Summary

• As wildfire smoke worsens across Canada, volunteers are teaching people to build low-cost DIY air purifiers.
• The fan-and-filter devices can perform as well as commercial HEPA air purifiers while costing around $60 to make.
• Organizers say the workshops provide practical protection from smoke while building community in the face of climate change.

On a sunny Saturday in July, a few dozen people file into a United Church on a quiet, tree-lined street near Victoria. Outside, the sky is clear and cloudless — a far cry from the wildfire smoke blanketing other parts of Canada. Inside, people are taking steps to protect themselves from the toxic smoke that has become a regular feature of Canadian summers.

As climate change makes summers hotter and drier, wildfire season becomes, on average, longer and more severe. More Canadians are experiencing the impacts with every breath they take and three-quarters say they’re concerned about wildfire smoke impacting their air quality. Once smoke rolls in, air purifiers — filtration machines capable of removing toxic chemicals and tiny particulates from the air — can be difficult to find in stores, even for those who can afford them.

But at the church, participants are learning to build simple, effective air purifiers at a workshop organized by Bill Darnell, a local resident who helped found Greenpeace in 1970.

“I’ve been involved in social justice and climate action pretty much all my adult life and it’s kind of discouraging that I’m still having to do it at this point,” Darnell tells The Narwhal.

Darnell was inspired to organize the event after learning about a similar workshop that took place in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. He and other volunteers use information compiled by the BC Lung Foundation and Simon Fraser University to help people build DIY air purifiers, using simple and accessible components like box fans, furnace filters and duct tape.

A 2023 study conducted at the National Collaborating Centre for Environmental Health found these air purifiers can perform as well as commercial air purifiers equipped with high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters. While HEPA-equipped air purifiers often cost hundreds of dollars, the materials for these DIY versions cost less than $60. Since 2023, the BC Lung Association has logged more than 160 community workshops where participants have built more than 3,200 air purifiers.

B.C. has recorded 634 wildfires since April 2026 and 98 are currently burning across the province. The fires have put thousands of British Columbians on evacuation alert, while others have been evacuated — like the community of Boston Bar in the Fraser Valley, where a rapidly spreading wildfire nearby also closed the Trans-Canada Highway for four days in early July. Even so, wildfire smoke has — so far this year — had less of an impact on air quality than in previous years. Most of the province is experiencing low-to-moderate-risk air quality. Meanwhile, intense wildfire activity in Ontario made Toronto’s air quality the worst in the world on July 15.

Darnell describes the DIY air purifier workshop as an opportunity to build community and educate people while also empowering them to take action in the face of a direct threat like climate change.

“It really is important to come together when you’re facing a catastrophe,” he says. “There’s the fast-moving ones like floods and fires, and there’s the slower-moving ones like climate change and smoke. The most important resource is the people around you.”

A fan, a filter, a roll of duct tape: a simple solution for cleaner air

Wildfire smoke is more toxic than everyday air pollution. It can travel thousands of kilometres and linger in the air for weeks. 

The smoke contains gases, such as carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide, and volatile organic compounds, like benzene, toluene and butene. There is also particulate matter, which can include soot, dust, pollen and spores, as well as chemical particles. The particles are classified according to size and fine particulates — the really tiny ones, less than 2.5 microns in diameter and typically referred to as PM2.5 — pose the greatest threats to human health because they can travel deeper into the lungs than larger ones. 

Fine particulates found in smoke and other types of air pollution have been linked to damage in several organ systems, including the heart, brain and reproductive system. 

Certain air filters are capable of removing particulates from the air. The DIY air purifiers use a single MERV 13, commonly used in furnaces and available in Canada for less than $20 per filter, which need to be changed out regularly to maintain performance.

The 20” filters fit perfectly on the back of a 20” box fan, which costs about $35. Duct tape seals the filter to the fan, allowing air to be drawn through the filter and pushed out through the fan. To increase the air purifier’s efficiency, a “shroud” can be placed on the side of the fan opposite the filter. Made of duct tape or cardboard, the shroud blocks off the corners of the fan face, preventing air backflow.

It takes about 25 minutes to assemble one air purifier, which can be used immediately to clean the air in a space of up to 400 square feet. At the Victoria workshop, each table soon sports at least one, some of them decorated with colourful duct tape designs, others sleek and white. 

Community in the face of climate crisis

Among the workshop attendees is Victoria city councillor Dave Thompson, who is considering putting on a workshop in the neighbouring municipality.

“I wanted to see how it got organized,” Thompson says. “We’ve been very active on climate change and this is a piece we haven’t done yet.”

Many participants express a desire to do what they can in the face of the climate emergency.

“I feel like whatever we can do on an individual basis for ourselves and our families is always helpful,” Mary Jean, a nurse, tells fellow participants at her table.

Around the room, several signs feature prompts for conversations about climate change and climate action.

“According to polls, 80 per cent of Canadians are worried about climate, but we often think we’re the only ones,” Darnell says. “So what we’re providing is a place where we can come, do something positive, have fun and know that we’re among people and we can talk about it.”

Climate change is making wildfires more likely and more intense. Between 1948 and 2024, annual average temperatures in Canada increased by an average of 2.8 C, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada.

In B.C., wildfires have burned about 10 million hectares of land, more than in the previous six decades combined, according to the BC Wildfire Service. 

While Darnell feels discouraged about the state of climate action at the provincial and federal level, he sees the importance of people gathering. 

“A lot of the province, particularly to the east of us, is on fire at the moment and certainly in the rest of Canada as well. We are trying to provide practical help for people in the community,” he says. 

“People really need a place to come together and just say, ‘Am I crazy?’ No, you’re not. The behaviors of our economy, of our corporations and our government are crazy at the moment.”

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Summary

• On Wednesday, Toronto’s air quality was the worst in the world, as wildfire smoke from northern Ontario blanketed the city. 
• Research suggests even moderate levels of wildfire smoke can pose significant health risks.
• The federal government uses the Air Quality Health Index to communicate the severity of air pollution. The higher the index score, the more precautions people — especially those with health conditions — should take to stay safe and comfortable.

On Tuesday, Sol Mamakwa was driving to Thunder Bay, Ont., sunshine behind him, darkness ahead. 

The Ontario NDP MPP represents the large, remote northwestern Ontario region that is currently burning at extreme rates. More than 100 active wildfires in his riding have displaced six communities so far, and put dozens more under threat as temperatures reached close to 40 C on July 15.”

Meanwhile, choking smoke from these fires has spread more than 1,000 kilometres away, making Toronto’s air quality one of the worst in the world. (On Wednesday, it was even the worst in the world and hospital visits are on the rise.) 

Ontario is not the only province burning. Per the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System, 858 active forest fires across the country have impacted 2.4 million hectares to date; 111 of these fires are considered out of control. Such wildfires are fuelled by warmer-than-average temperatures and drier conditions which make forests more prone to burning and lead to fires spreading faster and further. 

This year, there have already been 483 wildfires recorded inside Ontario’s fire region, compared to 351 last year and the 10-year average of 320. The number of fires has been climbing sharply, with 31 new fires discovered in a single day earlier this week.

“It’s eerie to be in my part of Ontario right now,” Mamakwa told The Narwhal. “The situation is unprecedented, and it’s getting worse.”

As the number of wildfires grows, so do the health risks of smoke, which is more toxic than normal pollution as it can linger in the air for weeks and travel thousands of kilometres. 

“Wildfires in my region have gotten worse and are getting worse,” Mamakwa said. “It needs to be treated like the emergency it is. Every possible measure needs to be taken to keep our communities safe.” 

Here are some things you need to know.

Wildfire smoke may increase health risks

Wildfire smoke continues to cloud much of Ontario, forcing people to stay inside as much as possible. 

This kind of smoke has three main ingredients. There are gases, such as carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide, and volatile organic compounds, like benzene, toluene and butene. There is also particulate matter, which can include soot, dust, pollen and spores, as well as chemical particles. The particles are classified according to size and fine particulates — the really tiny ones, less than 2.5 microns in diameter and typically referred to as PM2.5 — pose the greatest threats to human health because they can travel deeper into the lungs than larger ones.

The more particulates in the air, the hazier it becomes. Extremely poor air quality due to wildfire smoke is hard to ignore, often resulting in new reports and public health warnings to stay indoors and take precautions.

Research suggests even moderate levels of wildfire smoke can pose significant health risks, especially for people with chronic lung diseases like asthma or emphysema that make them more vulnerable to negative health impacts. Fine particulates found in smoke and other types of air pollution have been linked to damage in several organ systems, including the heart, brain and reproductive system.According to a study by the Canadian Climate Institute, long-term exposure to increased toxic wildfire smoke is associated with an estimated 2,500 premature deaths annually in Canada. The study found wildfire smoke caused an estimated total of $5.3 billion in acute health damages between 2014 and 2025.

Most air quality advisories in Canada are now the result of wildfires, not other pollution

Wildfires are now the most common reason for air quality advisories, which are issued when concentrations of particulate matter and hazardous gases rise to levels that can negatively impact human health.

To help Canadians understand the health risks stemming from current air conditions, authorities use the Air Quality Health Index (AQHI), a colour-coded scale of one to 10 (with a plus sign if it’s off the charts), based on concentrations of ozone, particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide — the pollutants found to have the greatest health impacts. 

The higher the health index score, the greater the risk and the more precautions people — especially those with health conditions that make them vulnerable to poor air quality — may need to take to stay safe and comfortable. Avoiding polluted air by staying inside and using air purifiers is the most effective protection but avoiding strenuous outdoor activity and wearing a respirator can also help.

Small amounts of wildfire smoke also come with long-term health risks

At the University of British Columbia, physician Chris Carlsten is leading an effort to shed light on how wildfire smoke affects human health over the short and long term. His team was recently awarded a federal grant to support its work.

Carlsten said the team is focusing on chronic exposure to any amount of wildfire smoke versus acute exposure to high levels, even though the short-term peaks are “problematic.” 

“There may be more health effects, ultimately, from the more common but lower-concentration exposures,” Carlsten said in an interview. The team will also explore how wildfire smoke affects people differently based on age, sex, genetics, exercise habits and socio-economic status.

Better data will help improve public health policy and planning when wildfires flare, allowing people to make more informed choices about how to reduce their risk.

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Summary

• Alberta’s plan to build a pipeline to B.C.’s south coast includes a new terminal capable of servicing supertankers sailing into the Salish Sea.
• If the project goes ahead, very large crude carriers (VLCCs) capable of carrying up to 2.2 million barrels of oil could be loading up at Roberts Bank in the Fraser River estuary.
• A major expansion of the Roberts Bank superport is already in the works with potentially catastrophic impacts on local endangered species.

At the mouth of B.C.’s largest river, industrial development has encroached on important ecosystems for decades. Now, Canada’s plans to boost shipping infrastructure and create a new terminal for oil tankers could increase stress on endangered species and critical habitat.

The Fraser River is truly vast. Its tributaries carry water from nearly one-quarter of B.C., and its delta — the area where the river’s waters mingle with the Salish Sea — stretches from the Vancouver neighbourhood of Point Grey to the American settlement of Point Roberts.

In between, there are mudflats, sandy beaches, eelgrass beds and salt marshes that provide critical habitat for young salmon, migrating birds and countless other species.

“These are really productive environments for fish, for shellfish, for mammals, for birds,” Misty MacDuffee, a salmon biologist and director of Raincoast Conservation Foundation’s wild salmon program, says. 

Freshwater from the Fraser pushes all the way out to the Gulf Islands and the tidal flow from the Salish Sea can make its way all the way to Mission, MacDuffee told The Narwhal. That mingling of freshwater and saltwater creates crucial habitat for young salmon as they make the transition from river living to ocean swimming.“We’ve got all five species of salmon going into the Fraser. It’s Canada’s most productive salmon system — our largest Chinook producer — and it’s really important for the rearing and the migrations of adult and juvenile salmon.”This region has long been subject to development, from canneries and agriculture, to airports and port infrastructure. But now the pressure is ramping up. 

The pipeline pivot to Roberts Bank

On July 2, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced federal support for $10 billion in infrastructure upgrades at the Roberts Bank superport as part of a memorandum of understanding with B.C. 

In the agreement, the federal government also pledged to preserve the ban on oil tankers transiting the waters near B.C.’s North Coast. Keeping the tanker ban in place “without alteration, suspension or narrowing of scope,” as the agreement states, removed the port at Prince Rupert as an option for the terminus of Alberta’s proposed pipeline. Prince Rupert is Canada’s deepest natural harbour, capable of accommodating very large crude carriers (VLCCs), huge tanker ships capable of carrying up to 2.2 million barrels of oil — three times as much as the largest oil tankers currently servicing the Trans Mountain pipeline.

Later the same day, Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced plans for a new West Coast pipeline (funded primarily by state-owned pipeline company Trans Mountain), which would follow the same route as the current Trans Mountain pipeline with one key difference: it would detour further south to end at Roberts Bank, instead of in Burnaby. 

Alberta’s submission to the federal Major Projects Office includes a two-berth terminal able to serve very large crude carriers. These ships are 330 metres long — that’s more than three World Cup soccer pitches laid end to end — and have a fully loaded draft of 20 metres. To reach water deep enough for these massive vessels to float in, the terminal’s causeway and jetty would extend about five kilometres out into the Strait of Georgia.

If the project goes ahead, it would be the first time that oil tankers of this size have ever docked in B.C. The largest tankers that can fit beneath the Second Narrows bridge to service Westridge Marine Terminal — the current terminus of the Trans Mountain pipeline — are Aframax tankers, which have a maximum capacity of 800,000 barrels of oil. Currently, even those tankers can only be filled to about 80 per cent, so the port authority has applied to dredge Burrard Inlet to make room for larger loads (a plan the Tsleil–Waututh Nation is fighting). 

On land, the proposed oil terminal would take up 260 hectares — nearly two-thirds the size of Stanley Park. About half of that space would be covered with 15 storage tanks capable of holding 6.5 million barrels.Roberts Bank’s location — hemmed by wetlands, Tsawwassen First Nation treaty lands, parcels in the Agricultural Land Reserve and residential neighbourhoods — raises questions about whether there is enough room for Alberta’s proposal. The Major Projects Office did not respond when asked whether any assessments about fitting the proposed tanker terminal in that location have been completed.A question about whether the oil tanker terminal could be built in conjunction with the proposed port expansion or would have to wait until Roberts Bank Terminal 2 is complete also went unanswered.

The Fraser River estuary has lost 85 per cent of its salmon habitat to the effects of development and there are already plans to double the size of the terminal.

MacDuffee described the estuary as an “incredible natural asset” that has economic and environmental value.

“It supports these vibrant ecosystems that people are travelling from all over the world to visit, to see the Salish Sea, to see whales, to see birds, to see these migrations, to see these special places and here we are moving to take this incredible asset and turn it into an industrial sacrifice zone.”

Tanker terminal piles risk on top of risk

Roberts Bank Terminal 2, as the $3.5-billion planned port expansion is known, would increase the port’s container capacity by 50 per cent. The 2020 federal assessment of Roberts Bank Terminal 2 concluded the expansion’s impact on wetland function, Chinook and chum salmon and southern resident killer whales “is high in magnitude, permanent and irreversible.” In 2023, the federal cabinet concluded the public interest in the port expansion superseded those impacts and approved the project, subject to nearly 400 conditions.

In 2025, the Vancouver Port Authority submitted Roberts Bank Terminal 2 to the Major Projects Office, hoping to see it designated a “nation-building project” and fast-tracked for final approvals. That designation would mean streamlined regulatory processes and assessments.

Alberta’s proposal will also be evaluated by the Major Projects Office. The office did not respond to a question about whether the tanker terminal will be assessed to determine the potential cumulative effects of the project on the Fraser River estuary and Salish Sea.

The proposal to add another terminal and introduce oil supertankers to the Fraser estuary is raising concerns amongst B.C. environmentalists.

“This is supercharging the impact in case of an accident,” Anna Barford, Stand.earth’s oceans campaigner, said. “If we have a spill, if there is a critical problem, if one of these ships loses power and runs aground, we’re looking at incredible devastation in an area that is wildly biodiverse … at the mouth of a very important salmon-bearing river.”

The logistics of bringing such large vessels into the crowded waters of the Salish Sea is also a concern, Barford added.For MacDuffee, the tanker terminal proposal flies in the face of the federal government’s acknowledgement of the Fraser estuary’s importance. With more than $2 million in federal funds, Raincoast has been working to restore salmon habitat degraded by marine infrastructure.

“We’re allowing the flow of water — of nutrients, of sediment, of fish, of everything — back onto Sturgeon Bank, trying to restore the function of this estuary and the opportunity for rearing salmon,” MacDuffee told The Narwhal.

Port expansion poses significant risk to endangered species and critical habitat

Even without adding an oil tanker terminal to the mix, Roberts Bank Terminal 2’s impact on endangered species could be catastrophic, Barford said. 

“We’re looking at increased underwater noise, which we know is very difficult for fish and for creatures like southern resident killer whales that use echolocation to find their food.” 

More than 100 species in the Fraser River estuary are at risk of local extinction by 2045, a 2022 study found. At-risk species include the southern resident orca, whose population was just 74 individuals as of last year’s census. 

Many migrating bird species, including the western sandpiper, could also be negatively impacted by the terminal expansion. During their annual migration from Peru to Alaska, western sandpipers stop in the Fraser estuary, where they fuel up on biofilm, communities of microorganisms that flourish on the estuary’s mudflats. Losing access to this crucial food source would be a significant blow to western sandpipers and the many other migratory bird species.

“Roberts Bank is critical habitat,” Barford said. “Just because it looks muddy … doesn’t mean that it isn’t a paradise for endangered and migratory species.”

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Summary

• B.C. is a world-leading mushroom producer with much of the provincial crop being exported to the United States.
• Recently, the United States Department of Commerce added tariffs to Canadian-grown mushrooms on the grounds they receive unfair government subsidies.
• One B.C.-based mushroom farm is fighting the tariffs, but more could be coming by the end of the year.

Mushrooms may not be the first crop that comes to mind when you think of high-tech agriculture. But in B.C., Agaricus bisporus — the fungal species sold in grocery stores as button mushrooms, creminis and portobellos — are grown using cutting-edge techniques.

“If you go back 10 or 15 years, you would travel to Holland to find the most productive, leading-edge mushroom facilities in the world,” Lewis Macleod, CEO of South Mill Champs Mushrooms, said in an interview with The Narwhal. “Today, you travel to Holland and British Columbia.”

In 2017, Pennsylvania-based South Mill merged with Aldergrove-based Champ’s Mushrooms to form South Mill Champs. The company now supplies more B.C-grown mushrooms to the U.S. market than any other, around 22,675 tonnes per year. 

Before B.C.’s mushroom tech boom, farms often mimicked more natural growing conditions. Modern B.C. farms use what’s called the Dutch method: metal shelves heaped with a mixture of manure and straw to cultivate their crops. The mushrooms are grown in air-tight facilities that are closely controlled for temperature and humidity. Unlike other indoor crops, mushrooms don’t need much light to grow. The buildings are dim, the opposite of brightly lit commercial greenhouses. This method results in faster growing, better quality mushrooms and fewer pests, according to Macleod. But it’s not as common in the U.S.

Nearly all Canadian mushroom exports — 98 per cent in 2024 — are sold in the U.S. As B.C.’s technologically advanced mushroom industry has grown into a global leader, some American producers have accused Canadian growers of benefiting from unfair government subsidies. It’s set off a trade dispute that could reshape the cross-border market.

B.C. mushroom trade sparks U.S. concerns

If you ask B.C. Agriculture Minister Lana Popham, mushrooms are among the most unique of the province’s commercial crops.

“They have to be harvested 24 hours a day and they grow in the dark,” Popham said in an interview. “There’s been a lot of technology that’s been coming around, a lot of innovation that is allowing for different types of harvesting [and] different types of lighting conditions.”

This innovation may be part of what sparked a trade complaint from a group of U.S. mushroom producers last year.

A September 2025 petition to the U.S. Department of Commerce from the Fresh Mushrooms Fair Trade Coalition argued fresh Canadian mushrooms are being “unfairly” subsidized by government programs.

“Canadian producers are exporting fresh mushrooms to the United States at prices below fair value and are benefiting from countervailable subsidies provided by the government of Canada,” the petition says. “These practices have resulted in significant negative impacts on U.S. mushroom growers and packers, including lost sales, depressed prices and declining profitability.” 

In fact, none of the subsidies provided by Canadian governments specifically target the mushroom industry and are instead directed at farmers generally.

But in May, the Commerce Department agreed with the U.S. petitioners and applied duties on some Canadian mushroom producers. The preliminary decision concluded Canadian governments do unfairly subsidize mushroom production. 

For now, about two dozen Canadian mushroom producers are facing a 2.84 per cent tariff on the mushrooms they sell in the U.S.

South Mill Champs is contesting the Commerce Department’s decision, which Mushrooms Canada, the national trade association representing Canadian mushroom growers, called “deeply flawed.”

“It’s using regulatory tactics to stifle healthy competition,” Macleod said.

Champ’s Mushrooms was handed a 1.62 per cent tariff by the Commerce Department. 

The Commerce Department has yet to decide on whether to hit Canadian mushrooms with anti-dumping duties, a type of tariff applied to imported goods that are being sold at lower prices, as a way to protect domestic producers.

Government subsidies aren’t specific to mushrooms — and U.S. growers get them too

There’s no denying Canadian mushroom growers receive support from the government. B.C. producers do not have to pay provincial sales tax on equipment for their businesses and can also access grant programs that support agricultural operations.

The province also offers funding to help farms cover the cost of adopting new technologies, but Popham pointed out none of the province’s programs are targeted specifically at bolstering B.C. mushrooms.

“It’s not specific at all to the mushroom industry,” Popham said. “It’s just the way we support farmers in B.C.”

And that means the Fresh Mushrooms Fair Trade Coalition’s complaint lacks merit under U.S. trade law, according to Mushrooms Canada CEO Ryan Koeslag.

“It is difficult to reconcile Commerce’s preliminary approach with the fact that comparable agricultural tax treatment exists in the United States,” Koeslag said in a statement after the Commerce Department’s preliminary duties were announced. “Canadian mushroom growers are not receiving special treatment. They are operating under ordinary rules that apply to farmers.”

The Commerce Department did not respond to questions about these criticisms of its decision and whether it will assess tax exemptions available to U.S. mushroom farmers before reaching its final decision on the tariffs. The Narwhal also contacted Giorgio Fresh Co., one of the U.S. companies that formed the Fresh Mushrooms Fair Trade Coalition, for comment but did not receive a response.

Macleod doesn’t believe the trade complaint is really about subsidy programs at all.

“This case is not about the U.S. versus Canada — it’s about companies who have invested in new infrastructure and those who haven’t invested in new infrastructure,” he said.

Most Canadian-grown mushrooms are grown using the Dutch method, Macleod explained. This technique gives growers large, reliable yields quickly, he added, while also reducing pest pressures and creating mushrooms that consumers prefer.

In the U.S., the majority of mushrooms are grown on wood shelves, an older technique that isn’t as efficient as the Dutch method.

Growing mushrooms on wood makes it “very hard to consistently produce a fine-looking mushroom and ensure disease doesn’t at times of the year really damage the crop,” Macleod said.

South Mill Champs’ U.S. operations have learned a lot about the benefits of modern mushroom growing from their Canadian counterparts, he added.

Switching from wood-based cultivation to the Dutch method isn’t cheap, though government grant programs and tax exemptions can help take the edge off the costs. Macleod said it takes years for a mushroom farm to see a return on investment into a whole new cultivation set-up. But the new technology can reduce ongoing costs, increase revenue and open the door to further technological innovation, he added. 

With new cultivation systems in place, Popham said some B.C. farms are introducing robots to harvest their mushrooms.

“Technology is taking over what I would call mundane tasks,” she said, adding human workers are still needed to oversee the machines.

“They don’t expect, as they bring in technology, to see displacement of labour. It’s adding to a better quality of workplace, which is really cool.”

Robots can’t harvest mushrooms grown using wood-based shelving, Macleod said, potentially putting old-style producers at even more of a disadvantage.

“If you don’t have new infrastructure, you have to build from scratch,” he said.

Final decision on additional cross-border costs for B.C. mushroom growers could take months

While additional duties on Canadian mushrooms could be announced within weeks, a final determination by the U.S. Department of Commerce may not come for months. Macleod is hopeful the final determination will be that Canadian-grown mushrooms do not harm U.S. producers.

“I really do not think less mushrooms will be exported from Canada into the U.S.,” he said. “Duties paid will mean ultimately the consumer pays more for mushrooms, which is bad for the consumer and the industry.”

Popham believes that B.C.-grown mushrooms are popular because of the industry’s embrace of innovation and its proximity to the U.S. market.

“I hope that what results from this most recent challenge is that there’s an acknowledgement that we’re just doing it really, really well,” she said.

At a time when many British Columbians want to support locally grown food, mushrooms are a perfect choice, she added.

“When we talk about being more resilient and growing more at home, mushrooms have been there the whole time,”Popham said. “I think that when consumers understand how big of an industry it is here and I think that this is another feather in our cap.”

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Summary

• With demand for electricity rising fast, BC Hydro says it needs natural gas power plants to keep operating to ensure the province has enough power.
• Island Generation, a natural gas plant in Campbell River, B.C., was supposed to be decommissioned but BC Hydro is now seeking to renew its contract as the province needs the power. 
• Energy Minister Adrian Dix said Island Generation is facing supply issues due to the Squamish-based Woodfibre LNG project. As the project is not yet operational, Dix’s comments have confused and surprised some politicians and experts.

When a heat wave hits Vancouver Island, residents turn up their air conditioning, flick on fans or adjust their heat pumps. Demand for electricity spikes. That’s also true during cold snaps and long, dark winter nights when more electricity is needed to keep homes lit and warm.

It’s on those days of extreme electricity demand that a Campbell River power plant fuelled by natural gas is most likely to fire up. Island Generation, owned by Capital Power, is one of a handful of facilities in B.C. that use natural gas to produce electricity. It’s what is known as a peaker plant, mostly called on to generate power at times of peak demand.

With a capacity of 275 megawatts, Island Generation can create enough electricity to power about 125,000 homes. It accounts for about one-quarter of all the electricity that can be produced on Vancouver Island. Only about 40 per cent of the electricity used on the island is generated locally. The rest comes from the mainland, transmitted via cables laid across the bed of the Salish Sea.

Over the past five years, Island Generation has operated an average of 15 days per year, according to Adrian Dix, B.C.’s minister of energy and climate solutions.

But, the facility has been having trouble getting the gas it needs to generate electricity at critical times, Dix told members of the B.C. Conservative caucus on April 23. He said the supposed natural gas supply issue is connected to liquefied natural gas (LNG) production. 

“The reason why the supply of gas is affected is that gas is going to a project called Woodfibre LNG in Squamish. That has been the issue between ourselves and Capital Power,” he said. 

Dix’s statement surprised and puzzled the politicians and experts The Narwhal spoke to. Woodfibre LNG is still under construction until at least next year. Until then, there’s no obvious reason the Squamish facility would be using gas that would otherwise go to Island Generation. 

But questions to the Energy Ministry, Island Generation and Woodfibre LNG mostly went unanswered. None provided information needed to clarify the situation with Island Generation’s gas supply.

“Woodfibre LNG will be purchasing gas in the future once the facility is operational,” a spokesperson for the facility said in response to multiple emails and questions, an answer that does not directly address whether the facility is currently buying natural gas, as the minister implied.

The Energy Ministry did not respond to The Narwhal’s request for an interview with Dix or to specific questions about the ministry’s knowledge about Island Generation’s gas supply or its efforts to ensure the facility will be able to get the gas it needs to operate.

Green Party MLA Jeremy Valeriote, who represents the Vancouver-Sea to Sky riding where Woodfibre LNG is located, told The Narwhal he has not been able to clarify Dix’s comments.

“I’m just flagging for the public that it’s been hard for either of us to get any public information on this,” Valeriote said.

‘Where would that extra energy come from?’

BC Hydro’s contract with Capital Power was set to end in October 2026, but it recently applied to the BC Utilities Commission for a new agreement. The application mentions both Island Generation and the McMahon Cogeneration facility in Taylor, B.C., near the heart of the province’s oil and gas industry. The two gas-fired plants could help BC Hydro meet about 80 per cent of a 500-megawatt electricity shortfall it forecasts will materialize by 2030.

Demand for electricity has been rising rapidly in B.C., driven partly by large industrial customers such as LNG terminals and mining operations. BC Hydro has been under pressure to find efficiencies in its system and bring on new generating capacity with an emphasis on renewable sources such as wind and solar.

Meanwhile, the provincial government has been working to usher in an LNG boom, which could put pressure on the electrical grid and increase competition for natural gas.

Valeriote noted BC Hydro is supposed to be phasing out fossil fuel electricity generation, not seeking new contracts with gas-fired plants.

“It’s pretty concerning when we talk about firing up what should have been a decommissioned gas plant on the island that may not even have gas … in those critical, peak times,” he said.

BC Hydro’s submission to the utilities commission argues the Clean Energy Act, which requires it to generate and purchase enough energy to meet demand, trumps the regulations regarding phasing out fossil fuels. 

B.C. Conservative MLA Larry Neufeld wants to know what would happen if Island Generation were unable to operate during a demand peak.

“Where would that extra energy come from?” Neufeld, who serves as his party’s critic for oil, gas and LNG, said. 

“Would that be siphoned off of the Lower Mainland? Would it be imported? Those are excellent questions that the minister would be responsible to answer.”

B.C.’s LNG push and electricity demand

By 2030, there could be three LNG facilities operating in B.C. and a huge increase in demand for natural gas. In May, the Canadian government celebrated an agreement that could see one of them, Ksi Lisims LNG, sell one million tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) per year to Germany, starting sometime in the 2030s.

Another is LNG Canada, located on B.C.’s coast, the first large-scale LNG export facility in the country. 

It is already using up a huge amount of gas to operate: last year, LNG Canada received more than 3.6 billion cubic metres of natural gas. Nearly 10 per cent of what it burned off was because of an issue with one of the flare stacks, as The Narwhal previously reported.

And, it might eventually use much more. Earlier this month, B.C. Premier David Eby, federal Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson and LNG Canada CEO Chris Cooper held a press conference about a potential second phase of the project.

The newsiness of this announcement — trumpeting another small step toward a final commitment to proceed — was so thin one reporter asked why a press conference had been called at all. But Phase 2 could make a big difference to the province’s energy supply, as LNG Canada’s demand for natural gas could double as its production capacity rises to 28 million tonnes of LNG per year.

Woodfibre LNG will have a much smaller production capacity. It is expected to produce 2.1 million tonnes of LNG per year and will need about 7.7 million cubic metres of natural gas to do so. That gas will be supplied via a new pipeline branch off the Eagle Mountain pipeline, which currently supplies Vancouver Island, including the Island Generation station.

FortisBC is in the process of building that new section of Eagle Mountain as well as upgrading the section of the pipeline that leads into Squamish. A spokesperson for the company said in a statement that Fortis “regularly assesses system capacity and plans for growth and changing regional needs.”

“FortisBC can meet the needs of existing customers on Vancouver Island and we are continuing to deliver natural gas service in line with our contractual agreements,” the spokesperson said.

The Narwhal also asked Capital Power for an interview to discuss the minister’s comments. In response, a company spokesperson sent a two-sentence statement.

“Capital Power and BC Hydro are engaged in discussions around the future of the Island Generation facility in Campbell River,” the statement said. “Our focus is always to ensure we support the reliable, safe delivery of the power needs of British Columbians.”

A follow-up email with the same questions The Narwhal sent to the Energy Ministry went unanswered.

Conservative MLA Neufeld said British Columbians should not have to worry about a shortage of natural gas, even with a large increase in demand.

“Having spent over 30 years in the industry in northeast British Columbia, I will state that it is my opinion that that is a non-issue,” Neufeld told The Narwhal.

“There is far more than enough natural gas in the ground … we don’t have to be concerned about a supply crunch. Whether that is taken advantage of properly by government and by regulation is another question for the minister.”

But as British Columbians brace for a summer of heat waves and rising electricity demands, the province’s ability to keep power flowing becomes an increasingly important question.

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Summary

• B.C. is preparing to overhaul its natural gas royalty system, which determines how much revenue the government earns from the industry, by 2027.
• The government is promising a better return for taxpayers while industry warns higher rates could drive investment to Alberta.
• The debate comes as some advocates argue B.C. should collect more from gas companies who are using public lands for profit.

As B.C. readies to change what it charges fossil fuel companies extracting natural gas from public lands, industry supporters are pushing back.

B.C. has been eyeing changes to its natural gas royalty structure since 2021 when an independent assessment found the existing system needed a complete overhaul. The old system was “contributing to or possibly overcompensating” for the costs of developing oil and gas in B.C., the assessment concluded, which hugely reduced royalties returned to the public.

Details on how the new framework will increase royalties have yet to be released.

According to BC Conservative Labour critic Kiel Giddens, it risks “chasing away investment potential.” He raised the issue in the legislature on the final day of the spring sitting, saying if B.C.’s new royalties are too high, gas producers could move their operations to Alberta.

“There is a real risk that we could actually lose revenue if we’re not competitive,” Giddens told reporters.

Green Party MLA Jeremy Valeriote had a different take. 

“If Alberta wants to sell off their public resources for a song, then we should let them,” he told reporters at the legislature. “We should be standing up for competitiveness in terms of getting the most out of our resources.”

Energy and Climate Solutions Minister Adrian Dix is confident the new royalty system will strike a better balance for both the industry and British Columbians.

“To ensure a fair return … but also a situation where the industry can prosper and invest — those are my two goals in the process,” Dix said.

The new royalty system is emerging alongside B.C.’s burgeoning liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry. LNG Canada, the first production facility to begin operating in B.C., began shipping its product to Asian markets last year — although the facility has experienced equipment issues that have reduced its production capacity. The B.C. and Canadian governments are eagerly anticipating a final investment decision on Phase 2 of the facility, which will double its capacity to 14 million tonnes of LNG per year.

Meanwhile, three other B.C.-based LNG projects are moving toward being operational before 2030. Together, these LNG production facilities will create a significant boom in gas demand, one the industry is keen to capitalize on.

On April 9, Dix sent a letter to industry stakeholders, as originally reported by DOB Energy. The letter, obtained by The Narwhal after Dix’s ministry refused to provide a copy, acknowledged the feedback included several key themes, such as “the need for reliable B.C. gas supply to underpin existing and future LNG projects.”

Dix also emphasized the government’s commitment to “the growth of LNG as a cornerstone of B.C.’s economic strategy.” 

“A strong, investable upstream sector is essential to realizing this opportunity,” he wrote.

How much revenue does B.C. earn from royalties? Probably less than you think

The new royalty system is set to take effect on Jan. 1, 2027, following years of consultations with the industry and First Nations, as well as members of the public.

Royalties are supposed to give British Columbians a share of the profits that private companies earn by pumping oil and gas from public lands. B.C.’s previous royalty regime was criticized on that front because it offered companies a generous suite of credits that could reduce their royalty payments.

In 2022, B.C. announced the end of several of those credits, including the deep well credit, which former Premier John Horgan described as “the largest fossil-fuel subsidy in British Columbia.” 

At that point, the province had given away more than $7 billion in credits to oil and gas producers, with $3.75 billion of those still on the books. Companies are able to use those credits to reduce the royalties they would otherwise pay; money that would have gone into the provincial budget to fund other initiatives. (As of last month, companies had yet to claim about $600 million in credits, according to Dix.)The billions in credits contrast with the revenue B.C. actually collects from natural gas producers. Budget documents show B.C. has collected $5 billion in royalty revenue from gas producers since 2019, nearly half of that in 2022. This year, the province expects to collect $942 million in royalty revenue — less than it projects the BC Lottery Corporation will earn. Next year, royalty revenue is expected to hit $1.6 billion, driven by higher natural gas production.

“I think the dirty little secret of oil and gas is that they don’t contribute a ton in taxes,” Sven Biggs, Stand.earth’s Canadian oil and gas programs director, said. “There is not tons of economic activity actually connected to this [industry].”

The majority of B.C.’s oil and gas operations are concentrated in the northeast, where agricultural fields are criss-crossed by pipelines and studded with well pads. Oil and gas is a way of life for many Peace Region residents but it also comes with downsides. Fracking operations use huge amounts of water to extract gas from the ground, a process that can also leak gas and chemicals into the air and water. The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment has called for the B.C. and federal governments to fund a health impact assessment of the LNG sector to assess links between the industry’s activities and “asthma, heart disease, birth defects, childhood leukemia, neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative diseases like autism and Alzheimer’s.”

Beyond royalties, Biggs argues B.C. should also be seeking to recoup the cost of the industry’s environmental and potential health impacts.

“All of those costs get passed on to us if they are not paying,” he said. “Technically this gas belongs to British Columbia — it’s a Crown resource and we are licensing it to these extraction companies.”

Complaints about competitiveness ‘a smokescreen,’ advocate says

The new system the province is proposing would take into account the money companies invest in their B.C. operations, as well as the money those operations make, called a revenue minus cost system. This approach is “globally recognized for maximizing economic values,” according to a B.C. government website.

Adopting a revenue minus cost system would bring B.C. into alignment with other gas-producing places, including Alberta, notes Werner Antweiler, an economics professor at the University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business.

When the province began reviewing the royalty regime, the plan was to capture “50 per cent of profits after production costs are accounted for” — a pretty standard split in other jurisdictions, according to Antweiler.

“When you calculate revenue minus cost, revenue is pretty simple [because] you can see what the market pays,” Antweiler said. “The cost, that’s a different thing. … Anything that’s increasing costs will reduce profits and will lower the royalty. So one of the key questions that I have is to what extent are we calculating costs the same way as other jurisdictions?”

Depending on how costs are calculated, companies may pay only 30 or 40 per cent of their profits to governments in royalties, Antweiler said.

As for BC Conservative Labour critic Giddens’ warning about companies moving to Alberta, Biggs said those warnings are “a smoke screen from the industry.” He noted gas companies have been investing in B.C. for years — a trend partly sparked when Alberta implemented a new royalty regime in 2016.

“I don’t see a way that they can walk away from those at this point,” he said. “It would be a huge write-down. Alberta could produce more gas — hypothetically, but not really enough to meet the kind of demand we’re talking about.”

However, Biggs worries that governments remain susceptible to threats that an entire industry will “pack up and leave town and blame the administration for the lack of investment.”

“It works very well on them every time,” he said.

Years ago, when B.C. was working to lure gas companies to set up shop in the province, offering competitive royalty rates was a key advantage, Antweiler said.

“As the industry has matured, there’s really no reason to continue treating them better than their peers in Alberta.”

‘No decision has been made yet’ on B.C.’s new natural gas royalty regime

Industry priorities have already prompted the government to back down on a couple of proposed royalty scenarios, as Dix’s April letter shows.

“The province will not be advancing the Transition-Plus or Enhanced Return royalty curve scenarios further,” Dix wrote in the letter. “We acknowledge the concerns raised about the magnitude of change associated with those scenarios and the uncertainty they could introduce at this stage. Any further scenarios will consider your feedback as we work to align with the objectives of the new royalty framework.”

The Energy Ministry did not respond to The Narwhal’s questions about the letter, including a request for a description of the Transition-Plus and Enhanced Return scenarios.

Antweiler noted the two scenarios are similar to interim royalty rates outlined in 2022 under which companies pay higher royalties when gas prices are high and lower rates kick in when prices drop. The revenue minus cost system is simpler, he said, and could still give B.C. a good rate of return, depending on how it is designed

“It makes sense to me to move away from just an update of the existing system and to something that’s really robust and economically cohesive,” he said. “That’s exactly what other jurisdictions — like Alberta — are doing.”

Antweiler hasn’t seen the specific rate scenarios the province has been discussing with industry stakeholders. Those are covered by non-disclosure agreements, as Giddens pointed out to reporters.

Dix said non-disclosure agreements, known as NDAs, are a standard part of government consultations with both First Nations and industry stakeholders.

“The energy companies provide information to us about the impact of different possible royalty regimes and differences that are obviously commercially sensitive, so that’s done under NDA,” Dix said. “We put forward different proposals and asked them to comment on different potential proposals, just to see what the impact is on different companies.”

“I think that’s really irresponsible,” the Green Party’s Valeriote said of the government’s apparent concession on the two royalty scenarios. “I think we should be extracting the most value for the B.C. public out of these public resources, and caving into lobbyists and others who want to make it easier to make big profits, it’s just not good public policy.”

“No decision has been made,” Dix said when asked about the letter in the legislature on May 28.

“A lot of work has gone into the process and now we’re in the consultation stage,” he added. “This included extensive consultation with Treaty 8 First Nations and with energy companies.”

The minister told reporters he hopes to have a final decision on the new natural gas royalties later in June.

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Summary

• As other provinces move to restrict access to public records, B.C. insists its proposed changes are about efficiency.
• Critics say these changes could make it harder for British Columbians to access public records.
• B.C.’s citizens services ministry is receiving fewer FOI requests now than it was in 2020, but those requests are producing more pages than ever before.

Maybe you’ve heard the famous lyric from Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”: “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone?”

That wistful lament about the environmental impacts of development seems unfortunately applicable to freedom of information systems across Canada these days.

The federal government is mulling shielding some forms of government communications from the public. Ontario’s government recently passed a law that exempts documents created by the premier’s office, cabinet ministers and parliamentary secretaries from freedom of information requests. The changes are part of the government’s omnibus bill and are retroactive, potentially stopping hundreds of active requests in their tracks. Meanwhile, Alberta enacted a new freedom of information regime last year, one that significantly restricts access rights and gives the government sweeping powers to withhold requested information or reject requests entirely.

The B.C. government’s freedom of information — known as FOI — legislation is different, at least according to Citizens Services Minister Diana Gibson. Since introducing Bill 9, Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, Gibson has repeatedly talked about other Canadian governments “pulling back” on access to information.

“We are not,” Gibson told reporters. “That’s why these amendments are here, to clarify that we are maintaining oversight and access and one of the strongest FOI acts in Canada.”

Broadly, Bill 9 has two areas of focus. Parts of the bill aim to make it easier for public bodies to share information in response to requests, cutting down on the need for people to contact multiple agencies to get the information they seek. 

Other changes seem geared toward getting more FOI requests rejected, critics say. Currently, the law says an FOI request must give “enough detail to enable an experienced employee of the public body, with a reasonable effort, to identify the record sought.” Bill 9 adds that an experienced employee must be able to identify requested records in “a reasonable amount of time” in “the opinion of the head of the public body.” That potentially gives public sector executives a lot of power to refuse to fulfill requests.

“It degrades freedom of information under the guise of administrative convenience, making the government both judge and juror over what the public can access,” Green Party MLA Rob Botterell said in a statement about the changes. Botterell, who helped draft the original law, which passed in 1992, called Bill 9 an “evisceration of this cornerstone legislation.”

Gibson has accused critics of spreading misinformation and cherry-picking data about B.C.’s FOI system to suit their own narratives.

Let’s unpack the politics and posturing and dig into the current state of B.C.’s freedom of information system and the changes the government is proposing.

What is freedom of information?

Freedom of information is the idea that citizens have the right to access documents and records held by public entities, such as school districts, police forces and government ministries. In Canada, freedom of information rights are laid out in federal and provincial laws. Members of the public can request a range of information from various public entities, from meeting notes and staff communications to databases and documentation about new policies.

Journalists like me can request information to better understand the impact train collisions have on wildlife or uncover a significant equipment malfunction at B.C.’s first liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility.

Most Canadian jurisdictions introduced freedom of information laws around 40 years ago, before the digital revolution. In the years since, the amount of documents public bodies create has grown significantly and many of those documents are subject to freedom of information laws.

How many people actually file freedom of information requests?

B.C. is fielding fewer FOI requests than it once did. In 2020, the citizens services ministry logged a total of 8,347 general requests compared to 4,691 in 2025 — a 44 per cent drop that can likely be at least partly attributed to the creation of a $10 fee for requests implemented by the provincial government in 2021.

But the number of pages generated in response to the average request has increased. The Ministry of Citizens Services says its FOI operations office processed 1.64 million pages in 2020 compared to 2.18 million pages in 2025 — a 33 per cent increase. The average general FOI request filed in 2025 in B.C. yielded 366 pages.

That suggests the public bodies may not be managing information as efficiently as they could be, Mike Larsen, president of the BC Freedom of Information Association, said.

“If we have better ways for people to organize information and if that’s followed consistently, then it shouldn’t be a problem to provide efficient and effective access,” he said. “I think that the minister is not wrong to say that there’s been a shift in the terrain here, but to respond to this with the idea of needing to perhaps curtail access rights in some way, I think, is a step in the wrong direction.”

Larsen also points out that focusing on the quantitative aspects of the FOI system — number of requests filed and pages processed — doesn’t give a complete picture of how well the system is functioning.

An FOI request could, for instance, yield 300 pages, but hundreds of those pages could be redacted, offering no useful information to the requester. In cases like that, knowing the number of pages a public body produced but not how many of those pages contained useful information gives a “totally skewed” impression of the system, Larsen added.

The minister takes issue with the idea that FOI requests are down overall.

“Personal requests are up and those are bigger and more complex,” Gibson told reporters. “Overall, the issue is about sensitive Ministry of Children and Family Development files, where there are multiple parties involved and a lot of sensitive information, thousands of pages. So it isn’t just about numbers being down. Actually, that’s not accurate.”

Gibson is partly right. FOI requests to the Ministry of Children and Family Development — which is responsible for sensitive personal information about adoption, child protection and foster care — have increased. In 2025, the ministry received 2,372 requests, up from 1,858 in 2020.

However, overall requests are still down significantly, from 10,205 in 2020 to 7,063 last year. Citizens Services declined to provide data for the most recent fiscal year, telling The Narwhal those figures are still being reviewed.

How is the government proposing to change B.C.’s FOI law?

Gibson introduced Bill 9 on Feb. 26.

“Taken together, these amendments strengthen [the law] for the future,” she said during her second reading speech. “They protect privacy. They uphold access to information. They enable better services for British Columbians, and they support a more transparent, efficient and people-centred public sector.”

But in addition to the changes aimed at improving information sharing between public bodies, some parts of the legislation broadens the grounds on which public bodies can refuse to respond to requests. That includes allowing a public body to reject requests that “would unreasonably interfere” with its operations or the government’s more broadly. “Abusive” or “malicious” requests could also be thrown out.

Larsen worries public bodies operating with reduced budgets or poor information management policies could use the unreasonable interference language to reject requests “simply because they’re overwhelmed — for reasons that aren’t due to the requester’s actions or the nature of the request in question.”

“If you’re unreasonably resourced, then a reasonable request can look unreasonable,” he said.

If your FOI request is rejected, you can appeal to the FOI and privacy commissioner, Gibson points out.

“The independent office of the privacy commissioner oversees any requests that would be denied,” she said. “What we’re talking about here is things like … death threats or white powder in envelopes. This is about being able to manage that kind of behavior, so that citizens with requests that we want to serve can get served quickly.”

Relying on complaints to ensure good requests still make it through the system doesn’t sit well with Larsen.

“That really worries me when people say, ‘We’re changing things in a way that may make it likely that people are dissatisfied, but don’t worry, there’s an appeals process!” he said.

“Going through a review as a way of trying to manage the scope of requests, that’s just completely inefficient.”

The minister did not directly answer questions about whether the commissioner will get a funding increase to deal with the additional stream of complaints Bill 9 could create. Instead, she touted the government’s proactive disclosure policies and promised Bill 9 will result in the release of more information without FOI request.

“This isn’t about making the situation worse,” Gibson told reporters. “This is about making it better.”

So what is proactive disclosure? And how will Bill 9 expand it?

One way governments can reduce the need for members of the public to file requests is to release documents without being asked, a practice known as proactive disclosure. The B.C. government proactively releases 17 types of records, including binders for new cabinet ministers, lists of briefing notes and expense claims and records requested via freedom of information request.

Typically, these records are kept confidential for months before being published, although the timeline can vary. However, as of the publication of this story, the B.C. government has “temporarily paused” proactive disclosures while it develops and launches a new system to publish these records. (The pause has lasted more than a month so far.)

Gibson did not mention the suspension and, when asked about it directly, did not explain why the old publication platform could not continue until the new one was ready to launch.

“We haven’t stopped doing proactive disclosures. What we’ve got is a new and more modernized system that’s going to deliver better on proactive disclosure and also a new proactive disclosure coming in Bill 9,” she told reporters. “But there’s a temporary gap while we move to the new, more modern system, and we’re hoping to have that online as soon as possible.”

The Citizens Services Ministry said the “pause is temporary and technical in nature,” and that the new system is expected to be operational any day.

How many new types of documents will Bill 9 add to the proactive disclosure schedule? Many or none, depending on how you look at it. The new proactive disclosure provisions in the bill apply only to personal information, not records created by the government.

The changes will give government ministries the ability “to disclose personal information back to the individual the information is about, without going through an FOI request,” according to Citizens Services.

Larsen sees value in making it easier for people to access personal information from public bodies, especially with proper privacy protections in place.

“That’s not the same thing as proactive disclosure of public records, though,” he added. “It’s a very different and meritorious thing to do, but it’s important not to conflate those things.”

If — when? — Bill 9 passes, when will these changes take effect?

The B.C. legislature has just nine sitting days left before the summer break. If Bill 9 doesn’t pass by May 28, it will be October before it passes.

The bill is just about to begin committee stage, the point at which opposition MLAs can ask the minister responsible questions about the effect of the changes proposed and put forward changes of their own, though these don’t often end up in the final version.

Gibson has already tabled amendments to Bill 9, ones she says clarify the powers of the information and privacy commissioner.

“I’m really looking forward to committee [stage] where we actually get to speak to the merits of the legislation and have a real debate about the content,” Gibson said. “It’s also a good opportunity to correct some real misinformation and misunderstandings about the bill.”

The B.C. Green and B.C. Conservative caucuses oppose Bill 9 in its current form. Interim Conservative Leader Trevor Halford even tried to have debate on the bill suspended for six months to allow for further consultation, a move that led to hours of late-night debate before the motion was defeated with the support of the NDP caucus and a pair of independent MLAs.

Odds are good Bill 9 will pass this spring, even if the government has to cut debate short to make it happen. Some of its changes will take effect immediately, including the requirement that requests provide enough detail to be located in a “reasonable amount of time.” Most of the others won’t take effect until the ministry has developed regulations to provide more detail about their function.

That process could take weeks, months or more. At least one piece of legislation that passed last spring has yet to take full effect because the regulations are still being developed.

It will likely be a year or more before we know if the changes really will improve B.C.’s FOI system, as Gibson claims. One of her predecessors made similar comments about the bill that created the $10 FOI filing fee, claiming those changes would help unclog the FOI system and result in faster responses to FOI requests. Five years later, we know she was wrong. 

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Summary

• B.C.’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act has been a point of tension for the provincial government and First Nations leaders since December 2025.
• After months of vowing to change the law by June, Premier David Eby now says amendments will wait until at least October.
• In the meantime, the province and First Nations leaders will try to find a solution that both sides can agree on.

The showdown over B.C.’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act is not over, but the future of the landmark law is now on hold until the fall.

For several months, B.C. Premier David Eby claimed the Declaration Act — also known as DRIPA — had to be changed, and quickly. First he said the law would be amended, then paused, and now he’s said legislation to change the law can wait until the fall session.

“It is absolutely possible, as a leader, to move off confidently in the wrong direction,” Eby told reporters at the legislature on April 20.

Eby has moved in many directions on DRIPA this year. Initially, he maintained that changing the law was non-negotiable because of legal liability, and something that had to be done before the legislature’s summer break.

Then — after First Nations leaders told him his “approach was totally unacceptable” — the premier proposed suspending DRIPA for up to three years. That, according to Eby, would allow the province’s appeal of a recent court decision to be heard by the Supreme Court of Canada.“This will be a confidence vote,” Eby said at the time, raising the possibility that DRIPA could trigger a provincial election.While the premier said he was confident the “strong and united” NDP caucus would back his plan, that turned out not to be the case. Two weeks later, Eby said no changes to DRIPA would be made this spring.

Instead, the B.C. government and First Nations leaders have committed to spend the summer seeking a solution that can address “the government’s stated legal concerns, while upholding the title and rights and human rights of First Nations,” according to an April 20 joint statement from the premier’s office and the First Nations Leadership Council.

Whether the discussions will result in legislation that both the government and First Nations support is far from certain.

“There is no guarantee, simply because we reached this agreement that come fall legislative session, that we will have that agreement, but I’m certainly hopeful that we will,” Eby told reporters. 

So … what is going on with DRIPA?

Why does the government want to change DRIPA?

Let’s go back to December 2025. That’s when the B.C. Appeal Court determined the government’s obligations under DRIPA are legally enforceable. This created “unlimited legal liability” for the province, according to Eby.

The appeal court’s ruling was the result of a challenge to part of a 2023 B.C. Supreme Court ruling launched by the Gitxaała and Ehattesaht First Nations. That ruling agreed with the nations’ claim that B.C.’s mineral claim-staking regime did not fulfill the government’s obligations to consult with First Nations.The 2023 decision also concluded that DRIPA was not legally enforceable. The nations appealed that part of the ruling and, in December 2025, the court agreed with their arguments. 

According to the premier, the legal threat the province faces is twofold.In ruling that the government’s obligations under DRIPA — to align provincial laws with the principles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples — are legally enforceable, the court has opened the door to further challenges of any provincial law on the grounds that it does not align with DRIPA.That’s not the incremental approach the province was prepared to take when DRIPA was introduced, Eby said.“Instead of eating the elephant one bite at a time, the court has invited us to do it all at once and that is just not possible,” he told reporters on April 2.

Secondly, the appeal court’s December decision can now be used in other court cases, which often refer to existing court rulings. According to Eby, more than 20 lawsuits involving the province have been launched or amended since the Gitxaala decision was released.

In an open letter to B.C. MLAs released on April 19, the First Nations Leadership Council described Eby’s arguments as “not only misleading but … also inherently wrong.”

“We are dismayed at the degree to which the court cases and DRIPA are being misrepresented, mischaracterized and conflated as rhetoric and fearmongering,” the council wrote. “The risk before the legislators and all British Columbians is not created by DRIPA — it is created by the decisions to undermine it through unilateral action.”

Why do First Nations leaders oppose those changes?

First Nations leaders have called Eby’s plans for DRIPA “a unilateral betrayal and an abandonment of the province’s commitment to principled reconciliation, as well as serving to create a climate of uncertainty.”

Altering, suspending or repealing DRIPA — as the B.C. Conservative opposition has proposed — will not eliminate B.C.’s obligations to consult with First Nations on issues related to Indigenous Rights and title. And it will not prevent First Nations from seeking to exert those rights in the courts, a more expensive and time-consuming option and one where First Nations have seen victories time and again.

“I think that we have an obligation and a responsibility to remember that no one is giving First Nations anything,” Huy’wu’qw Shana Thomas, Hereditary Chief of Lyackson First Nation, said during an April 10 press conference. “First Nations people continue to assert their inherent rights and title and prefer reconciliation, prefer negotiations.”

What does DRIPA have to do with the Cowichan decision?

B.C.’s back and forth on DRIPA is being connected by some with the Cowichan decision.

In 2014, the Cowichan Tribes filed a case with the B.C. Supreme Court, asserting Aboriginal Title over lands along the Fraser River, in what is now known as Richmond, B.C. The lands claimed included a traditional summer village site, known as Tl’uqtinus, and the tribes’ suit also asserted rights to fish and gather food in the claimed area.In its August 2025 ruling, B.C.’s Supreme Court affirmed the Cowichan Tribes’ Aboriginal Title. All of the defendants in the case, including B.C. and the federal government, are appealing the decision, which has been at the centre of a national — and often misinformed — debate about property rights.

The Cowichan case only named governments and government agencies, and the tribes have repeatedly said they have no intent of trying to take away any private property as a result of the court ruling.

Since announcing the province’s appeal of the ruling, Eby has said his government will “go to the wall” to protect the rights of private property owners.

The premier has also linked the Cowichan Tribes and Gitxaala cases, calling them “dramatic, overreaching and unhelpful court decisions.”

But DRIPA and the Cowichan decision actually have little to do with each other, besides being related to Indigenous Rights. The case was launched prior to DRIPA becoming law and turned on Section 35 of the Canadian Constitution, not provincial law.

Does DRIPA ‘create uncertainty’ for industry?

Short answer: it depends on who you ask. 

Section 7 of the law allows for joint decision-making agreements with First Nations regarding industrial projects on their traditional territories. DRIPA’s goal is to “provide certainty and stability” about how projects can move toward approval by clearly defining the responsibilities of the provincial government and First Nations.

That Section 7 agreements enabled by DRIPA have helped advance some natural resource projects is a point on which Eby and First Nations leaders actually agree.Take the plan to reopen the Eskay Creek mine on Tahltan Nation territory.

In 2022, the B.C. government and the Tahltan Nation signed an agreement under Section 7 of the Declaration Act. The section allows the government to undertake a joint decision-making process with First Nations. 

In December 2025, Tahltan Nation members voted in support of the Eskay Creek revitalization project and the province announced its approval of permits for the mine in January 2026.

The Red Chris mine and the Galore Creek mine have also advanced under Section 7 agreements and, on Vancouver Island, another agreement involving forestry tenures on ‘Namgis Nation territory is in the works.

Continuing to deliver these types of agreements is evidently a high priority for the province. Eby’s proposal to suspend DRIPA would not have affected the sections of the law that enable these agreements.

What happens now?

Well, the legislature will shut down for the summer on May 28. MLAs aren’t scheduled to return until October. In the meantime, the government will continue to discuss the future of DRIPA with First Nations leaders and try to find a solution that both sides can support. 

Attorney General Niki Sharma, who Eby credited with convincing him not to pursue a legislated solution this spring, has expressed confidence that a mutually agreeable solution is achievable.

“I have faith in partnership and the fact that when we come to the table to sort out challenging issues, that we can come to solutions that last,” she told reporters at the legislature on April 21. “If we can get to sitting down and rolling up our sleeves and fixing things that are challenging in a way that lasts, then we’ve solved it for generations to come, and I see that pathway.”

If — and it remains a pretty big if — the provincial government and First Nations leaders do agree on DRIPA’s future, any changes to law could be made during the fall sitting of the legislature, which is scheduled to wrap at the end of November. 

By then, things could be quite different in the legislature. The B.C. Conservative Party will have a new leader, possibly one without a seat in the legislature. The Conservatives want DRIPA repealed and all candidates running the leadership race have backed that position, so it’s likely Conservative MLAs will vote against whatever changes the government eventually proposes.

The B.C. Greens have criticized the government’s proposals to change DRIPA so far, backing First Nations calls for the law to be left as is.

Currently, there are also six MLAs that do not belong to a caucus, although all were at one time B.C. Conservative members. Three of those MLAs have vocally opposed Indigenous Rights, reconciliation and DRIPA. The other three may be open to overtures from the government to support legislation to amend DRIPA.

To pass legislation without support from the opposition, Eby will need to get his entire caucus on side — something he was not able to do this spring.

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The average home in British Columbia uses around 10,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year.

There are approximately 2.2 million homes in B.C. This means the province needs to make sure the grid has enough energy to supply about 22 billion kilowatt hours every year to keep those homes warm and the lights on.

And that’s just for homes. It doesn’t include all the electricity needed for industry, businesses and a rapidly expanding electric-vehicle market.

In B.C., the average resident pays around $100 a month for electricity, roughly $1,200 per year for those 10,000 kilowatt hours.

Residential rates just went up on April 1, when BC Hydro increased its rates by 3.75 per cent. That’s partly to start paying off some of the sunk costs the government has already invested in building new power infrastructure. 

Electricity demand is only going to rise over the coming decades, as B.C. tries to reduce its use of fossil fuels while also bringing a whole lot of industrial projects onto the grid.

So where will all this energy come from, where is it going — and who will pay for it? There’s much we don’t know (yet) but here’s what we do.

First, let’s clear up a couple of things about the units of measurement — because utility companies use a variety of terms to describe electricity generation, output and consumption.

Kilowatts, megawatts and gigawatts represent an amount of power, at a single point in time. 

1,000 kilowatts is one megawatt. And 1,000 megawatts is one gigawatt.

Add the word “hours” to the end of any of those units and it describes how much of that power gets used up (or is generated) over time. Kilowatt hours is the unit most British Columbians will encounter, on their monthly bills, so while the others are useful to know we’ll stick to that measurement as much as possible.

Take a fridge, for example. If yours sucks up about 200 watts per hour (a large, older fridge might use twice as much) that means you’ll use around 1,750 kilowatt hours per year to keep the milk fresh. To meet the demand of millions of fridges, power producers need to make sure they have enough capacity to send all that electricity across the province every day. 

Ensuring there’s enough electricity to go around is getting expensive for the B.C. government — and the taxpayers that fund it.

B.C.’s newest source of hydroelectricity, the Site C dam, produces about 5,100 gigawatt hours (GWh) per year, or 5.7 billion kilowatt hours. It added about eight per cent more power to the province’s existing grid.

Site C cost around $16 billion.

BC Hydro doesn’t expect to pay off the costs of building Site C until 2094, 70 years after the project began producing electricity.

Now, the province is planning to invest at least $6 billion to build the first two phases of the North Coast Transmission Line, a network of around 450 kilometres of high-voltage power lines spanning the northwest. The B.C. government says it is building the line to “enable development” of mining and LNG projects. A third phase is proposed, for power lines heading north to service mines and Ksi Lisims LNG. If that happens, the final cost for the transmission network could rival Site C.

To state the obvious: this is a lot of public money. It’s hard to grasp just how big these numbers are. Understanding the difference between one million and one billion, expressed in time, might help. 

One million seconds is about 11.5 days. One billion seconds is more than 30 years.

So when the estimated cost of the first two phases of the North Coast Transmission Line doubled from $3 billion to $6 billion in 2025, that’s like jumping from 90 years to 180 years.

On top of infrastructure investments like Site C and the transmission lines, B.C. spends public money enticing private companies to build big industrial projects. Those subsidies are eventually reflected in residential utility bills — and in other ways across the economy. 

Take the push to grow the province’s LNG industry. Last year, the B.C. government coughed up $200 million to connect Cedar LNG, a liquefaction and export facility being built in Kitimat, to the grid.

Or take LNG Canada, the country’s first major liquefaction and export facility, also in Kitimat. It received a suite of subsidies, including reduced rates for the small amount of hydroelectricity it uses, as well as tax credits and an exemption from B.C.’s industrial carbon tax for the first two years of operations. Between the provincial and federal governments, public investments in LNG Canada are estimated to be almost $4 billion.

In the years ahead, homes and businesses in B.C. are going to need more power. BC Hydro predicts annual demand for electricity is likely to climb from 58,400 gigawatt hours in 2025 to more than 87,600 gigawatt hours by 2050. These amounts are way too big to wrap your head around if we convert them to kilowatt hours, but let’s just say it’s a lot.

The more things we need to plug into the grid, the more power the grid needs to be able to deliver. The sooner we plug things in, the faster BC Hydro has to find ways to meet that demand.

Electricity demand in B.C. could rise even faster if the province prioritizes providing power to industries, which are eager to portray their products as “clean” or “green” in an increasingly climate-conscious market. LNG facilities that plan to power their operations with B.C.’s electricity are already advertising their products as “low carbon” and “net zero.”

B.C.’s history of abundant, cheap and low-emission electricity has been hailed as one reason the province is well-positioned to supply LNG to countries like South Korea and Japan.

But liquefying natural gas requires an enormous amount of energy. As a liquid, methane takes up a fraction of the space that it does as a gas, making it viable for transport overseas. That process requires not just chilling the gas, but supercooling it, which LNG Canada does by burning gas to power massive turbines. But other approved facilities, like Ksi Lisims LNG and the aforementioned Cedar LNG, want to use electricity instead. Hence, the new power line with a multi-billion dollar price tag.

So how much power does all this industrial infrastructure need?Well, Ksi Lisims, a floating LNG facility proposed for B.C.’s North Coast requested the equivalent of around 5,200 gigawatt hours, or 5.2 billion kilowatt hours, from BC Hydro.

That’s more than the electricity output of the Site C dam potentially going to power just one project.

Cedar LNG expects to use up to 1,800 gigawatt hours, or 1.8 billion kilowatt hours.

Powering just those two LNG projects could use up to the equivalent electricity that would keep power flowing to 700,000 homes.

All that electricity isn’t free, of course. But it is cheaper for industrial users. Residential customers currently pay $118.70 for the first 670 kilowatt hours they use in a month.

That climbs to around $140 for each additional 1,000 kilowatt hours. Small businesses pay about the same as heavy-use households. 

But for larger businesses it’s the opposite: the more they use, the less they pay.

Large industrial customers — consumers that use more than 550,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year — pay $67.90 per 1,000 kilowatt hours, slightly over half the residential rate.

So what does all this mean for the average British Columbian?

Well, to keep the lights on in homes across the province over the coming decades, B.C. will continue to build out more power capacity. It will also keep trying to find ways to use industrial revenues to balance the government’s budget, so homeowners don’t have to pay (much) more per kilowatt hour consumed. But the province is up against the clock — and a moving target. 

Less than six months after releasing a new forecast for electricity demand, BC Hydro now anticipates needing to supply an additional 2.7 billion kilowatt hours to its customers. The LNG industry is identified as a driving force behind that increase.

Because B.C. relies heavily on hydroelectric dams, the province’s ability to meet demand with power produced domestically is subject to droughts. When this happens, the province imports electricity from its neighbours, including Alberta.

Whether on monthly bills or in other ways spread out across the economy, taxpayers are paying for provincial support of massive industrial projects, including the push to get those projects on the grid. Those hidden costs could eventually surface on utility bills or through cuts to other government services.

Either way, future British Columbians will pay for decisions made today about how to make sure all that electricity keeps flowing through the wires.

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Summary

• B.C.’s throne speech was not delivered in 2026 due to the tragic shooting in Tumbler Ridge.
• The Narwhal obtained a copy of the speech via freedom of information request.
• The unshared speech gives an insight into B.C.’s priorities which include mining and liquefied natural gas (LNG).

In a typical year, the spring sitting of the B.C. legislature starts with a throne speech.

The speech from the throne — as the document is formally known — is delivered by the lieutenant-governor on behalf of the provincial government. It is a snapshot of the political moment, a mixture of policies and milestones the government of the day considers accomplishments, as well as hints about legislative priorities for the coming months.

For journalists who cover the legislature, the throne speech is an opportunity to peer at the political tea leaves and guess at what lies ahead.

But in 2026, the government’s planned throne speech was never presented in the legislature. Two days before its scheduled delivery, a horrific event occurred in the small town of Tumbler Ridge, B.C.: a mass shooting that resulted in the deaths of nine people, many of them students and staff at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.

In the wake of the tragedy, the date set for the throne speech was postponed and the province observed a day of mourning. A few days later, Lieutenant-Governor Wendy Cocchia delivered a short and somber speech dedicated to the community of Tumbler Ridge.

But what was in the speech the government was poised to deliver? The Narwhal filed a freedom of information request for a copy of the speech with Premier David Eby’s office. And we received a mostly un-redacted copy.

Over the year ahead, the B.C. government plans to continue championing liquefied natural gas (LNG) and mining development, which — along with forestry — form the province’s economic foundation, according to the speech.

“This natural inheritance remains central to our future prosperity,” the speech says.British Columbians should look forward to “a more sustainable forestry sector,” even as tariffs imposed by the United States continue to bite, the speech says. The government will also continue to work toward “delivering B.C. energy to growing markets” — supporting companies producing LNG to ship to markets on the other side of the Pacific — and “driving momentum on critical minerals,” it says.

A section of the speech is dedicated to the North Coast transmission line, which the government says will deliver “clean, reliable electricity needed to unlock tens of billions of dollars worth of private sector projects across” northwest B.C. The transmission line may almost exclusively serve large industrial customers, such as the Ksi Lisims LNG facility and multiple proposed mines. But its cost, which was most recently estimated at $6 billion for a little more than half the line’s length, will be shared between all BC Hydro ratepayers. 

The North Coast transmission line will be built “in true partnership with First Nations,” the throne speech says before it segues into a section titled “Reconciliation and Partnerships with Indigenous Peoples.”

‘Reconciliation is the responsibility of elected governments,’ throne speech says

For its next 431 words, the throne speech highlights the importance of reconciliation with First Nations and the work the province has done since the unanimous passage of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act in November 2019. It affirms the existence of Aboriginal Title, recognized by Canadian courts and in the Canadian Constitution.

“Reconciliation is the responsibility of elected governments,” according to the throne speech. 

“Repealing the Declaration Act, or walking away from negotiations with First Nations, would not change that reality,” the throne speech says. “It would create chaos, delays, lost jobs, and endless lawsuits.”

On page 13, the tone of the speech shifts as it mentions “recent court decisions [that] have raised questions about what reconciliation means in practice.” While those decisions aren’t named in the speech, the province is seeking to appeal a December 2025 decision by the B.C. Court of Appeal, which agreed with an argument from the Gitxaała and Ehattesaht First Nations that the government’s obligations under the Declaration Act — to align provincial laws with the principles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples — are legally enforceable.

Since December, Eby has been touting plans to amend the Declaration Act to “address some serious legal liabilities that were created … through the court decision.” This angered First Nations leaders across B.C., who told Eby in a meeting last week that his plans to amend the law were “totally unacceptable.” So, on April 2, he made an abrupt announcement saying he would suspend parts of the Declaration Act and the Interpretation Act in the coming weeks instead.

However, suspension still requires legislative amendments, which will be voted on in the legislature by May 28. 

Eby said he is willing to risk the future of his government to get it done.

“This will be a confidence vote,” Eby told reporters on April 2. That means if the majority of MLAs vote against the legislation, the NDP government will have lost the confidence of the house, likely triggering a snap election.

These plans to change the landmark Indigenous Rights law over the objections of many First Nations leaders seem contradictory to the throne speech promise that the B.C. government “will not abandon responsibility for reconciliation.”

You can read the entire 25 pages of the throne speech here, except for a few lines redacted by the premier’s office under section 12 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, which covers matters discussed in cabinet. 

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Summary

• B.C. Premier David Eby has backed off on permanent changes to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, following backlash from First Nations leaders. 
• Instead, he’s proposing to suspend parts of the Declaration Act for up to three years while the province appeals a court decision.
• The government says the recent court ruling makes changes to the Act urgent, but critics warn they could weaken legal accountability.

After a virtual meeting with First Nations leaders, B.C. Premier David Eby says his government is abandoning its plan to permanently change parts of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act — at least for now.

“We heard loud and clear that this approach was totally unacceptable to First Nations leaders, that it reflected government unilaterally drafting changes to a law that we had worked on together to write, and they felt the process was rushed and that the entirety of that approach was wrong,” Eby told reporters at the legislature on April 2.

In lieu of the amendments he’s been vowing to make for months, the premier is now proposing to suspend parts of the Declaration Act for up to three years while the province appeals a December 2025 decision by the B.C. Court of Appeal.

In its December ruling, the court agreed with the Gitxaała and the Ehattesaht First Nations, which argued the government’s obligations under the Declaration Act — to align provincial laws with the principles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples — are legally enforceable.

Eby’s proposal would block further court challenges of provincial laws on the grounds that they do not align with the Declaration Act — a move the premier said is critical.

“We have seen court filings now and court decisions that rely on that Court of Appeal decision and the volume of litigation that we face is not sustainable,” he told reporters. “We have to fix it. It is non-negotiable. We have to fix it.”

The premier positioned his new proposal as less definitive and less permanent than the prior amendments, but admitted his latest pitch is not particularly palatable to the First Nations leaders he met with.

“I recognize that Indigenous leadership wants no pause on these sections,” Eby said. “They want no amendments, [but] we have to do something. A pause is, in my opinion, hopefully the least invasive way of addressing government’s concern.”

First Nations leaders will have an opportunity to provide the government with feedback on the new proposal — feedback Eby promised “will be taken seriously” — but the Declaration Act will be modified in some way before the legislature rises for its summer break at the end of May.

Eby confirmed his government intends to draft legislation to suspend parts of the Declaration Act and the Interpretation Act in the coming weeks, introduce it in the legislature and pass it by May 28. And he’s willing to put the future of his government in the balance to get it done.

“This will be a confidence vote,” Eby said. If the majority of MLAs vote against the legislation, the NDP government will have lost the confidence of the house, likely triggering a snap election and possibly Eby’s resignation. Former BC Liberal premier Christy Clark lost a confidence vote in June 2017, resulting in the NDP and Green Party forming government.

Eby believes he will not meet the same fate.

“We have a strong and united caucus. All of our MLAs understand the seriousness and importance of our work and partnership with Indigenous people and our commitment to all British Columbians to grow the economy and ensure prosperity for British Columbians.”

Eby’s new proposal would not affect the Declaration Act action plan — a road map for the work the province has committed to undertake with First Nations through 2027 — or the sections of the law that allow joint decision-making agreements with First Nations, according to a spokesperson from the premier’s office.

‘It got inconvenient’ 

The Declaration Act changes have drawn a lot of interest at a time when high-profile court decisions have thrust Indigenous Rights and Aboriginal Title into the public spotlight. 

Prior to Eby’s announcement on April 2, The Narwhal spoke to Adam Olsen, former MLA and lead negotiator for Tsartlip First Nation, lawyer Cynthia Callison and Jessica Clogg, executive director of West Coast Environmental Law and a member of the Gitxaała Nation’s legal team.

In November 2019, Olsen was one of 87 elected officials to vote in favour of passing the Declaration Act. The law’s unanimous passage was hailed as a major accomplishment.

At the time, the government described the act as “a path forward” for relations between First Nations and the province, and a way to avoid long and costly court battles. Now, the province is readying amendments to the Declaration Act, aimed at barring courts from interpreting or applying the law. 

“It kind of breaks my heart that in 2019 we get unanimous support in the legislature to move this forward,” Olsen, a former member of the BC Green Party, said in an interview. A member of Tsartlip First Nation, Olsen represented Saanich North and the Islands from 2017 until 2024 before exiting provincial politics. “Now, the same government a couple of years later is going to use the slimmest of majorities — if they can even muster it — to basically amend [the law] because it got inconvenient.” 

The legislation that was once celebrated as a major step toward working with First Nations in a better, more equal way has been recast as a destabilizing or even destructive force. Repeal or revise — those seem to be the only two options B.C.’s elected leaders can envision for the Declaration Act. 

“It’s frustrating, sad and angering that our government would set up a binary like that,” Olsen said.

Olsen, who did not seek re-election in the October 2024 provincial election, is now the lead negotiator for Tsartlip First Nation. As a participant in the confidential consultations, he could not discuss any details about the ongoing process but did reflect on the political climate in which the Declaration Act amendments have been proposed.

“This past year for Indigenous relations has been awful. It’s been awful on social media. It’s been awful to hear how the official opposition has handled this,” said Olsen, referring to the BC Conservative Party’s vocal desire to repeal the law altogether.

There were no BC Conservative MLAs in the legislature when the Declaration Act passed in 2019, though MLAs who now represent the party did vote in favour of the law at the time. Former BC Conservative leader John Rustad — who once served as B.C.’s Minister of Aboriginal Affairs — began calling for the Declaration Act’s repeal during his 2024 election campaign. Rustad was ousted as party leader in December and the BC Conservatives are now in the midst of a leadership race to replace him.

The BC Conservatives still support repealing the Declaration Act, interim party leader Trevor Halford told reporters at the legislature on April 1. The legislation, he added, has failed to deliver the stability and reconciliation progress it was intended to deliver.

“As difficult a conversation as that is, I think it’s worth having,” Halford said. “I think that a full repeal actually gives certainty. I do believe that.”

Olsen feels the conversation about Indigenous Rights has shifted so far from where it was in 2019 — when all MLAs voted in support of the Declaration Act.

Public support for the application of the Declaration Act has dropped in recent months, according to a new poll released by Angus Reid. In August, 44 per cent of British Columbians polled felt B.C.’s effort to align its laws with the United Nations declaration had gone “too far in limiting provincial authority over land and resources.” As of this month, 53 per cent of respondents said they think the province’s approach on reconciliation and Indigenous Rights has gone too far.

Clogg believes Eby’s comments about the need to change the Declaration Act have contributed to the decline in public support for reconciliation.

“We need leadership from the highest levels and from all sectors of society to face down racist, populist sentiment and chart a course towards true reconciliation,” she said.

Declaration Act amendments happening quickly

The fact that the government is prioritizing making these changes quickly — by legislative standards — is a further complication. The Declaration Act essentially enshrines the federal United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, or UNDRIP, in B.C. law. That includes Article 19, which states Indigenous Peoples have the right to be consulted and to give free, prior and informed consent on legislation that impacts them.

One thing the ongoing consultations have made clear, Olsen said, is that many First Nations do not want the act changed.

“The ones that have spoken publicly have said that they oppose amendments to the act,” he said.

The government’s proposed changes to the Declaration Act will “prevent significant litigation risk for the province of British Columbia,” Eby said in the legislature on March 30. Some First Nations leaders and Indigenous law experts disagree, warning that the tight timeline the government is pursuing to change the act could actually spark more lawsuits.

“I hope that B.C. appreciates that the highly abridged timelines and their intransigence in the face of opposition from civil society groups and First Nations makes them vulnerable to legal challenge should they proceed on the originally proposed timeline,” Clogg said.

Eby admitted that consultations with First Nations are being “rushed,” but maintained the province has no other option.

“We are having to move quickly to make amendments in order to address some serious legal liabilities that were created … through the court decision,” he told reporters. “Nobody is excited about this process. Certainly I’m not, and First Nations leadership are not.” 

The condensed consultation timeline and vocal opposition from First Nations should give lawmakers “extreme caution” about the quality of the process for changing the law — or risk ending up right back in court, Olsen argued.

“If they’re going to table a bill, they need to be very comfortable that their consultation record is impeccable,” he said.

Proposed amendments would block First Nations from defending their rights in court, legal expert says

Non-disclosure agreements notwithstanding, the Canadian Press reported on some of the government’s proposed changes to the Declaration Act last week. 

According to the Canadian Press, leaked documents included a change in the wording of the Declaration Act, narrowing the government’s commitment to take “all measures” to ensure provincial laws align with the United Nations declaration. The amended law would task the government only with aligning laws deemed to be a priority, the Canadian Press reported.

For Cynthia Callison, a partner with Callison & Hanna Law who has advocated for First Nations in B.C. for 29 years, the proposed changes reported last week do not seem to materially change the province’s approach to implementing the Declaration Act to date.

“They have not been working on aligning all laws, they have been working on priorities,” Callison, who was appointed King’s Counsel by the province in January, told The Narwhal in an interview. King’s Counsel designations recognize lawyers for their expertise and significant contributions to the judicial system.

Those priorities outlined in the action plan include self-government and anti-racism initiatives, changes to family services and emergency management programs and pathways for joint decision-making on resource management.

The proposed amendments leaked to the Canadian Press indicate to Clogg that the government is moving toward doing exactly what Eby said it would do in December: block the courts from being able to hold the government to account when First Nations take issue with its progress on reconciliation.

“The amendments that are proposed are designed to deny First Nations access to the courts to defend their Indigenous human rights,” she said, adding these amendments are “essentially an effort to avoid that accountability.”

The recent court cases that the premier has taken issue with — specifically the Cowichan Tribes ruling and the Gitxaała decision — were “never a priority for the province and are not part of their action plan,” Callison added. 

Canadian Press also reported the government is planning to add language to the Declaration Act to allow the province to make changes to the action plan, potentially without the support of First Nations. That could make the action plan more vulnerable to political whims, Callison said.

B.C. government is once again pushing legislation over the objections of First Nations

This isn’t the first time Eby’s government has side-stepped its consultation obligations to First Nations.

In May 2025, Bill 15, which granted cabinet broad powers to fast-track infrastructure projects, prompted vocal opposition from many, including Don Tom, Chief of the Tsartlip First Nation and vice-president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs. Eby has acknowledged his government failed to meet the consultation standard set in the Declaration Act at times but insisted his government was not backsliding on its commitments to reconciliation and Indigenous Rights.

Now, the province is once again pushing legislation that has drawn strong criticism from First Nations leaders. 

“This is two spring sessions in a row where First Nations leaders are in the spotlight, not for any of their own doings, but because of what the provincial government is up to,” Olsen said. “When Premier Eby says, ‘We are really keen on reconciliation and it’s still a top priority’ — well, the behavior seems to be quite confrontational with First Nations, rather than relational.”

Clogg was more blunt.

“There is nothing about the way B.C. is approaching this that remotely could be called cooperation or co-development,” she said. “It’s an entirely unilaterally driven, expedited process.”

Despite the mounting objections from First Nations leaders, Eby confirmed on April 1, the amendments will be introduced in the coming weeks.

“The amendments will be introduced with lots of time for debate and discussion in the legislature,” he said.

Olsen warned the premier’s plan to push ahead with the controversial amendments to the Declaration Act could land his government in a quagmire.

“The premier has backed himself into a corner. Now he’s making quicksand.”

Updated April. 13, 2026, at 11:07 a.m. PT: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated former BC Liberal premier Christy Clark lost a confidence vote in June 2017, resulting in the election that brought the NDP to power. In fact, there was no second election. Clark tried unsuccessfully to convince the lieutenant governor to allow one, but former NDP leader John Horgan secured a confidence-and-supply agreement with the Green Party and formed government.

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