Thursday, the Huu-ay-aht First Nations declared its support for the Trudeau government’s leadership on the economy, environment, and long-term reconciliation with First Nations.
One year into its term, Trudeau’s government has had to make some tough decisions in advance of longer-term reconciliation with First Nations being achieved. As a coastal community potentially impacted by these decisions, Huu-ay-aht First Nations leadership has completed a review of the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain and Northern Gateway pipeline decisions made earlier this week, as well as the decision to formalize an oil tanker ban on the north coast of British Columbia.
In our view, the Trudeau government is on its way to successfully achieving principled resource development and effective environmental stewardship in a manner consistent with our three core traditional values of iisaak, hish-uk tsawak, and uu-a-thluk.
While short-term decisions on projects such as Trans Mountain and Northern Gateway are being made, work must continue on the longer-term goal of reconciliation, where First Nations will one day co-manage their territories with industry and government as their partners.
The Huu-ay-aht First Nations look forward to working together with industry and all levels of government to advance reconciliation and achieve the important balance between pursuing prosperity for all Canadians and protecting the land, sea, and resources that form the basis of that prosperity.
The concept of iisaak can be interpreted as meaning “greater respect and respect with caring.” It is the public demonstration and acknowledgment of respectful interaction between individuals, groups, communities and generally between the human world and the natural world. The is the value most concerned with ensuring First Nations are meaningfully involved in projects such as these.
The concept of hish-uk tsawak can be interpreted as meaning “everything is one.” It is the acknowledgment and appreciation for the wide and deep interconnectedness, interdependence and reciprocal relationship between all things in the human and natural worlds. This is the value most concerned with ensuring a comprehensive and evidence-based approach is taken in considering the positive and negative impacts of these projects.
The concept of uu-a-thluk can be interpreted as meaning “taking care of (present and future generations).” It is the need of government to consider the generations-long interest of the Nation and its people in addition to more immediate desires. This is the value most concerned with an approach that balances the needs of today with the needs of the future.
The Huu-ay-aht First Nations (HFN) is an indigenous community located on the west coast of Vancouver Island in British Columbia. It is a part of the Nuu-chah-nulth culture group, formerly called the Nootka. The HFN is a party to the Maa-nulth Final Agreement, a modern treaty that grants its five member-nations constitutionally-protected self-government as well as ownership, control and law-making authority over their lands and resources.
I found your article in the Globe & Mail this morning to be very thoughtful and well constructed and I particularly appreciated your longer term perspective around reconciliation. Somehow or other we need to get to a place of balancing interests, rather than holding to positions when it comes to decisions of this nature. My fear is that if we do not recognize the need to support more moderate discussion we will swing back and forth between widely divergent all or nothing views. This is what is happening in the US and in the near east. The potential outcomes of polarized and short term debate are very frightening to contemplate.