VANCOUVER — The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed the latest challenges to the Trans Mountain expansion project.
In a unanimous, 3-0 decision today, the court dismissed four challenges to that approval launched last summer by First Nations in British Columbia.
FCA dismisses applications challenging the second approval of the Trans Mountain Pipeline Project: https://t.co/gsIjYO66TI
— Federal Court of Appeal (@FedCourtApp_en) February 4, 2020
In its decision, the court said there is no basis for the First Nations to interfere with the second approval of the project.
A court hearing in December focused on the government’s consultation with the First Nations between August 2018 and June 2019.
The consultation took place after the Court of Appeal struck down the first project approval in August 2018 in part because of insufficient dialogue with Indigenous groups.
At the hearing last month, the Tsleil-Waututh Nation, Squamish Nation, Coldwater Indian Band and a coalition of small First Nations from the Fraser Valley argued that the government came into the consultations having predetermined the outcome.
The federal government responded that consultations were meaningful, saying that instead of just listening and recording the concerns it heard, it also incorporated them into broader programs to protect the environment.
The three judges who decided the case said cabinet’s second round of consultations with First Nations affected by the pipeline was “anything but a rubber-stamping exercise.”
The judges said the government made a “genuine effort” to listen to and consider the concerns raised by the First Nations and introduced new conditions to mitigate them.
The project is to triple the capacity of the existing Trans Mountain pipeline to carry diluted bitumen and refined products from Alberta’s oilsands to a shipping terminal in Burnaby, B.C.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government purchased the pipeline and related infrastructure for $4.5 billion in 2018 and construction of the expansion is underway.
The Canadian Press
