Rock music legend Neil Young will play the first of four Canadian benefit concerts on Sunday, to help an Alberta aboriginal band fight the expansion of the Athabasca oilsands.
The "Honour the Treaties" tour, which kicks off at Toronto's Massey Hall, will benefit the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation in their legal fight against Shell Canada's Jackpine oilsands mine expansion plan. Last month, the federal government approved the project which Shell has said will double its bitumen production to 300,000 barrels a day and create 750 jobs.
But some first nation and environmental groups say the project's potential environmental damage outweighs the economic benefits of expanding the oilsands site.
Nearby Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation has said the expansion plan violates several federal laws concerning fisheries and at-risk-species, as well as treaty rights.
"Canadian and Albertan environmental protection laws have been greatly eroded in recent years, and what laws do exist are rarely if ever followed, or law-breakers penalized," the Honour the Treaties tour website explains.
The federal government gave the go-ahead for the Jackpine expansion plan last month, despite a review panel's conclusion that the project would result in severe and irreversible environmental damage.
In a statement last month, Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq said the environmental effects from the Jackpine expansion plan are "justified in the circumstances."
Greenpeace Canada has accused Ottawa of putting the interests of oil companies ahead of First Nation treaty rights and environmental protection.
"Canada would be much better off diversifying its economy, investing in renewables, green jobs and projects that get ust out of this madness not deeper into it," the group said in a statement.
The Honour the Treaties concert series aims to raise $75,000. As of Saturday morning, more than $23,972 has been raised. The tour, which also features Canadian jazz singer and pianist Diana Krall, includes dates in Winnipeg, Regina, and Calgary.
