Simon's Legal Resources

Real Property - Indigenous Land Rights

. Chippewas of Saugeen First Nation v. South Bruce Peninsula (Town)

In Chippewas of Saugeen First Nation v. South Bruce Peninsula (Town) (Ont CA, 2024) the Ontario Court of Appeal considered an indigenous claim seeking damages and a declaration that "excluded coastline (the “Disputed Beach”) forms part of the Reserve, that no third parties have any interest in the Disputed Beach, and that the honour of the Crown and its fiduciary duties were breached by the wrongful demarcation of the Reserve boundaries".

Here the trial court considered the issue of the relationship between treaty land rights and the white private land property systems:

[53] The trial judge found that Saugeen’s claim was not barred by any defences. She held that the patents issued along the Disputed Beach could not extinguish Saugeen’s Treaty right to the Reserve land, given they did not demonstrate a plain and clear intention to extinguish the Treaty right, pursuant to the Supreme Court’s direction in R. v. Badger, 1996 CanLII 236 (SCC), [1996] 1 S.C.R. 771, at para. 41.