The Supreme Court of Canada rejected Saskatchewan’s attempt to narrow a Métis challenge to uranium exploration permits in a unanimous ruling on February 28, 2025. The decision preserved disputed portions of the Métis Nation–Saskatchewan’s application for judicial review, despite two earlier lawsuits involving related Aboriginal rights issues.
Writing for all nine judges in Saskatchewan (Environment) v. Métis Nation – Saskatchewan, 2025 SCC 4, Justice Malcolm Rowe concluded that the overlapping proceedings did not amount to an abuse of process. The Court dismissed the province’s appeal with costs. It did not decide whether the Métis held the asserted title or rights, whether Saskatchewan had breached a consultation duty, or whether the exploration permits should be set aside.
Three proceedings with different purposes
The dispute arose from three uranium exploration permits issued to NexGen Energy Ltd. in July 2021 for mineral exploration near Patterson Lake in northwestern Saskatchewan. According to the background recounted in the reasons, the province had offered to consult about fishing, trapping and hunting rights but refused to consult about asserted Aboriginal title and commercial harvesting rights. The Court stressed that this appeal concerned a motion to strike pleadings: its account of the facts came from those pleadings, rather than findings after a trial.
MNS sought judicial review in August 2021, alleging failures in the consultation process and seeking declarations, the quashing of the permits and restrictions on further permits without an appropriate consultation process. Saskatchewan responded by asking the court to strike passages referring to Aboriginal title and commercial harvesting rights. Those were allegations and remedies sought by MNS, not relief granted by the Supreme Court.
The province relied on litigation dating to 1994, in which MNS sought declarations of Aboriginal title and harvesting rights. That action was stayed in 2005 after MNS failed to comply with an order to disclose documents. As the Supreme Court recorded the history, MNS had not secured the lifting of the stay, while Saskatchewan had not sought dismissal of the action as abandoned. MNS’s counsel described organizational and funding difficulties that had contributed to the non-disclosure.
A separate action begun in 2020 attacked Saskatchewan’s 2010 consultation policy. That policy excluded asserted Aboriginal title and commercial uses of resources from its consultation framework. The action sought a general determination of the province’s obligations. By contrast, the 2021 application challenged particular exploration permits. A chambers judge struck the disputed passages as abusive duplication, but the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal restored them.
A stayed lawsuit did not erase the asserted claim
Saskatchewan argued that MNS lacked an active underlying claim after the 1994 action was stayed. It also emphasized that the undisclosed documents were needed to assess the credibility of the asserted rights. MNS answered that it continued to assert those rights and that the province already knew about them, regardless of the older lawsuit’s procedural status.
Rowe rejected the province’s position. The duty to consult can operate before a final determination of Aboriginal rights or title. He restated three conditions for the duty to arise: Crown knowledge, actual or constructive, of a potentially existing right or title; contemplated Crown conduct; and a potential adverse effect on the asserted right. Waiting for final proof of the underlying right would defeat the protective role of consultation while claims are being resolved.
The 1994 action was a legal means of advancing MNS’s claim, rather than the claim itself. Its procedural status did not settle whether Saskatchewan knew about the asserted rights. The Court said the province clearly had that knowledge, but expressly declined to decide what consultation duties followed. Those substantive questions belonged to the other proceedings, not this appeal over the wording of the pleadings.
The reasons also emphasized mutual good faith. Governments must intend to address Indigenous concerns, while Indigenous claimants must not frustrate reasonable, good-faith consultation efforts or take unreasonable positions to prevent decisions after meaningful consultation. The Court did not treat a consultation claim as an automatic power to stop government action. It also rejected the argument that the passage of time since the 2005 stay established an abuse in this case.
Case management could address the overlap
The Court accepted that the 2020 policy action and the 2021 permit application overlapped. One raised a general consultation question; the other presented a specific instance of it. But similar parties or legal issues were not enough to establish abuse. The inquiry had to address the fair administration of justice, including efficient use of court resources, consistency and finality.
Rowe recognized a potential for inconsistent answers if the two proceedings continued in parallel. Unlike the Court of Appeal’s account of that risk, the Supreme Court’s reasoning did not depend on denying it existed. Instead, case management offered a response. Saskatchewan’s counsel acknowledged that adjourning the permit application could have addressed concerns about duplicate argument and conflicting judgments.
Striking pleadings was too drastic a response in these circumstances. The permit application was an appropriate way to challenge specific provincial action and seek protection for asserted rights. Using abuse of process to prevent that challenge would effectively shield potentially consequential government decisions from judicial review. The Court identified case management as an available solution; it did not itself order an adjournment or grant the requested relief against the permits.
The ruling did not exempt Indigenous litigants from abuse-of-process rules. Rowe said courts must nevertheless consider the distinctive context of litigation over Aboriginal rights when deciding both whether proceedings are abusive and what remedy is appropriate. The immediate result was a procedural victory for MNS: the restored pleading passages survived, and Saskatchewan’s appeal was dismissed with tariff costs, rather than a damages award or a decision on the underlying claims.
