François Rolland, who will act as a neutral and independent facilitator, will be asked to make recommendations on the approach Hydro-Québec should adopt.
Hydro-Québec has appointed retired judge François Rolland to study the company’s practices in collecting unpaid bills in certain Indigenous communities.
Rolland, who will act as a neutral and independent facilitator, will be asked to make recommendations on the approach Hydro-Québec should adopt. These recommendations will be made public.
Last September, Radio-Canada revealed that First Nations had accumulated debts worth $250 million for unpaid bills to the company, which did not cut off the communities. Some residents in the report also spoke of the damage caused by Hydro-Québec installations on their territory.
The company said on Monday that Rolland will have to consider the history of its collection practices in the province’s First Nations and Inuit communities. He will also have to “situate the issue of nonpayment of bills in the broader context of economic reconciliation and energy transition.”
“We have heard the concerns expressed on this complex issue. Our concern is to respond to them with all the sensitivity, rigour and discernment that this requires,” said Hydro-Québec president and CEO Michael Sabia in a release.
During his mandate, Rolland will be supported by Geneviève Motard, professor of constitutional law and Aboriginal rights at Laval University’s Faculty of Law, and by Ghislain Picard, chief of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec-Labrador.
“I hope that this exercise in facilitation and recommendation will enable the parties to chart a constructive new course in the common interest,” said Rolland, who is currently counsel, mediator and arbitrator in the litigation group at Langlois Avocats in Montreal.
Rolland was Chief Justice of the Quebec Superior Court from 2004 to 2015. He has also chaired numerous settlement conferences in civil, family and commercial matters.