else. Um,
00:53:28
Speaker
and that in order for us to move beyond that as a country, we have to come to that understanding first and then work together on
00:53:36
Speaker
on making better choices. And that means having a conversation and then accommodating each other so that we can get along. And building an economy that works for everyone. That means everyone's basic needs where we're not dependent on, you know, ex global corporation making 20% on some random oil and gas development. That's probably just going to leave us with a bunch of environmental liabilities. Anyways, anyways, Rob, thank you so much for coming on the pod. I really do appreciate it. It's that time of the show.
00:54:04
Speaker
where people can follow you on Twitter. You can plug any projects you're working on. How can people kind of keep up with what you're up to?
00:54:10
Speaker
uh... i'm on twitter at me how rob uh... i'd tweets somewhat regularly as it's a great twitter can please try to uh... i try to get out there and and i have written some articles that it that talked about an intense history uh... i am presenting at an upcoming symposium on heritage around indigenous naming in the city of edmonton so uh... that's interesting so it's it i'm trying to continue to advocate and be this voice of
00:54:40
Speaker
helping people understand what the real situation is in Canada and Alberta and in the city of Edmonton as well. Yeah and I think your Twitter account and the stuff you've written for Ecamp or whatever the Edmonton city as a museum project has been extremely useful like we linked to it in another project another podcast that we did on on Frank Oliver and yeah I give Rob a follow he's definitely a really awesome dude to follow on Twitter.
00:55:02
Speaker
Um, it's also that time of the show where we talk about how you can keep this podcast going. And one of the ways that you can support this podcast, the very easy way to support this podcast is to rate, review and subscribe to us. So if you're not, if you're listening to this, you're not subscribed, hit that subscribe button on your pod catcher of choice. I think that also really helps us.
00:55:19
Speaker
is if you're on Apple Podcasts, and I think like 70 to 80% of our listeners are on Apple Podcasts, is to give us a review, to actually write out a review and say, oh my God, Duncan Kennedy's interview with Rob Hoole was amazing. It really opened up my eyes to settler-indigenous relations. Whatever, write anything you want. Just give us a five-star review and actually write some text out. It really does help us. The other way that you can really help us out, and one of the things that is key to kind of us continuing as an independent media project, is financial support.
00:55:48
Speaker
So one way that you can do that is to go to theprogressreport.ca slash patrons and become a $5, a $10, a $15 a month donor and join the 250 other folks who contribute to help keep us going, to help keep Gemini in groceries and keep a roof over our heads. So just put in your credit card and contribute. We would really appreciate it.
00:56:07
Speaker
Also, if you have any notes, thoughts, or comments that you think I need to hear, you can reach me on Twitter at Duncan Kinney, and you can reach me by email at DuncanKatprogressalberta.ca. Thanks so much to Cosmic Family Communist for the amazing theme. Thanks again to Rob Fool for coming on the show, and thank you for listening. Goodbye.
00:56:26
Speaker
Did you know that Progress Alberta is part of a national community of leftist podcasts on the Ricochet Podcast Network? You can find the Alberta Advantage, 49th Parahel, Kino Lefter, Well Reds, The Progress Report, Lefi Sales, Out of Left Field, and Unpacking the News, as well as a bunch of other awesome podcasts at Ricochet Media or wherever you download.