Minister walks out on chiefs

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Alberta's Aboriginal Affairs Minister Pearl Calahasen listened silently as Driftpile First Nation Chief Rose Laboucan read a resolution rejecting Alberta's plan for consulting First Nations about resource harvesting on their traditional territories. Then the minister got up and left the room.

All parties agree that's what happened. They disagree on other details though.

It was Sept. 14, the second and final day of the Alberta Treaty Chiefs Gathering in Edmonton.

Mere hours after the minister's unscheduled exit, Alberta Regional Chief Jason Goodstriker presided over a hastily called press conference where representatives of the three treaty groups in the province-Treaty 6, 7 and 8- took turns condemning the minister's actions.

Calahasen had been invited to discuss the consultation plan with the chiefs, but "10 minutes into our discussion she walked out of our assembly," Goodstriker said.

Laboucan said the minister insulted the chiefs and Elders.

"I was totally disappointed in the process that occurred this afternoon. The minister walking out of our assembly after receiving our resolution rejecting the government of Alberta's policy and guidelines was very shameful and disrespectful to the First Nations government and its people who made this province possible," she said.

The Driftpile chief said that the process began on the right track back in February of 2005, but has since gone wrong.

"Treaty 8 chiefs, Elders and Minister Calahasen agreed to a government to government process to address our concerns with Alberta's First Nation Consultation Policy," she said. "What has happened since then is an Alberta dictated process that, with this final blow, adds up to bad faith by the government of Alberta's lead minister of consultation."

All provinces are feeling their way along in the area of consulting First Nations on resource harvesting. Licenses for lumber, oil and gas, mining and other business endeavors provide millions of dollars every year to provincial government coffers.

Recent Supreme Court of Canada decisions say the previous way of doing business, which did not include First Nations, was not good enough. First Nation leaders interpret the various court decisions as broadly as possible and see a chance to gain a share of resource revenue.

Governments, so far, have tried to minimize the scope of the high court decisions.

Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development spokesperson Jason Gariepy said the minister was ambushed by the chiefs and had no choice but to walk out of the meeting.

"Minister Calahasen was invited by the chiefs to speak and discuss with them the consultation guidelines that had been in development for about a year. So the chiefs had been aware of it, they'd been working on it. They had seen drafts of it. And the minister was working through the guidelines and the chiefs stopped her before she had a chance to get halfway through and said we've got a resolution we'd like to present to you. The resolution stated that a number of the chiefs- less than half but a number of the chiefs-had rejected the policy and the guidelines outright and wanted to basically start from scratch," he said. "

This caught the minister by surprise. She had no advance warning that a resolution was going to be coming forward. She didn't have a chance to take a look at the resolution before it was presented. I think the chiefs were expecting her to comment on the resolution but I think when you're caught by surprise and you want to have a meaningful discussion, you need to review it in advance. I think that's just common sense."

Laboucan rejected the claim that there was no warning that the chiefs were opposed to the policy.

"They have letters on file. One is dated Sept. 8," she said.

And her comments at the press conference conflicted with Gariepy's claim that less than half of the chiefs supported the resolution.

"It was moved and everybody accepted it the way that it was presented. It was voted on an it was accepted unanimously to reject the document," Laboucan said on Sept. 14.

Some observers claim the minister stormed out of the room in anger. Gariepy said that is not accurate. He said Calahasen could not respond to the chiefs because she is only one of six ministers working on the consultation policy.

"If she was to speak on behalf of all the ministers it wouldn't have taken us anywhere because she'd probably have to backtrack. She's got to make sure that the government response is clear," he said.

But he said discussions about what the next step will be are underway in the various ministries.

"The consultation policy was in response to the Supreme Court decisions. We've accepted and respected what the Supreme Court has had to say. And Alberta has always recognized the duty to consult on Crown lands. The guidelines that were developed just provide more clarity on what that would involve," he said.

He said the chiefs have been "actively involved" in the development of the policy and guidelines. He added that First Nations have been funded from $40,000 to $200,000 to participate in the process.