Prentice comments on visit to Lubicon

In an interview with Alberta Oil magazine in January, Premier Jim Prentice said one of the reasons he immediately visited the Lubicon First Nation after taking office is because “there’s much unfinished business there…. Most of the First Nations in northern Alberta secured treaty land entitlement settlements with the federal and provincial crowns through the 1980s and 1990s. The Lubicon did not…” Prentice praised his predecessors Getty and Klein for the work they did for helping to resolve land claims from the 1980s to 2000s. Prentice said he visited the Lubicon First Nation because they are “arguably the poorest Albertans” as 75 per cent of the community is unemployed, there is no running water, and they continue to use outhouses. Prentice said Chief Billy Joe Laboucan is “extremely articulate, extremely thoughtful, and wants to elevate his people out of poverty and be a constructive partner.”