By Ken Coates, February 12, 2026
Canadians generally favour Indigenous rights – so long as those rights don’t affect them personally. When Indigenous rights are distant, abstract, or symbolic, public backing is steady. But when those rights involve land, resources, economic opportunity, or political authority that non-Indigenous Canadians consider their own, support withers.
In the 1960s and 1970s, when First Nations, Inuit, and Métis people experienced the first small legal and political victories, these communities had little recognition of even the most basic Indigenous rights. Gradually, increasing numbers of Canadians came to support their search for justice and fairness.
Court victories, like R. v. White and Bob from the mid-1960s that recognized the right of First Nations to hunt for food purposes, arrived with little fanfare, as they did not directly impact Canada’s growing urban population. In 1982, Indigenous rights were enshrined during the patriation of the Canadian Constitution – marking a significant turning point.
Since then, Indigenous resilience and persistence have paid off: we have seen the forging of several modern treaties, the creation of the Inuit-controlled territory of Nunavut, and the paradigm-shaking 2004 Supreme Court decisions in Haida and Taku that governments owed First Nations a “duty to consult and accommodate.”
Most of these decisions affected northern and remote locations. Since most Canadians live in cities, the impacts were abstract: what did cases like 1999’s Marshall decision on Indigenous fishing rights in the Maritimes – as important as it is – matter to people in faraway Toronto, Montreal, or Calgary?
However, in recent years, support for Indigenous rights has slowly eroded. Several events have exacerbated the situation, from the backlash to the residential school graves controversy in Kamloops, BC, to the decision to grant title to Haida Gwaii to the Haida Nation, to the multi-billion-dollar settlements for a host of legitimate Indigenous grievances (such as the Indian residential school system, the “sixties scoop” child welfare scheme, and Ottawa’s general failure to uphold its treaty obligations).
The situation has worsened significantly since both British Columbia and Canada passed legislation to recognize and implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).
At the time, most Canadians thought the move was symbolic. Indeed, then Prime Minister Stephen Harper called the Declaration an “aspirational” document more than a legislative roadmap. His successor, Justin Trudeau, chose a different path – pushing ahead aggressively although not always thoughtfully. So did BC, where the legislature unanimously passed the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act in 2019. This new law required the government to bring all provincial legislation in line with UNDRIP through a co-developed process that critics claimed gave too little voice to non-Indigenous perspectives.
With the principles of UNDRIP now embedded into law in Canada – one of the only countries to take this step – the debate about Indigenous rights is no longer an abstract discussion. Just ask homeowners in Richmond, BC, who, because of a recent BC Supreme Court ruling, now fear they will see title to their property taken from them (plot warning: they will not lose it).
Ironically, when the Haida Nation’s title over Haida Gwaii was recognized, it barely caused a political ripple in BC – likely because Haida Gwaii was far removed from the larger urban power centres in Vancouver and Victoria.
This changed with the 2025 Cowichan decision. Justice Barbara Young, who accepted the Cowichan specific claim, asserted that the subsequent sale of the contested lands to private or corporate owners did not eliminate or resolve the underlying Aboriginal title to the land.
The controversial ruling, though portrayed by critics as a sign that Indigenous legal rights had grown out of all proportion, was logical. The village site should have been reserved for the Cowichan but it was used for government purposes. The Cowichan signed no treaties or land surrenders governing the lands in question, leaving unresolved the long-standing Cowichan claims to the lands, waters, and resources (claims that overlap with other First Nations’ claims in the area). The judge simply pointed out the obvious – but a backlash erupted, nonetheless.
Today, the Cowichan decision is sparking concern across the country, especially since there are currently several similar lawsuits working their way through the courts. Municipal and provincial politicians are openly expressing worry about the sanctity and security of private land holdings in the province and beyond. Mortgage holders in Richmond fear their loans will not be renewed; financial institutions and governments have not been particularly fast or convincing in their responses. The BC government intends to appeal the Cowichan decision, which will further delay a resolution of the matter.
Meanwhile, Indigenous rights and “the duty to consult” appear to be on a collision course with Prime Minister Mark Carney’s vow to rapidly build major projects to reduce Canada’s economic dependence on the United States.
In 2025, the Carney government rushed Bill C-5 through Parliament to expedite major project approvals. Indigenous groups felt brushed aside by the Prime Minister’s decision to proceed with the legislation before engaging directly with First Nations, Métis, and Inuit groups. Despite subsequent meetings and promises from Carney and his ministers that they will respect Indigenous and treaty rights, the damage to Indigenous-federal relations is real. Understandably, many Indigenous people feel the bonds of mutual respect and expectation between Indigenous nations and the rest of Canada have been weakened considerably.
Indigenous peoples have not had an easy ride since the arrival of newcomers in North America. A wave of disruptions to Indigenous lives – diseases, new economies, settlement and dispossession, attempts at assimilation, cultural loss and racial discrimination – were met with sustained acts of resilience and cultural survival.
First Nations, Inuit, and Métis people will weather the current storm, as they have all others before now. But the fracturing of the Canadian consensus on Indigenous authority, which was based on a partial recognition by many non-Indigenous Canadians of the injustices of the past 400 years, reflects a new and difficult reality. Indigenous rights are now being seen, by a growing number of people, as impinging on the rights and privileges of non-Indigenous Canadians. Support for Indigenous rights, long an abstraction, now involves real land, economic opportunity, and local decision-making.
Canadians say they support reconciliation. Right now, that support appears to come with a caveat: “as long as it doesn’t impact me.”
The evidence from the past few months suggests that the path forward will be rockier and more contentious than expected. After centuries of suffering in relative silence, Indigenous people are raising their voices, demanding fairness and justice.
With the courts increasingly supporting their claims, Indigenous people are not just asking for a “seat at the table” – they’re calling for a full stake in the game. If non-Indigenous Canadians want to truly walk the talk of reconciliation, they will need to get used to the idea that Canada must find ways to share power and authority with First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples. This is what real political and economic reconciliation requires. However, it’s unclear whether Canadians are truly ready to share power – or fall back on tired and unconvincing platitudes.
Ken S. Coates is a distinguished fellow and the recently retired director of Indigenous Affairs at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. A former professor of Indigenous Governance at Yukon University, he also held the Canada Research Chair in Regional Innovation in the Johnson-Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy at the University of Saskatchewan. He has served at universities across Canada and at the University of Waikato (New Zealand), an institution known internationally for its work on Indigenous affairs.
