You know, when someone has an idea that's just so crazy, it might work, and they run with it.
And then, when to everyone's gobsmacked shock, it does work, well, you know what happens next?
EVERYBODY IN THE POOL!
Which is what's happening in Canada, and lemme 'splain.
A week and a half ago, I told you how the folks in Richmond, British Columbia, had woken up one fine, brisk morning to find that the real estate they'd bought, paid taxes on, perhaps raised generation after generation of family there - maybe for over 150 years or more - suddenly didn't belong to them anymore. The story of how a roving band of nomadic native Americans called the Cowichan, who, for centuries before, had sometimes fished and pitched camps along the banks of the river where the city of Richmond now nestled, came to lay claim to duly purchased, legally titled property through a claim of 'Aboriginal title' had people snorting fire.
Since the ruling from the B.C. Superior Court Judge was handed down, and the subsequent letter from the town's mayor hand-delivered to all the affected residents alerting them to it, things have lurched from shock to worse.
For one thing, now that the Cowichans have won their case, their prior benevolent posture has become a bit more assertive to the detriment of the home and business owners in town. Where the tribe had been soothingly saying 'we're not really interested in YOUR home' before winning, now they're all about being interested in YOUR home...which is now technically theirs.
And a home or business owner'd best check with the Cowichans if they have any plans. Capisce?
🚨MAJOR BREAKING - 175 HOMES AFFECTED BY COWICHAN LAND CLAIM ARE UNSELLABLE
— Tablesalt 🇨🇦🇺🇸 (@Tablesalt13) October 30, 2025
Private home sales in the area affected by the new "native title" in Richmond BC
can now ONLY proceed with buying/selling with the consent of the Cowichan Nation”
-Cowichan nation’s lawyer pic.twitter.com/kc4Jc5qyz3
Not that, once sought and received, Cowichan permission to proceed would be any assurance of success. There are good reasons why people are wary of dealing with anything tribally related, and some outfits simply refuse to do so. The risk of costly snafus is not worth taking, particularly for a high-dollar project.
And voilá.
KABOOM 💣💣💣
— Mortimer (@mortimer_1) October 30, 2025
Welcome to the reality in B.C…the BC NDP are about to collapse an entire province…when money and financing dries up, so do jobs and the economy
This is for a manufacturing facility on private land…bank halted support after court rulinghttps://t.co/zqdWFlyISo pic.twitter.com/e594EGUGbr
The brakes came on financing for a $100M facility just that fast, even though the company they were negotiating with already owned the land.
But the land was in the newly designated Cowichan claims.
..."This company, they had a deal already in place with one of the major banks to finance their project," Loo said in an interview on Wednesday, identifying the potential lender as National Bank.
She said the company already owns land for the planned facility in the Cowichan area but was told by the bank that it "doesn't want to deal with new projects at this time" because of the uncertainty stemming from the court ruling.
"So it's not an existing mortgage that is being pulled … but they are cancelling this project for now, because of the uncertainty over the land title and because the appeal process could take anywhere from three to five years to 10 years," Loo said.
Some fun now in Richmond, huh?
How much of British Columbia could a ripple effect of this ruling affect?
Oh...damn near all of it.
95% of BC's land base is currently subject to unresolved claims of Aboriginal title.
— Keith Wilson, K.C. (@ikwilson) October 21, 2025
The court just ruled in the Cowichan case that a successful determination of Aboriginal title can declare fee simple interests invalid as unjustified infringements.
This means the assumed… pic.twitter.com/JJIesxoyWN
...This means the assumed indefeasibility of registered titles of BC home and business owners under BC’s Land Title Act just flew out the window.
Oh, those land acknowledgments are just woke kids' gibberish, right?
What the BC types did was turn a sappy, 'harmless and well-meaning United Nations aspiration' into The Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act and a binding law.
The Cowichan case ruled that homes in Richmond belong to an indigenous tribe. I just introduced a bill to keep private property in the hands of its rightful owners. pic.twitter.com/dSB4vMfqDZ
— Dallas Brodie (@Dallas_Brodie) October 29, 2025
HEY! NO ONE TOLD US IT WAS SERIOUS! WTF!
Why weren't we told sooner about the implications of Aboriginal title? The answer should concern everyone https://t.co/J7nfbOLyws pic.twitter.com/B73G7uG8th
— The Vancouver Sun (@VancouverSun) October 30, 2025
Oh. NOW they're worried.
The B.C. province and the court handling the lengthy, decade-long land claims trial thought it would be just too cumbersome to let all these landowners know their title was in jeopardy. Next thing you know, owners'd be all up in arms, and want to be part of the court case, and be all pesky and stuff. The province worried about potential legal liability in the future for passing the Aboriginal Title law, which gave the tribe the right to claim the land.
I mean, what a mess, right? Everybody was watching out for themselves, and not a one was giving a rat's patootie about the folks who would actually be impacted.
So they never told Richmond landowners that the tribe was after their homes, land, and businesses. See how that works?
Not once in all those ten years. Landowners can file their own claim if the Cowichans change their tribal minds.
...The province also chose not to give notification on its own because of the legal implications in terms of liability down the road, Sharma said.
Case management judge J.A. Power of the B.C. Supreme Court rejected motions for notification from the provincial and federal governments.
The judge worried that if the court ordered formal notifications to private landowners it could be swamped with applications from them for standing.
“It would for all practical purposes put a halt to these proceedings,” Power ruled. Plus, the Cowichan Tribes “do not seek at this stage to invalidate fee-simple interests held by private landowners.”
Note: “At this stage.” In the event Cowichan were to revise its intentions in future, the private landowners could then proceed to court and file a complaint that “they were not given formal notice” earlier.
Good to know the government's got your back, huh? With a shiv.
So we've established Richmond's a mess, and that the whole of B.C. has a big, fat indigenous target on it. The B.C. city of North Vancouver has already sent out letters alerting its residents to claims on properties within the city limits.
Three tribes are asserting title there.
— Cosmo wonder boy (@Cosmowonde83072) October 30, 2025
Some fun.
Don't think for two seconds that there are stirrings elsewhere, like...hello, Quebec.
We have a winner.
WOAH: Now we have a Quebec Land Grab attempt.
— Drea Humphrey (@DreaHumphrey) October 29, 2025
The Algonquin First Nation has filed a title claim over 8 large areas across the province.
It’s like the “Unmarked Graves” cash grab 2.0.
One band after another and if you call it out, you’re racist. pic.twitter.com/pKXouBax9n
And, again, with a solicitous, non-threatening First Nations, 'We've no intention of dislodging private landowners' pinkie swear...until they win.
An Algonquin First Nation has filed a title claim in Quebec Superior Court over large swaths of territory across the west of the province in an effort to address what it described as historic injustices against its peoples.
Jean-Guy Whiteduck, chief of the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation, says his people need to have a say in the way water, wildlife and forestry are managed in their traditional territory. He said that meaningful reconciliation can’t exist until that happens.
“Quebec refuses to recognize that Aboriginal people, traditional people, have any rights outside of reserve territory, except for basically subsistence fishing and hunting,” Whiteduck said in an interview, speaking from the First Nation located on the shores of the Gatineau River, near Maniwaki, Que. “When we talk about title and land ownership, and having a say in the management of the resources, there is no say.”
Whiteduck says the lawsuit only covers areas that are owned or managed by governments, and there’s no intention to dislodge private landowners.
So far, Albertans believe they are immune to this sweep across Canada because their indigenous tribes ceded all territory to the Queen and the Crown in the mid-1800s, unlike B.C. and other territories. There were none of these two-clever-by-half treaty and title deals done then. The key phrase from the North Vancouver letter distinguishing between them all is whether tribes signing such agreements 'ceded or surrendered' their territory.
If they did, your little fishing cabin on the lake is good to go.
If they didn't, you and your neighbors have a huge problem thanks to your woke, virtue-signaling government.
Which I'm sure still expects you to keep paying taxes on the land they gave away.
Neat how that works.
