{"id":55464,"date":"2025-08-08T21:52:04","date_gmt":"2025-08-08T21:52:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55464\/"},"modified":"2025-08-08T21:52:04","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T21:52:04","slug":"major-land-claims-ruling-says-b-c-indigenous-group-has-claim-to-a-portion-of-city-and-port-lands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/55464\/","title":{"rendered":"Major land claims ruling says B.C. Indigenous group has claim to a portion of city and port lands"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

In what was billed as the longest trial in Canada\u2019s history, the ruling represents a milestone in Indigenous reconciliation.DARRYL DYCK\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

A British Columbia First Nation<\/a> has won a major court victory, with a judge declaring it has title to a portion of land in the Vancouver area that includes currently active industrial operations on the Fraser River.<\/p>\n

Justice Barbara Young of the B.C. Supreme Court declared the Cowichan Tribes \u201chave established Aboriginal title\u201d to roughly 800 acres in the City of Richmond, as well as an Aboriginal right to fish for food. Her 863-page ruling \u2013 from a trial that stretched 513 days over five years, from 2019 to 2023 \u2013 was issued Thursday and published online<\/a> Friday.<\/p>\n

Justice Young, a decade-long veteran of the court, also suspended her declaration of Aboriginal title for 18 months so the Cowichan, the federal government and the City of Richmond \u201cwill have the opportunity to make the necessary arrangements.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cMuch remains to be resolved,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

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The court ruling, in what was billed as the longest trial in Canada\u2019s history, represents a milestone in the country\u2019s continuing societal and legal reckoning of Indigenous<\/a> reconciliation. The decision follows a line of similarly important rulings and there will almost certainly be future legal arguments in this case in the appellate courts.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is precedent setting,\u201d said lawyer David Rosenberg, who is among the lead counsel for the Cowichan Tribes, in an interview on Friday. \u201cThis case has tremendous significance.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a statement Friday<\/a>, the Cowichan Tribes said they saluted generations of their leaders who fought for the lands in question and their fishing rights on the Fraser River \u201cever since the Crown began its unauthorized alienation of our lands there in the 1870s.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Cowichan Tribes case, like many before it, is particularly complicated. Defendants included the federal government, the province of British Columbia, the city of Richmond and the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority \u2013 but also two other Indigenous groups: the Musqueam Indian Band and the Tsawwassen First Nation. <\/p>\n

The case thus pitted regional Indigenous groups against each other. The Cowichan are based on Vancouver Island but in centuries past had an annual summer village on the Fraser River where they fished for salmon. The Musqueam and Tsawwassen have long lived around the Fraser River in B.C.\u2019s Lower Mainland.<\/p>\n

The Musqueam are upset<\/a> over the court ruling. On Friday morning, they called it devastating and said it impacts their own title and fishing rights. The land in question is within the Musqueam\u2019s traditional and unceded territory.<\/p>\n

Chief Wayne Sparrow said in a statement the Musqueam are \u201cextremely disappointed\u201d that the Cowichan \u201cwould go against our shared Coast Salish protocols.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was emotional,\u201d he said, speaking of the legal battle in an interview. \u201cWe have a lot of family ties.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Musqueam are considering their next legal steps. <\/p>\n

Alex Munro, a Vancouver Fraser Port Authority spokesman, said the port is reviewing the decision\u2019s implications, alongside other affected federal government departments. Kim Decker, a spokeswoman for the City of Richmond, said it is too early to comment.<\/p>\n

The provincial government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Mr. Rosenberg said this week\u2019s ruling answers questions about privately held land in Aboriginal title cases that were left unresolved in a precedential case at the Supreme Court of Canada. In 2014, the court confirmed a trial judge\u2019s finding that the Tsilhqot\u2019in Nation, for whom Mr. Rosenberg was lead counsel, had established Aboriginal title.<\/p>\n

The Cowichan claim involved about 1,850 acres and the court declared title on roughly 40 per cent of that.<\/p>\n

There are some privately held properties but lawyers involved in the case say that, if the ruling stands, that land would not be affected until it was sold.<\/p>\n

Justice Young declared the land titles held by Canada and Richmond to be \u201cdefective and invalid.\u201d If the Cowichan\u2019s win is upheld in future appeals, they could eventually take control of the land in question and use it as they see fit.<\/p>\n

The land<\/a> is largely industrial and is on the Fraser River in Richmond, across from Tilbury Island, south of Highway 91 and east of Highway 99.<\/p>\n

Justice Young wrote that her declaration \u201cwill change a long-established status quo\u201d and have significant impacts for Richmond and third-party lessees on the lands that Canada owns.<\/p>\n

She said she was balancing the broader public interest and a respectful relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples.<\/p>\n

\u201cA period to allow for an orderly transition of the lands is in keeping with the principle of reconciliation,\u201d the judge wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: In what was billed as the longest trial in Canada\u2019s history, the ruling…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55465,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,44,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-55464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-news","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55464\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}