First nations dispute route for power transmission line

Consultations among BC Hydro, British Columbia Transmission Corp. and first nations along a key 255-kilometre power line route are an outright failure and need to start all over again, the B.C. Utilities Commission heard Monday.

More than two dozen first nations and tribal associations along the proposed route for the much-needed $600-million Interior-to-Lower Mainland transmission line are arguing at a hearing before the commission that neither BCTC nor BC Hydro has made a legitimate effort to consult or accommodate aboriginal interests.

Some first nations claim their calls for different routes or technologies were ignored, others say BCTC and BC Hydro must deal with wide-ranging aboriginal rights and title issues.

Both BCTC and BC Hydro have lengthy documentation of more than two years of consultation with affected groups along the route, and believe their duty to consult has been discharged.

The commission ordered the hearing after a rebuke last year from the B.C. Court of Appeal.

The commission decided in March 2008 that it would defer judgment on the adequacy of aboriginal consultation to the provincial government -- which was in the midst of a separate examination of the project's environmental impacts.

The commission's decision was overturned in the B.C. Court of Appeal in February 2009 after Kwikwetlem First Nation and other aboriginal groups appealed it.

The court ruled the commission's decision to defer to the province was unreasonable and was based on a misunderstanding of the extent of its duties as a representative of the provincial Crown. The court instructed the utilities commission to stage a hearing that would look exclusively at the adequacy of aboriginal consultation and then decide whether it has been sufficient.

"There was no consultation, and yet BC Hydro says there was," said Greg McDade, legal counsel for Kwikwetlem.

He did not dispute that Hydro and BCTC held several meetings with Kwikwetlem representatives, but said those efforts did not qualify as consultation or accommodation as those words are defined in a series of precedent-setting court decisions.

"The problem that we have to address, right from the get-go I urge you, is to realize that consultation is not simply an English word that my friends are free to put whatever meaning on they want."