What is the situation with aboriginal right and title in B.C.?
Denhoff: A series of court cases have found that there is unextinguished aboriginal rights and title in parts of Canada that are covered by historic and modern-day treaties. Historically, B.C. governments haven’t done treaties – for the most part – so the Crown has an obligation to sort out the aboriginal title and the Crown title that might be there. We have two options: we can either litigate or we can negotiate. And the advantage of negotiating is that we get certainty around exactly what the rights are and we can then get on with businesses, investing and people getting on with their lives. And do we really want to spend the rest of the century litigating? Jerry Lampert: The interesting thing is that the major court cases have essentially ended up in the same place. Yes, there’s a lot of discussion about what the particular aboriginal title and rights are, but the court is ultimately saying, “Go back and negotiate.” That’s the bottom line for all of these cases. Andrew Bak: The way
