Attorney General Sharma says B.C. supports company’s request to reopen Cowichan case

VICTORIA – British Columbia’s attorney general says it is rare to reopen a court case as significant as the landmark Cowichan Tribes title decision, but the government supports an effort to do so by the largest private property owner in the title area.

Niki Sharma says Montrose Properties will be able to bring forward details about how it has been affected by the ruling that Aboriginal title is a “senior interest” compared to fee-simple title.

Montrose owns about 120 hectares in the overall title area of 300 hectares granted by the judge, but the court didn’t hear from private landowners during the initial case, so the company is asking a B.C. Supreme Court judge in Victoria to reopen the case.

The same judge hearing Montrose’s arguments through to Wednesday ruled in August that the Cowichan First Nation has Aboriginal title over the land, that the granting of private titles by government unjustifiably infringed on the nation’s title, and that Crown and city titles on the site are defective and invalid.

Montrose Properties owns land along the Fraser River in Richmond, B.C., the area the Cowichan said was its former summer village before it was taken from them in the 1870s.

The company says it wants to reopen the case, because it doesn’t have the time for a years-long appeal process.

Sharma says circumstances have changed since the original ruling last August.

“So, I would just say, that I think that that evidence is something the court should consider, when it’s determining whether or not they have a valid role (in the case), that they should have been able to provide evidence in the trial.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 26,