Controversy continues over Metis hunting rights

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A constitutional challenge on Metis hunting rights is heating up after a Saskatchewan Court of Appeal overturned a lower court ruling that said Metis had the same hunting rights as treaty Indians.

In a 2-1 May decision, justices declared a new trial was necessary for John Grumbo, a 61-year-old Yorkton area Metis charged in 1994 under the provincial wildlife act with illegal possession of deer carcass. He'd been convicted by a provincial court judge whose ruling was overturned two years later after Grumbo's appeal to the Court of Appeal. Justices Edward Bayda and Nicholas Sherstobitoff said there was no evidence showing Metis were considered Indian in the 1930s Transfer of Natural Resources Act giving them the same rights as Indians.

Aboriginal people under treaty are not restricted by many provincial game laws and conservationists say they fear extending hunting rights to the approximately 50,000 Saskatchewan Metis will endanger wildlife populations. Section 35.2 of the Canadian Constitution adopted in 1981 defines the word Aboriginal peoples as the Indian, Inuit and Metis peoples of Canada.

The Metis Nation of Saskatchewan, which is backing Grumbo and other Metis charged with provincial hunting regulations, plans to get additional evidence for presentation at the new trial to allow the court to rule on the issue of hunting rights. Additional funding to fight the case has come from the Ottawa-based Metis National Council, the umbrella organization for cross-Canada Metis organizations. The council's president Gerald Morin, is also a lawyer who is providing legal advice to the defendants.

Metis Nation Vice-President Murray Hamilton said the latest case was significant.

"I suppose there's a good likelihood this could wind up in the Supreme Court."

An encouraging factor is the recent Morin-Daignealt case heard in North Battleford. A judge in the trial of the two northwestern Saskatchewan Metis charged for fishing out of season rejected the Crown's position that the federal government's Metis Scrip process had extinguished Metis Aboriginal rights, including hunting and fishing.

Hamilton says the fact the Crown hasn't appealed that decision means Metis hunting and fishing rights were not extinguished and Metis can still legally hunt as their Aboriginal right guaranteed under the Constitution's Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The vice-president said the Metis Nation of Saskatchewan is supporting other Metis hunters who may be charged by provincial wildlife authorities but not without certain criteria being evident in the cases.

"If they are people who still use the land for subsistence, who supplements his income by hunting or fishing and who depends on land for a lot of his food, then we'll back him up but not, say, someone from an urban area who works in the city, makes $60,000 a year and comes out sport hunting," he said.