"I recently attended an event that began with an announcement notifying those present that “you are now on treaty land”. By now, we are all familiar with this new way of commencing public functions. It stems from a recommendation from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). The claim is that such announcements will be a step in the direction of the reconciliation between Indigenous people and the mainstream that the TRC emphasizes.
But, this new procedure has clearly been designed to signal a new way of looking at treaties, and is meant to accomplish more than simply introducing a novel way of beginning an event.
With a view to gaining a better understanding of the significance of this new greeting, I listened to a CBC interview with a person who described himself as a “treaty official”. He explained that when new immigrants come to Canada he meets with them, and tells the bewildered arrivals that the country they have chosen to come to, is in fact, “treaty land”, and they will be expected to honour the treaties, and “share the land”.
Clearly, a radical new way to interpret treaties was being proposed. And it is wrong."
-- Brian Giesbrecht, Frontier Centre for Policy Policy, article from April 2018
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