Greg Rickford is hoping the province has turned a corner on the Ring of Fire but it still has some big hurdles to overcome.
MP Rickford (Con., Kenora), who is also the federal natural resources minister, said he was a little perplexed after receiving a letter from provincial Northern development and mines minister Michael Gravelle given he considers him a friend. But Rickford said what he's reading from it is that the province is finally hearing what the federal government, industry and First Nations have been saying all along.
"That is to identify the Ring of Fire as a priority and to identify specific projects within the Ring of Fire that are worth moving forward on," he said.
Those projects include identifying transportation and energy corridors in the area not only for mineral development but to get access for isolated First Nations communities.
But there are three areas that the province needs to address.
The first is figuring out resource revenue sharing with First Nations. While the province has championed its regional framework with Matawa Tribal Council as a success, Rickford said that is really a mandate to negotiate but it's not clear of what they can negotiate or what to negotiate about.
"If it sounds a bit confusing, it still is," he said.
A North South corridor was lost according to the law when a dispute between Cliffs Natural Resources' Canada Chrome Corporation and KWG Resources went to the Ontario Mining and Lands Commissioner. Rickford said that's something the province could have addressed before it headed there.
"That has stifled any and all conversation about what corridor options are available," he said.
"Nobody's been able to move, nobody's been willing to move on an advanced discussions around other planning for other corridors."
Despite several announcements, no one knows anything about the Ring of Fire development corporation beyond the fact that so far its board is made up of four senior provincial bureaucrats. It cannot be a policy option and will not be until stakeholders have at least seen how it's going to work Rickford said.
"Let's get this straight. Neither the federal government, any of the private sector companies and importantly the First Nations communities have seen any documents, not articles of incorporation, not policy position statements on what the devco would do except administer all of this money that we would apparently pour into it," Rickford said.
"We don't drop off money into a devco where we don't have any ability to even so much as sit on its board and have a decision making capacity. That's not an option for us."
