In a Prince Rupert board room in mid-January, the British Columbia-based Indigenous alliance Coastal First Nations-Great Bear Initiative (CFN), Lax Kw’alaams and the Haisla Nation met with Prime Minister Mark Carney and reaffirmed their opposition to a new oil pipeline to the northwest coast of the province.
“It’s loud and clear. That’s a no, and our interest isn’t about money in this situation. It’s about the responsibility of looking after our territories and nurturing the sustainable economies that we currently have here,” CFN President Marilyn Slett said at the time.
The alliance includes nearly all First Nations within the Great Bear Rainforest on B.C.’s central and north coast, meaning that its opposition could be a powerful obstacle to building new oil export infrastructure. Despite that, Carney only met with CFN after he had already signed a pro-pipeline Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith last November. The MOU aims to create the conditions needed to build an oil pipeline to B.C.’s northwest coast, including potentially adjusting a ban on oil tankers through the region.
In late February, Premier Smith told Albertans in an address that she expects “approval from the federal government for a million barrel a day pipeline to our west coast” with no mention of Indigenous consent or rights.
That could prove to be overly optimistic, given that one of the most pro-industry First Nations on the coast also opposes a new oil pipeline.
The Haisla Nation, no longer a CFN member but whose traditional lands encompass the Douglas Channel and the delta of the Kitimat River, have in recent years invested heavily in Liquefied Natural Gas. The Nation is currently developing the Cedar LNG project on its territory, which promises to be a major economic boost for the small coastal community. Despite this, they too have long opposed any oil transportation on the coast.
Chief Councillor Nyce explained to DeSmog in an interview that projects which involve new oil tankers navigating the coastal waters represent a line that the Haisla will never cross, because the potential damage to local fishing livelihoods and access to ocean sustenance, which many in her community still rely on, is too great a risk.
“We are very disappointed that the government of Canada has committed with Alberta to explore the feasibility of an oil pipeline to the north,” said Chief Councillor Nyce. “Basically, they declared that this project is of national interest and without any engagement whatsoever with Indigenous people across the province or along the coast.”
The logic of their opposition isn’t hard to understand. To Nyce, an LNG tanker sinking in the Douglas Channel would be terrible, but wouldn’t be an existential threat to the community. The same can’t be said of an oil tanker sinking and wiping out the Haisla Nation’s ability to fish and feed itself. That, says Nyce, “would be catastrophic for us.”
Around the same time Carney was meeting with CFN, his former Chief Of Staff Marco Mendicino stated that a key goal for the federal Liberals is “to grow our oil production, as complicated as that may be when it comes to our relationship with the climate and First Nations groups.”
But as DeSmog’s interview with Nyce makes clear, the Haisla are standing firm.
“We’ve Been Down This Road Before”
As the sun set on the town of Kitimat in Northwest, B.C. in April 2014, dozens of people gathered outside town hall to hear the results of a plebiscite that would signal the community’s support or opposition to the Enbridge Northern Gateway oil pipeline and supertanker project along the Douglas Channel on the north coast of B.C.
As the results were read out, 60-40 in opposition of the project, the crowed erupted with cheers and sighs of relief. Members of the Haisla Nation, from Kitimaat Village, just across the bay at the top of the Douglas Channel, were not included in the vote. They showed up anyway, pounding thunderous drums in support of their neighbours’ efforts to keep the channel oil free.
“Enbridge and the government really don’t understand what happened here tonight, not just here in Kitimat but the entire Northwest,” said Gerald Amos, a former Chief Councillor of the Haisla Nation. “What we witnessed was a community building exercises that should scare the shit out of them.”
More than 10 years on that sentiment hasn’t wavered.
In a call with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith the day before she signed the MOU with Mark Carney, Haisla Chief Councillor and Mayor of Kitimat Phil Germuth reiterated their determination to never support oil transportation through the Douglas Channel.
“We’ve been down this road before,” Nyce said in an interview. “We’ll go down this road again to ensure that we are heard and understood about what we value on the coast and why we just aren’t ever going to accept a pipeline to our shore. We take all our food from the Douglas Channel and…a spill on our waterway would be catastrophic for us.”
Federal and provincial leaders appear to now be better at appreciating the Haisla’s concerns. Premier Smith announced in late January that Kitimat, part of the community home to the Haisla, is no longer an option for the proposed pipeline. The shipping route, she explained, would be “too complex.”
Roots Of The Oil Tanker Ban
For more than 50 years, oil export on B.C.’s North Coast has been debated ad nauseam. In the 1970s, an oil ports inquiry determined that the waters off the North and Central Coast were too unpredictable for oil transportation and too ecologically sensitive to the risks from an oil spill.
Since then, a voluntary exclusion zone has been in place, supported by every First Nation on the coast, including the Haisla.
The Haisla’s opposition to oil transportation deepened during the Northern Gateway era. When Enbridge proposed twin pipelines to bring bitumen to Kitimat for shipment across the Pacific, Haisla leaders joined a broad Indigenous and environmental coalition that opposed tanker traffic and pipeline corridors through Northern B.C. The nation filed legal challenges, participated in public hearings, and mobilized local opposition.
In 2010, Coastal First Nations formally banned oil tankers through their territories, but since the late 1970s, there has been a voluntary oil tanker exclusion zone, which governments and companies have long adhered to.
The Northern Gateway project was eventually abandoned, after a Federal Court of Appeal overturned the project’s approval due to the government’s failure to adequately consult with First Nations. Since then, the Haisla’s position hasn’t changed, as they have repeatedly signaled that oil-by-tanker is not acceptable in their territory.
In 2019 the federal Liberal government of Justin Trudeau enacted the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act, which formalized the ban on oil tankers through northern waters.
Why Haisla Sees Oil as a Bigger Threat Than LNG
Chief Councilor Nyce, who took office in 2025, has been one of the Haisla’s most visible spokespeople during this most recent wave of proposals. In a joint statement issued with the District of Kitimat following the call with Premier Danielle Smith, she highlighted the community’s long-standing rejection of an oil pipeline and supertanker port through Haisla territory. Chief Councillor Nyce says this position reflects the lived memory of how oil and marine accidents can devastate subsistence, livelihoods, and culture that the Haisla still depend on.
In 2016, for example, the Nathan E. Stewart, a tugboat, ran aground near Bella Bella on the traditional territory of the Heiltsuk, a CFN member. Over 110,000 liters of diesel were spilled, which has had a lasting impact on clam beds there that haven’t been harvested since.
But Chief Councillor Nyce says the Haisla are not against development, citing the nation’s support for LNG Canada and the construction of its own Cedar LNG project.
“We have found that with the development of LNG facilities on our shores, we feel that is a fit that works with our values,” said Chief Nyce. “The transportation of LNG on our waterways doesn’t pose a high risk to our food source so we’re supportive of that.”
As pressure mounts on the federal government to support Alberta’s efforts to build a new oil pipeline to the west, one stipulation may throw a wrench in their plans— First Nations consent—which the Haisla, and several other First Nations say they will never give.
“They’re hoping that Indigenous people will buy into the pipeline as equity owners along the way,” said Chief Councillor Nyce. “But we weren’t included in that conversation between the premier [of Alberta] and our prime minister at all. We were not engaged in any way shape or form. And I feel like that was a huge signal of disrespect from both of them to not include the leaders who will be affected along the coast that they’re proposing.”
In early December, the Conservative Party put forward a motion in the House of Commons to force the governing Liberals to vote on building an oil pipeline to the north coast. The motion outlined part of the MOU brokered by Carney with Alberta, but excluded language regarding Alberta’s commitment to lowering methane emissions, industrial carbon pricing, and respecting Indigenous rights.
However, one notable vote in support of an oil pipeline to the north coast came from Conservative MP for Skeena-Bulkley Valley, Ellis Ross.
Ross, a rookie MP, is also a former Haisla Chief Councillor who opposed Enbridge’s Northern Gateway project more than a decade ago, citing concerns about remediation if an oil spill occurred in Haisla territory. “There’s no real way to pick this product up out of a marine environment,” Ross said in 2013.
Although Ross voted in favor of the Conservative motion supporting the pipeline, he is still facing criticism from First Nations and constituencies about his lack of clarity on the issue.
Despite Ross’s apparent support for an oil pipeline to the North Coast, First Nations are digging in and preparing to fight a potential proposal at all costs. And after years of building consensus among First Nations and communities along the North Coast to support LNG development, Nyce points out that the notion of forcing through an oil pipeline has already damaged government relations with First Nations. This could impact future negotiations of developments that require First Nations consent.
“They’ve taken a major step back, in my opinion, in terms of the relationship with First Nations with this announcement,” said Chief Councillor Nyce. “It makes no reference in the MOU to the need for Indigenous consent for the pipeline to go ahead, and that is completely unacceptable.”
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This post has been syndicated from DeSmog, where it was published under this address.