First Nations should have the possibility of being shareholders in Hydro-Québec and of concluding agreements with the Crown corporation without Quebec’s agreement, the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador (AFNQL) argued on Thursday.
During the study of Bill 69 on energy, the AFNQL demanded that the legislative text “reflect the inherent place of First Nations in energy governance in Quebec.”
To achieve this, First Nations should be able to sign agreements with Hydro-Québec without needing approval from the Quebec government, argued Chief Ghislain Picard. “The current legal framework complicates the conclusion of agreements between Hydro-Québec and First Nations and denies the right of First Nations to self-government,” is written in the brief filed by the AFNQL.
The document also states that First Nations “must have the opportunity to be shareholders of Hydro-Québec in order to obtain a fair and equitable share of the dividends and benefits from the exploitation of their territories.” Hydro-Québec has only one shareholder: the Government of Quebec.
The AFNQL is raising a red flag about Bill 69, which opens the door to private electricity distribution to a customer located on “adjacent land” to a production site, under certain conditions. This proposal “opens the door to direct supply of industrialists from private producers,” argues the AFNQL. The organization also writes that “First Nations have the right to produce, acquire, sell, transport and distribute electricity.”
Exploitation, compensations
The AFNQL also argues that First Nations must be compensated “for past and current losses and damages related to the exploitation of the territory and energy development.” The Crown corporation “derives its success from the exploitation of resources found on territories over which First Nations hold rights,” the organization points out.
Hydro-Québec recently signed a $32 million, 23-year agreement in Unamen Shipu (La Romaine) to “settle” the delicate issue of the Lac-Robertson hydroelectric plant, built in 1995 on Innu territory without their consent. The Crown corporation and the government also provided $45 million over six years to open negotiations with the community of Pessamit, where Hydro-Québec has ambitions in wind power.
The APNQL also considers that the First Nations “must [être] significantly represented on the board of directors as well as in management positions at Hydro-Québec.” In a response sent to the Duty In February, Hydro-Québec wrote that there were no First Nations members among the sixteen people sitting on its board of directors. “This is part of our wish that members from First Nations occupy management and governance positions,” wrote strategic advisor Louis-Olivier Batty, recalling a wish expressed by the former head of Hydro-Québec, Sophie Brochu, as early as 2021.
Also in February, 368 Hydro-Québec employees were Indigenous, and the vast majority of these people held jobs identified by the Crown corporation as “trades.”