B.C.’s cattle ranchers are joining the court fight against the NDP government’s controversial Declaration Act.
The BC Cattlemen’s Association is seeking intervenor status in an ongoing constitutional challenge against the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples law, said president Werner Stump.
“It’s hard to imagine who might not be interested with DRIPA because it impacts, potentially, pretty much everybody in the province,” Stump told Northern Beat.
“We have our businesses based on private land and the stewardship of private land, and we’ve all been made well aware of the concerns around the uncertainties with private land rights recently.
“Also, our business is dependent on grazing tenures and water rights. And so we’re just feeling a lot of uncertainty as to where those things lie and where the rights to those things lie in the future. And more broadly, we have concerns about the government structure essentially of British Columbia and what that’s going to look like in the future.”
The move comes as Premier David Eby struggles to figure out a path forward for DRIPA, following a landmark BC Court of Appeal ruling in December that the 2019 law on Indigenous reconciliation could be used to strike down other provincial laws.
The premier said that the ruling is untenable because it creates immense legal uncertainty. But he has faced opposition from First Nations leaders — and at least one MLA in his caucus — on making actual changes. He’s pushed off any amendments until the fall, in favour of more consultation.
Read the full story at the Northern Beat: BC cattle ranchers join court battle against DRIPA