A statement of claim launched by two northern Saskatchewan First Nations over hunting rights in a bombing range is headed to trial.
A Federal Court justice made that ruling earlier this week in denying the Crown’s application to have the case dismissed.
The court challenge was launched by the Buffalo River Dene Nation and the Birch Narrows Dene Nation.
However, the trial will only deal with the bands’ claim for Aboriginal title or interest over provincial land and the alleged duty to consult.
The judge agreed with the Crown that the claims regarding nuisance and trespass, commercial hunting rights and negligence all be struck.
But the bands have been given two months to file a better-worded claim regarding the issue of negligence.
The judge says it’s time for this case to proceed to trial in a “reasonably speedy fashion”.
A trial date will be set after the bands submit an amended claim, the Crown files an amended defence and a case management hearing is held.
The Primrose Lake Air Weapons Range (PLAWR) was created in 1954 in what the bands claim is their traditional territory. The bands are not challenging the range’s creation — but rather, their claim that they have been repeatedly banned from hunting, fishing and trapping in the range at times when others have not.
In 1994, BRDN members James Sylvestre and Harry Catarat were charged with hunting in the PLAWR, but were initially acquitted. The ruling was later overturned by a higher court and the Supreme Court of Canada later denied an appeal.