(Coast Salish Territory/Vancouver, BC – August 11, 2017) The Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UBCIC) remains steadfast in its ongoing opposition to Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Expansion Project (TMX). 

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, UBCIC President, stated, “Though we welcome the BC Government’s commitment to defending the coasts and waterways, and commend BC’s resolve to ensure the Province meets its constitutionally-enshrined, judicially-recognized obligations to consult Indigenous Peoples, for all future generations, we must continue the true fight against increasingly rapid climate change. These devastating mega-projects must obtain the free, prior and informed consent of all affected Indigenous Peoples. Period.”

As defined by the United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Nations retain the right to provide or withhold their free, prior and informed consent regarding developments on their respective territories. The vast majority of BC remains the unceded territory of Indigenous Nations who remain committed to protecting their inherent rights, their respective cultural beliefs, their families and the natural environment for the benefit of future generations.

The UBCIC firmly believes TMX represents an unacceptable and egregious risk to the clean and healthy ecosystems many Indigenous Peoples and British Columbians’ livelihoods depend upon and directly conflicts with the Trudeau Government’s Paris Agreement commitments to avoid dangerous climate change by limiting global warming to well below 2°C. Since 2011, the UBCIC has consistently opposed the TMX project, with Grand Chief Stewart Phillip being arrested in November 2014 to protest TMX’s exploration of Burnaby Mountain.

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip declared “As long as any Canadian or Provincial government permits environmentally destructive projects that places our communities, families and unceded territories at risk, our Nations and communities will exercise our inherent rights and responsibilities to resist within the courts, in the streets and most certainly, on the land itself.”

21,561 people have signed the Coast Protectors’ pledge: "With our voice, in the courts or the streets, on the water or the land. Whatever it takes, we will stop the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion." http://www.coastprotectors.ca/

Media inquiries:
Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, Union of BC Indian Chiefs
Phone: (604) 684-0231