"First Nation sues Manitoba Hydro, governments over 'devastating' effects of Lake Winnipeg regulation", 17 June 2025

A First Nation on the shore of Lake Winnipeg has filed a lawsuit seeking damages from Manitoba Hydro, as well as the provincial and federal governments, over a decades-old hydroelectric project it alleges has had negative effects on the lake, nearby reserve lands and the community's way of life.

Berens River First Nation...filed the document in Manitoba's Court of King's Bench Tuesday over Hydro's Lake Winnipeg regulation project, which began operation in 1976.

"Our treaty rights have been infringed upon. Our people can no longer fish where their ancestors fished. Our medicines no longer grow where grandmothers once harvested," Chief Hartley Everett said at a news conference in Winnipeg.

The community, which entered into Treaty 5 with the Crown in 1875, said in its statement of claim it also wants an environmental assessment of the project and inclusion in future decisions affecting Lake Winnipeg, describing the impacts of the project as "devastating" for the community...

None of the allegations in the statement of claim have been proven in court. Manitoba Hydro and the provincial NDP government wouldn't comment on a matter before the courts, and CBC News did not hear back Tuesday from the federal Liberal government....

The statement of claim says it has caused problems for the First Nation including poor water quality, flooding and loss of traditional areas.

It's also caused problems for fishers in the area, as fish leave the shore, and boats and equipment get damaged by rocks and sandbars uncovered when water levels drop to an unnaturally low level, the claim alleges...

While Manitoba's Clean Environment Commission held hearings on the effects of the project in 2011 and issued a report in 2015, the statement of claim says that report was not technically an environmental assessment...

The statement of claim is seeking an order to have "appropriate and sufficient" monitoring technology installed and a comprehensive study done to assess the impacts of the project. 

The filing says it's also seeking injunctions stopping Hydro from operating the project in a way that it alleges negatively affects the community's lands and treaty rights, but what its future holds will "be the basis of the conversation between Manitoba and Berens River," the lawyer said.