Federal New Democrats are criticizing Prime Minister Mark Carney over a First Nation in Ontario’s $100-million lawsuit against a second-tier subsidiary of his former firm, Brookfield Asset Management.
In 2022, Mississauga First Nation (MFN) and its chief sued Brookfield BRP Canada Corp. and the Ontario government over alleged breaches of Indigenous rights and treaty obligations in the construction and operation of four dams on the Mississagi River.
The First Nation, located near Lake Huron’s north shore 200 kilometres northwest of Toronto, alleges the Brookfield BRP-owned dams “have devastated MFN, its territory and ability to exercise its rights,” according to Ontario Superior Court papers obtained by CBC Indigenous.
The dams were previously operated by Ontario Hydro but sold to Brookfield BRP in 2002. When the lawsuit was first filed, Carney was vice chair and head of transition investing at Brookfield Asset Management, an archived web page says.
The First Nation says it was never consulted before the sale.
“MFN has been and continues to be deeply adversely affected by the dams and will be for decades to come,” alleges a Feb. 20, 2025 amended statement of claim.
None of the allegations have been proven in court.
Mississauga Chief Brent Niganobe said the community would have preferred to resolve the issues without litigation.
“We asked not to go this route and to try to do things on an equal footing, which is what Carney preaches and especially with his private company,” Niganobe said Friday.
The NDP says the dispute shows a need for Carney to disclose possible conflicts of interest and projects he’s connected to.
“There’s a lot of questions about his time at Brookfield and we have virtually no answers,” said Manitoba MP Niki Ashton during a virtual news conference on Friday.
In the news conference, Ashton was joined by the NDP’s candidate for the riding of Sault Ste. Marie–Algoma, Laura Mayer, a member of Mississauga First Nation.
The Prime Minister’s Office has not responded to a request for comment. Brookfield Asset Management also hasn’t responded.
Brookfield Asset Management has a 61 per cent interest in Brookfield Renewable Partners, which is the parent company of Brookfield BRP, also known as Evolugen, according to lobbying records. Brookfield BRP owns 49 renewable power facilities in Ontario.
Asked why it’s fair to criticize Carney given the apparent distance between the parent and the subsidiary, Ashton said Carney “was in a leadership role at Brookfield and the buck stops with the leader.”
Brookfield BRP is defending the case and denies the allegations. The dams were built several decades ago and operate subject to Crown oversight under a comprehensive regulatory and legal regime, says an amended defence filed March 3, 2025.
The company denies it has any duty to consult the First Nation, denies the plaintiffs have suffered damages, and says the First Nation does not have sufficient proprietary rights to the allegedly affected lands.
Election promises
Carney hasn’t said much about his approach to Indigenous people since being sworn in but in his 2021 book, Values, provides a clue Carney says any efforts on sustainability “must be in partnership with Indigenous people” as part of a larger economic reconciliation project.
“More fundamentally, our approach to sustainability should draw on the wisdom of Indigenous people,” the former central banker writes.
“Indigenous communities know that environmental and economic considerations are not independent factors to be weighed against one another. They are intrinsically linked.”
It’s a good thing to say but Carney’s government will need to show it, said Niganobe.
‘If that’s what he believes in, then that’s what he should practise. And his government, that’s what they should practise,” he said.
“We shouldn’t be taking a back seat to the other things that are going on.”
On a March 18 stop in Nunavut, Carney promised to secure the Arctic, “unleash the North’s economic potential, and reaffirm reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples.”
In a news release, NDP MP for Nunavut Lori Idlout criticized Carney for announcing $6 billion for an early-warning radar system but just $66 million for housing in the territory.
“This is not acceptable. This is not what reconciliation is all about,” she said.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre also set his sights on the North recently, promising last month to build a military base in Nunavut to counter foreign adversaries’ interests in the region.
Poilievre this week pledged to fast-track projects in northern Ontario’s mineral-rich Ring of Fire region, drawing criticism from the grand chief of Nishnawbe Aski Nation as well as some praise from two First Nations in the area.
