Feb. 11 was the hardest day yet as MLA for interim B.C. Green Party leader Adam Olsen, or SȾHENEP.

In a solidarity action to support the hereditary chiefs of the Wet’suwet’en opposed to the Coastal GasLink pipeline crossing their traditional territory, hundreds of people blocked the doors to the legislature for a planned speech from the throne that would open B.C.’s new parliamentary session. 

Olsen, a citizen of the W̱SÁNEĆ (Saanich) Nation and member of the Tsartlip First Nation, was escorted through the crowd by members of the police as people shouted at him to ‘stand with Indigenous people.’ 

In an interview with The Narwhal, Olsen said he looked out at the crowd and thought, ‘I am.’

In a speech the following day, Olsen forcefully criticized MLAs in the assembly for the role they played in igniting the crisis, which to this day, is reverberating across the country in blockades, demonstrations and arrests. He also recalled his experience entering the B.C. legislative chamber in 2017 wrapped in a blanket with the support of his family.

“It is that powerful expression of love that my family showed for me, even after what generations of decision-makers in this very chamber did to them, that I must now show a compassion and love for this institution,” he told the chamber.

In conversation with The Narwhal, Olsen said he remains committed to his role in government, the empowerment of Indigenous governance and the country’s pursuit of reconciliation, despite challenges and setbacks.

This interview is edited for brevity. 

Q: How do you feel walking out of the chamber after your speech?

A: There was a lot of silence around me. A lot of people making busy. But I have no intention of making shortcuts. I really believe that part of the tragedy of where we stand right now is because the people in these institutions over the decades have been taking shortcuts on these issues and it hasn’t served us well in the past.

It’s not okay to ignore a decades-old problem … I heard the leader of the official opposition [BC Liberal Party Leader Andrew Wilkinson] talking about a ‘small group’ of people, kind of downplaying the Wet’suwet’en and hereditary chiefs and their legitimacy. It’s important to recognize that this is no small case. [The Delgamuukw decision] took years of preparation, months of testimony, and it is not to be undermined. 

This government put together an obscene, taxpayer-funded corporate welfare program that essentially lured the final investment decision out of LNG Canada. Our independent colleague [Andrew Weaver] spent a lot of time during the debate of that Income Tax Act stating that this is not the thing that we should be doing in a climate crisis, investing taxpayer money in an industry that can’t survive without it. That we should not be trying to attract the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure. And that there were unresolved issues in Wet’suwet’en. 

So then to be told, “it’ll sort itself out, it’s fine” — the result is that it’s not being sorted out, it’s not fine. 

Q: In your speech you said the protest outside the legislature [on Feb. 11] was not peaceful for you or others approaching the building, but at the same time you understand where that rage is coming from. Where do you come out in your feelings of how everything has unfolded?

A: Well, I was trying to get in the building into another door, a side door, and I was being told by the people that were there that I should stand with Indigenous people. That I should be standing with Indigenous people. And I said, “but … but that’s me.”

They said, “stand with us, stand with us.” And I said, “I am” — in the sense that I’m raising these issues. I’m not standing outside because my job and my world is actually inside. While they might not agree with the institution, I was brought in here in a good way. Even in the face of the great challenges that my family has faced from the decisions of this institution, they brought me in here in a good way to do a job. 

B.C. Green Party interim leader and MLA Adam Olsen presses through a crowd of blockaders to enter the B.C. legislature Feb. 11. Photo: Carol Linnitt / The Narwhal

So then I went around the other way and the experience that I had was devastating to me. I don’t know, having a megaphone yelling in your ear demands and in a very angry way … I don’t know, it just stands for itself, it just is what it is. The picture is on the front page of the paper, you can see it, it was not a pleasant experience for me. 

I think I said it best in my speech. The advice I’ve been given by my elders is to be very careful with what we do with power. And you can use your power to build people up, or you can use the power to tear people down, and tearing it down is always far easier than building it up. Building it up requires a lot more work and a lot more investment and a lot more time. I come in here every day to build up.

I felt the pain of the people, and I speak to the substantive frustration that’s created by decisions about their future. I will persist here to continue to try to affect better outcomes and to do that work. I strongly believe there needs to be an understanding of what they’re saying, but there needs to be great care in how they say it. 

Saul Brown, Haíɫcístut negotiator from the Heiltsuk Nation, speaks to a crowd gathered outside the legislature. Photo: Carol Linnitt / The Narwhal

Q: You’ve said you won’t threaten the stability of government by pulling Green support from the NDP, as some have called on you to do. What are some of the paths forward or solutions on your mind?

A: For the first time there’s an opportunity for Indigenous Peoples to embrace self-determination. There is an opportunity for feasts and potlatches and gatherings and coming together of Indigenous communities to talk about how they want to be governed … and to approach the provincial government and say “this is how we want to be engaging with you.” The government now has a law [The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act] that says they have to respect that. That’s a new thing and a thing that we should celebrate.

I think the provincial government should be operating in good faith and really put a lot of resources in to show Indigenous people and the broader public that they mean what they say. That investment in moving forward and leaning in is really important in the next weeks and months going ahead.

A third piece, I think, is to rebuff at every time that it’s said that reconciliation is dead. No, it’s not. It cannot be. If it is, we die with it. We know too much, we’ve seen too much. There is no turning around on this path. I will continue and always rebuff a notion that we can simply say this little experiment over a few years didn’t work, so that’s it, it’s over. 

Crowds gather in support of Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs outside the B.C. legislature, where a sign, reading ‘reconciliation is dead,’ is posted on the lawn, Feb. 11. Photo: Carol Linnitt / The Narwhal

We live next door to one another, our kids go to school with one another. We have partnerships, we love each other. There are people like me who have got a mixed heritage, whose lives make zero sense if we’re at war and fighting with each other. I understand the frustration and I understand the statement. But I will also push back and say it may feel that way now, but I’m not giving up. In fact, this is the moment in which I push harder forward and look for a good way and a good outcome.

How the Wet’suwet’en crisis could have played out differently

Q: What sort of responses have you gotten to your media appearances?

A: The response has been, ‘thank you for explaining this.’ ‘Thank you for being willing to open up and be vulnerable about all the different aspects of this which are kind of kicking your ass right now.’ 

Because — and you can publish this — my ass is being kicked all sorts of different ways on this. 

Often times what ends up happening is rhetoric, propaganda, simple language, simple messaging. “Their issues.” “They’ll deal with it.” Nobody taking responsibility. I’m prepared to say where responsibility lies. Some of it has to do with deliberate government policy, some of it has to do with the dysfunctional relationship that evolved out of that.

It really makes the position that I am in enigmatic, in a way. I am kind of all parts of this conversation: the political, the social, the personal, the environmental, the economic. I kind of just got dropped right in the middle of it.

Indigenous youth occupy the B.C. legislature in a solidarity action with Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs on Feb. 11. Photo: Carol Linnitt / The Narwhal

Q: That personal aspect you’ve mentioned, about your identity and having a mixed heritage. Do you feel an obligation to be a bridge between worlds? Does that drive some of what you do?

A: My origin story as a politician, or actually as a productive member of society, is I went through the sort of existential crisis of being ‘the other.’ I have referred to myself in the past as being the Indian in a room full of white people and the white person in a room full of Indians. It’s always been othering, right? 

It was a conversation I had at the turning point of my life when I was going through some of these really big questions that my grandmother, my dad’s mum, actually said those words to me: that as a person with a foot on both sides of the line, I have a really dramatic opportunity to be involved and to help bring this forward. I have no idea what she pictured in her mind when she saw that. And on Feb. 14 it will be, I think, 13 years since she passed. She was the matriarch, I am one of 275 descendants at the time of her passing directly from her. I got the honour of delivering and preparing her eulogy. I was given the beautiful honour of telling her story.

I don’t know what she pictured when she was giving me that advice, and she was sitting behind the click-clacking of her knitting needles. But her advice produced the first Saanich-born MLA. That’s pretty cool. So, for however long I get the honour of representing that place, I’ve just made the commitment to do it fiercely and with courage, and to try to advance the conversation as much as possible.

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The law of unintended consequences could see the NDP government’s new rules regulating fish farm tenures have the opposite effect, says B.C. Green Party MLA Adam Olsen.

The new regulations, which do not take effect until 2022, say companies must negotiate agreements with First Nations in whose territory they propose to operate and the industry must convince Fisheries and Oceans Canada their operations will not adversely affect wild salmon stocks.

Expiring tenures in the Broughton Archipelago, which have been the focus of First Nations protests and frustrations, are being renewed on a month-by-month basis while government-to-government talks are held between the province and First Nations in the area.

Olsen worries the NDP plan will create division among First Nations as some, within the immediate coastal area, could be persuaded to welcome the industry because of lucrative benefit agreements without broader consideration of the effect on wild salmon.

Government is taking the long overdue step of ensuring the industry offers benefits to First Nations, but divide and conquer tactics could potentially turn First Nations against each other, Olsen said.

If the Department of Fisheries and Oceans continues to allow the industry to operate, instead of open net pens disappearing within four years, as anticipated, there could actually be an increase, Olsen said.

“If this creates more fish farms, which might be the case, what happens to the First Nations who rely on the salmon, but are not in the territory of those farms?” he asked.

“This has been profiled as a step forward for reconciliation and Indigenous relations, but I would say there has been one-half step forward and one full step back,” he said.

“I don’t think this was fully thought through,” he said.

The Narwhal held a wide-ranging question and answer session with Olsen, a member of the Tsartlip First Nation, whose critic roles include ministries responsible for fish farm tenures and aboriginal relations.

Are wild salmon runs threatened by fish farms?

I am becoming increasingly convinced by science that is being published that not only sea lice but (diseases) have been proved to transfer from the farms to the wild salmon.

What are the other factors affecting wild salmon?

Fish farms pose a large threat to wild salmon, but human behaviour is posing a large threat as well.

Agricultural practices, watershed management or mismanagement, how we use critical salmon habitat as drainage ditches and the nutrient loads and pesticides. It’s the same with municipal development and how we build our communities and our roads.

We should be making sure critical salmon habitat is not blocked and it’s the same with forestry practices. If we are cutting irresponsibly and not preserving and protecting critical creek habitat then they have no place to return home to.

What do wild Pacific salmon mean to you?

They are part of my family…We are the salmon people and we have been taught to respect that family and recognize the importance to the environment, to our communities culturally and to the economics.

I see them as being the perfect symbol of how we should be working towards creating a sustainable environment, a sustainable society and a sustainable economy.

Are you optimistic we will have wild salmon four years, 10 years, 20 years from now?

Yes, I am optimistic because our salmon relatives are very resilient.

They have taken everything we have thrown at them and, yes, there has been a devastating collapse and the sense of urgency is probably not where it should be, but good salmon policy is good environmental, economic and social policy and what I have been encouraging government to do is put the political will behind a commitment to conserving, protecting and enhancing wild salmon habitat. Then they do have a good chance.

The provincial government has a lot more responsibility for wild salmon than we take ownership of.

We are the regulatory authority in all those areas and if we showed the political will to put the fish at the centre of decision-making and not some political calculation, we will do good for them.

What do you think of NDP efforts to protect wild salmon — better than the BC Liberals?

To be candid, it doesn’t take much to be better than the Liberals on this file and frankly that’s not good enough.

In the early 2000s, then minister John van Dongen said — and I am paraphrasing — wild salmon are not the focus, the focus is private industry and fish farms.

The NDP government has said they will get behind wild salmon and I want them to keep saying that and then I want them to do it and go all in on it.

These salmon are in our blood, in our veins, they run through us and a very high percentage of British Columbians want this government to go all in on wild salmon.

What would you do differently if you were in government?

I think it is critical to have support of local First Nations, but there are broader conversations that need to take place with Indigenous communities across the province.

Salmon are not localized. They are not born and raised and die in the same area, they have this massive migration pattern so everyone is implicated when anyone makes a decision to farm salmon.

What we would have done (with) the expiring tenures in the Broughton Archipelago, is we would have allowed those fish in the net pens to be harvested and we would then have cancelled the tenures and required the companies to decommission the site.

It’s an industry that has been encouraged by government, with 6,000 workers, so we would then invest in the innovation side of moving this industry on land. We, as government, would have supported the industry in the transition.

The second piece is that we would have helped them brand a product that is environmentally friendly, ocean-safe salmon. It would be a premium product with premium value.

When someone in California or Oregon is purchasing a product they could look at it and say ‘this is a B.C. product and it’s ocean-friendly.’ Unfortunately what’s going on here is the government is trying to be all things to everybody and we are not at the head of that innovation.

The other piece is that this is an example of a changing industry and the government could have embraced that and seen an opportunity to help workers in transition because this is not going to be the last time in which an industry is replaced by another industry and workers are displaced.

We could have learned how to support other workers transitioning from an industry that has been hit by innovation.

Are you convinced closed containment could be done on a large scale?

These companies in B.C. that are saying it’s not viable are making investments in other parts of the world because that’s the way this industry is going.

As a provincial government and federal government, which owns a lot of the blame, we are allowing these companies to pollute for free. We are allowing the blood water to be released and fecal matter to pile up and all sorts of behaviour and if these farms were on land they would have to deal with their waste.

The people of B.C. are picking up a lot of their costs, so, of course, the mathematics are going to look different, but we can demand better.

They are pushing back strongly against these changes because it benefits and suits them.

What about the federal government’s role? Why has the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) not been more assertive in protecting wild salmon?

I have a very poor perception of DFO. I grew up on the Tsartlip Reserve and the relationship between DFO and our communities has not been a good one. They have not treated us well.

I think there’s a conflict of interest. They are not only responsible for wild salmon, they are also responsible for the aquaculture industry and the growth of the industry.

Your favourite recipe for salmon?

Straight up — on the barbecue with salt and pepper.

This interview has been edited and shortened for clarity.

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The spectre of a massive, floating LNG plant in environmentally fragile Saanich Inlet may seem unlikely to gain environmental approval, but the proposal must be defeated before liquefied natural gas prices increase to the point that the project becomes too tempting, worried southern Vancouver Island residents are being warned.   “It is best not to let your guard down and say the economy is not good right now,” said Eoin Finn, founder of My Sea to Sky and a retired partner in KPMG, who holds a PhD in physical chemistry.   Proposals by Steelhead LNG Corp. for a floating plant anchored adjacent to Malahat First Nation land at Bamberton, fed by gas pipelines criss-crossing the Salish Sea and then snaking across Vancouver Island to Sarita Bay near Bamfield, where the company wants to build a larger LNG plant on Huu-ay-aht First Nation land, were initially greeted with incredulity.   However, last October, the National Energy Board approved export licences for Steelhead to export up to 30 million tonnes of LNG per year for 25 years, with six million tonnes from Malahat and the remaining 24 million tonnes from Sarita Bay.

There are currently 20 proposed LNG projects in B.C. although none have received final investment decisions. Three projects, including LNG Canada in Kitimat, Pacific Northwest LNG near Prince Rupert and Woodfibre LNG near Squamish, have advanced beyond the proposal stage but a combination of low prices, First Nations opposition and federal permitting have prevented the industry from gaining a major foothold in the province.

“The NEB seems to hand out export permits like confetti at a wedding,” Finn told capacity crowds at meetings in Esquimalt and Mill Bay.   It is not only the Steelhead plant itself — which would be the first floating LNG terminal in the world — that should worry southern Vancouver Island residents, they should also consider the massive ships, about the length of three football fields, that would pick up LNG, Finn said.   The ships suck in vast amounts of seawater to cool the frozen gas, which means phytoplankton and small fish are also sucked in, making “the biggest bouillabaisse engine of all time,” Finn said.   “Then they blow it out again and, because they don’t want anything fouling the pipes of their very expensive ship they add a little biocide into it,” he said.

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“That means 50,000 tonnes of hypochlorited hot water poured into the Inlet every year, making it into a marine desert.”   Or, think about the greenhouse gas emissions, Finn suggested.   “It would be like adding 400,000 cars a year to the Malahat.”   Saanich Inlet, a glacially-carved fjord with deep water that is oxygen-depleted for much of the year, has been studied by scientists for 80 years because of the rare ecosystem that produces phytoplankton blooms. It is home to shellfish, herring, salmon and many other species and currently houses the Ocean Networks Canada VENUS (Victoria Experimental Network Under the Sea) cabled undersea laboratory.

VENUS Laboratory in the Saanich Inlet. Photo: Ocean Networks Canada.   It is flanked on one side by the winding Malahat highway, dotted with numerous small communities, and on the other side by Saanich Peninsula, with villages such as Brentwood Bay, tourist attractions such as Butchart Gardens and Victoria International Airport. At the tip of Saanich Peninsula is the busy Swartz Bay Ferry Terminal.

Steelhead CEO Nigel Kuzemko said one of his priorities is ensuring that there will be no detrimental effects on Saanich Inlet, so the company has commissioned a study that will model the effect of one LNG ship a week picking up gas from the floating plant.   Using seawater for cooling the giant LNG thermos tanks is more efficient than air and will produce less greenhouse gas emissions, he said.   “But the water comes out warmer which is what we are concerned about and we want to know what the effect will be on Saanich Inlet,” Kuzemko said.   A chemical will be used to stop bacteria growing in the pipes, he said.   “We are looking at different ones, but they will all be biodegradable so they don’t have any long-term impact,” he said.   Saanich Inlet is a unique area, but has had its share of industrial activity over the last 100 years, Kuzemko said, pointing out that the area where the plant would be situated is beside the old Bamberton concrete plant, where the bottom of the Inlet is covered in concrete dust.   Information compiled in the study would be needed for the environmental assessment process, but Steelhead wanted to get out in front and ensure all the questions were answered and that the community had been consulted from the start, Kuzemko said.   “We hope to do it the right way, but, some people think any energy project is wrong,” he said.   “What we are trying to do is something that we think is great for the world. There’s no reason industry and Saanich Inlet can’t co-exist.”   The aim of reducing the environmental footprint is the reason Steelhead has chosen to use existing pipeline routes, meaning the route wends from B.C., across the Strait of Georgia to Washington and then back to Saanich Inlet, rather than cutting across an untouched landscape over the Coast Range mountains, Kuzemko said.

Adam Olsen, B.C. Green Party deputy leader, who lives 100 metres from Saanich Inlet and grew up on Saanich Peninsula, fears that the belief such a proposal will automatically be rejected is resulting in apathy, which could allow Steelhead to slip through the approval process.   Even though the project is unlikely to be viable at the current price of LNG, many options open up once the company is given a certificate, he said.   It could be sold or put on stand-by for the future, so the focus has to be stopping it at this stage, said Olsen, who believes the provincial government is likely to be in favour.   “This government has basically bet everything they have on LNG and they are also the regulator,” he said.   “I don’t think we can have any confidence that, just because the project appears to be outrageous, that this government won’t look at it seriously.”   Olsen is a member of Saanich Inlet Network, a group formed to fight the LNG proposal, which, during the last week, has collected almost 500 signatures on a petition asking provincial Environment Minister Mary Polak and federal Minister of Natural Resources Jim Carr to reject the Malahat proposal.   Investigative energy reporter and author Andrew Nikiforuk, who has written extensively on LNG, worries that, if Steelhead builds the plants, there will be a push to extract methane from the many coal seams around Vancouver Island.   “A company which has spent billions on LNG terminals will want to keep those facilities full and there’s a lot of methane in old coal seams on the Island,” he said.   “It could mean fracking in watersheds full of salmon.”   However, Finn believes that using methane from coal seams would not be tolerated even if the company is given approval for the plants.   “The coal seams are very close to the surface and any government that gave a company the right to frack so close to people’s drinking water would be hung, drawn and probably quartered,” he said.   It is not yet known whether the 300-member Malahat First Nation will continue to support the project following the election of a new chief and dismissal of three top economic development officials as part of a review initiated by new Chief Caroline Harry.   The agreement-in-principle was signed while former chief Michael Harry was in power and has raised the ire of some of the other four First Nations with land surrounding Saanich Inlet, who say they were not consulted.   Caroline Harry, who could not be reached before publication, said shortly after her election in November that she would reach out to Tsartlip, Tseycum, Pauquachin and Tsawout. Without Malahat support it is doubtful whether the project could proceed.

Steelhead has been talking to Malahat First Nation for 18 months, said Kuzemko, who does not believe there is any reason to think the relationship has changed with the election of a new chief and council.   “It’s going great actually. There are different concerns and a different environment with a new chief and council, but we will work with them,” he said.   Steelhead’s timeline calls for a final investment decision to be made in 2018 and, as with other companies looking at investing in LNG export plants in B.C., economics are likely to be a major factor.   Currently the LNG Asian spot price per million British thermal units is $5.72 and studies indicate that LNG prices are likely to remain low into the 2020s.   That means building LNG plants in B.C. makes no sense as the cost of fracking, transportation, capital costs, liquefying the gas and then shipping it to Asia would be about $12 per million British thermal units, Finn concluded after crunching the numbers.   However, Natural Gas Development Minister Rich Coleman said studies being used by the B.C government show that there will be a worldwide shortage of LNG within four or five years and, as it takes about four years to build an LNG plant, B.C. is well-positioned for developing a thriving LNG industry.   “If the demand is larger than the supply, the price will start to creep back to an economic level,” he said.   Kuzemko knows there are many hurdles before the project can start.   “B.C. is the most arduous location in the world to get approval,” he said.   “We know this project has to be community-based from the start. We are trying to do things in a different way.”

Image: Saanich Inlet by Lotus Johnson

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