The governments have failed to protect and restore the lands, waters, and resources on which Grassy Narrows rely for their well-being, cultural survival, and Treaty rights. Grassy Narrows is suing Canada and Ontario for breach of Treaty rights, breach of fiduciary duties, and violation of the Crown’s duties to act honourably in its relationship with Grassy Narrows. The lawsuit is based on the Crown’s continuing failures to meet its obligations to protect Grassy Narrows from the harms of mercury contamination and other industrial impacts, including industrial effluent and resource extraction. The legal action calls on the governments to compensate Grassy Narrows for damages arising from these failures, to act to remediate the river system, and to change the way it governs to respect and uphold their solemn Treaty promises and relationship with Grassy Narrows, instead of harming and disregarding them.
Grassy Narrows is also going to court over the cumulative impacts of resource extraction on their Territory. Ontario and Canada have authorized decades of forestry, mining exploration, hydroelectric dams, effluent discharge, and other industrial activities without Grassy Narrows’ free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC). Even now the government is considering locating a nuclear waste disposal site in Grassy Narrows’ headwaters. The Crown continues to severely affect Grassy Narrows’ sacred rights and Territory. It has also exacerbated mercury contamination in the life-giving English Wabigoon river, which the Grassy Narrows community has long stewarded.
“It’s not just an Indigenous problem; it’s a human problem, and now we need to put water in front of our survival as human beings on this planet. I think industry is given too much free reign on our lands to put their pollutants out there and their chemicals, and they need to put water first.”
— Judy Da Silva, Community Activist and International Peace Prize winner
The goal of this legal action is to finally bring some measure of justice to Grassy Narrows so that they can protect their lands and waters, restore their Anishinaabe way of life and wellbeing, and secure their children’s health and the health of future generations. The case seeks to establish an important precedent for Canadian governments to remediate the environment when Treaty rights and the health of vulnerable people are affected.
A judgement affirming that Canada and Ontario breached Treaty 3 and duties owed to Grassy Narrows would strengthen the environmental rights of all Canadians. It would highlight the governments’ obligations to preserve and restore environmental integrity, so Treaty rights can be exercised meaningfully across all of Treaty 3 territory, and that government regulators aren’t able to sweep environmental harms under the rug from resource extraction they authorize.