IN THE LEDGE – ‘Voting UNDRIP into law in B.C. was an act of betrayal’
(Image: Screenshot, BC Hansard)
Excerpt from debate during Question Period in the B.C. Legislature on Thursday, Nov 20, 2025 between Tara Armstrong, MLA for Kelowna-Lake Country-Coldstream, and Premier David Eby.
Tara Armstrong: This morning, I’ll be reading from the holy scriptures of the United Nations declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples. If you have it with you, please turn to article 26: “Indigenous Peoples have the rights to the lands, territories and resources which they have traditionally owned, occupied or otherwise used or acquired.”
If I am not mistaken, that’s all the land. That’s the land under 150 private homes in Richmond. That’s the land under the homes of 100,000 Kamloops residents. That’s the land under your very own feet.
Can the Premier point to any place in British Columbia that was not traditionally owned, occupied, used or otherwise acquired by B.C.’s Indigenous People?
Hon. David Eby: I would thank the member for the question, but it has been quite a day already with those members from OneBC.
Look, they have a clear position. It’s obvious. It is a very unfortunate position, given the history in this place, where Indigenous People were specifically excluded from participating, from voting, displaced from lands, where they were subject to a biological attack with smallpox, where they were forced into residential schools. Many were sexually abused. Children died.
To have to endure for those members, for members in this House who are Indigenous; for people, high school kids, to be listening to the members promulgating fictions that suit their agenda in the face of the well-documented history of this province; then to rise and to continue this attack on the work that we have to do, at the same time as Indigenous People across this province are working with this government to deliver prosperity in every corner of British Columbia; to ignore those facts, the thousands of jobs that are going to be realized through these partnerships — I mean, it is reprehensible, disgusting, appalling.
I’ve run out of words to describe what they’re trying to do. They’re trying to drag us to a terrible history, drag us back, and our government is focused on pushing forward, finding a path forward. It’s not easy work, but it is the only path forward for this country and for this province. We’re going to do it in partnership with Indigenous People.
The Speaker: The member has a supplemental.
Tara Armstrong: Yes. I do.
The Premier and the Leader of the Official Opposition voted UNDRIP into law in this province in 2019. This act of betrayal didn’t just surrender the province to the 204 Indigenous tribes in B.C., but now American tribes want to take in the action too. Yesterday, news broke that a tribe from Alaska is in court demanding land rights over a gold mine in northwest B.C. Can you blame them? B.C. is up for sale, and the asking price is zero.
My question for the Premier is whether there is any Indigenous tribe…
The Speaker: Question, Member.
Tara Armstrong: …that he won’t give our province away to?
Hon. David Eby: First of all — and the member knows this — we have aggressively resisted the attempts by American tribes to establish claims here in British Columbia. We will continue to do so.
The member is completely wrong when she thinks about reconciliation as a cost, because in our province, reconciliation represents, we believe, on the order of probably $100 to $150 billion in economic activity, tens of thousands of jobs and certainty and predictability for people and businesses across the province. These numbers are backed by companies advancing major projects in this country.
The member wants to rip that up for her ideology, which is clearly anti-Indigenous, unambiguously racist. It is incredibly problematic that we have these voices in our Legislature tearing at the fabric of the agreements that we need to be prosperous and successful in this province.
Those tens of thousands of jobs are not up for grabs as long as we’re on this side of the House. We’re going to fight for those jobs. We’re going to deliver prosperity for British Columbians. We’re going to do it in partnership with First Nations.
And those members on that side of the House — I fully support any effort to recall these members, because there is not a chance that the people who voted for them had any idea about the agenda they’d be advancing in this House.
Source: BC Hansard
ArmchairMayor.ca 
Another Castanet article on the Kamloops land claim issue and surprise surprise no comment section at all.
And another land claim from an Alaska tribe claiming B.C. title. And yet another land claim in Manitoba from a North Dakota tribe.
Remember, its racist to voice any opposition to this issue. Your a racist fascist if you think American citizens can’t make claims to Canadian land.
4 years since the announcement. Still no evidence. Why?
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What is racist is law that overtly establishes power and privilege based on ethnicity.
The Haida seemingly begrudgingly consented to “honor” private fee simple title when B.C. gave it over to them.
Operationally what does that even mean over the long term? None of the questions posed by the Cowichan decision have been answered there. There are about 10 million ways the Haida can make those titles meaningless without ever technically expropriating them over the coming decades and there’s nothing any of the roughly 50% of non-Haida residents of
Haida Gwaii can now do about it as they are racially excluded from having any say over what the Haida nation does with or around their properties.
Granting aboriginal title just changes, on a racially determined basis – forever – who gets to accumulate land profit.
Who in BC legitimately thinks that reverse racism is the path forward? This is going to blow up big time once people catch on. I don’t necessarily blame Aboriginals for this because BC was too stupid to resolve this through correct and legal treaties as most of the other provinces did.
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