First Nations Summit on Carney’s Major-Projects Bill ‘Only The Beginning’ of Talks Says AFN Chief – EnergyNow

July 16, 2025

OTTAWA — Assembly of First Nations (AFN) National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak said this week’s First Nations summit with Prime Minister Mark Carney won’t be the last negotiation over his recently passed major-projects bill, but the beginning of a longer process.

“This can’t be the end,” she said in a recent interview with National Post. “This should be only the beginning. It should have been the beginning a long time ago, right before this bill was even passed. Of course, it’s a tough issue, but we have to be at the table together.”

Carney promised he would be holding a First Nations summit on July 17, followed by other summits with Inuit and Métis peoples later in the summer, after facing intense criticism from Indigenous chiefs on the way his government fast-tracked Bill C-5 in Parliament.