If you own land in BC, maybe you don’t.An Indigenous group on British Columbia’s central coast is claiming ownership of private lands in a case that relies on a groundbreaking court decision from last summer that opened the door to Aboriginal claims on private property.
The Dzawada’enuxw First Nation is seeking a court declaration that almost 650 hectares of fee simple lands around Kingcome Inlet are rather “Indian settlement lands” that should never have been pre-empted by settlers more than a century ago. (Fee simple lands have long been known in Canadian law as the highest form of private land ownership.)
Most of the land is in the hands of two owners: Major lumber producer Interfor Corp., and the non-profit Nature Trust of British Columbia. In their statement of claim, the Dzawada’enuxw say they were promised settlement lands at Kingcome Inlet in 1879 by the Indian Reservation Commissioner of the day, Gilbert Sproat. He was replaced a year later, and when the reserve lands were mapped out, the DFN found themselves with a much smaller portion.
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