Welcome to Episode 1 of RAVEN’s new mining justice podcast series, Plunder: True Crimes, Canadian Mines. This is a show that looks beneath the surface of mining in Canada, a country that’s home to 60% of the world's mining companies.

For all the glittering office towers that you might be used to seeing in Toronto and Vancouver, Mining has a dark history, and — you’ll discover, a controversial future. We’ll travel from the earliest days of colonization, fuelled by gold rush-style plunder, to the toxic era of uranium mining that contributed to the Manhattan Projects’ development of the nuclear bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and to today, where hunger for critical minerals continues to drive colonialism deep into the heart of Indigenous lands: in Canada, and around the world.

After centuries of exploitation, the drive to get-rich-quick is baked into Canada’s DNA, with extractive industries still given preferential treatment by the government. Despite a lot of talk about reconciliation - allocation of resources is still very much done without proper consultation or consent of the Peoples who have stewarded these lands and waters since time immemorial.

We’re going to start the series by looking at how mining actually begins. Even today, anyone with a laptop and $25 can stake a claim without even bothering to inform the First Nation whose territory they’re staking. We take a deep dive to look at how Gitxaała Nation dealt with illegal discharge of tailings from the Yellow Giant gold mine - a project that Gitxaała said from the beginning they did not want. After the company devastated Banks Island’s salmon-rich creeks and near-shore areas, Gitxaała decided to go to court to change the outdated and unjust Mineral Tenure Act in a case that has fundamentally shifted how mining will be done: not just on Gitxaała territory, but everywhere in B.C.

Today on the show we’re talking with Bryant Doradea — HK aka Higher Knowledge. He’s a youth worker, activist and multimedia artist who joined RAVEN first for the Canned Salmon festival in 2021, and most recently brought his storytelling and teachings through hip hop to our Vancouver Festival Afloat concert .

As we celebrate the landmark settlement of Cindy Blackstock's class action lawsuit, we're taking a look at kids in foster care. There are, right now, more Indigenous kids in the social welfare system than were ever at residential school at any given time. It’s a reality that has led many to observe that the foster care system IS the new residential school, for how it both pulls kids away from the land and their culture, and how it perpetuates the colonization of Indigenous families.

Illuminating the path he's taken, that builds power — not in spite of, but from out of — the deep well of his own struggles, HK shares about how he uses his hard-won learnings to help Indigenous youth - in the inner city, on the 'rez, and on the land.

This episode features the voices of Melody Lepine, Tori Cress, Daniel T’seleie and Paul Belanger, all recorded at a press conference organised by Environmental Defence Canada and Keepers of the Water.

Fora like UN summits can be structured in very colonial ways: we are grateful to Lou Romain for weaving a tapestry of sound, grounding Indigenous teachings in birdsong, the voices of the river, and the breath of the wind.

The more-than-human voices are the Athabasca river and various animals are recordings from he Yellowstone National Park, which share many species also endemic to the Wood Buffalo National Park. red-winged blackbird, Wilson’s snipe, warbling vireo, bald eagle, western meadow lark, common loon, savannah sparrow, and sandhill crane.

Additional music is by Holizna CC0, Soft and Furious, and Loyalty Freak through the Free Music Archive; theme music is by Luke Wallace.

You can hear more of Louise’s work on her podcast, Circle of Voices. Listen on Spotify and Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/tune-intotheworld

Now: sit back, pour yourself some tea and enjoy this guest episode from Circle of Voices and Louise Romain.