She was turned away ...
Highway 113 runs through Nisga’a territory in northern British Columbia. It is named for the 113 years of negotiations that led to the Nisga’a Treaty, a recognition of governance, identity, and a Nation’s enduring relationship to land. It stands as a visible reminder that this work was not given easily. It was carried forward across generations, grounded in persistence, clarity, and the assertion of inherent rights.
And yet, not far from that highway, a young Nisga’a woman was told that her identity was not recognized. I remember the day clearly. I was working in Prince Rupert with three teenage girls who had come to take their learner’s tests.
They arrived together, carrying the kind of quiet excitement that comes with stepping into something new. In northern communities, getting a driver’s licence is not simply a milestone, it is a pathway. It is access to education, to employment, to healthcare, to family. It is often the difference between being able to participate fully in community life and being left on the margins.
Two of the girls were able to proceed. They presented laminated status cards, which were accepted without question. The third girl presented her Nisga’a citizenship card. It was not accepted. She was turned away.
At lunch, while the other two girls were now legally able to begin learning to drive, she sat quietly and said something that has never left me: “I wish I was status Indian.”
It is a sentence that should never need to be spoken.
Because what sat underneath that moment was not simply a question of identification. It was a question of recognition. A young woman whose Nation had spent over a century negotiating its place within this country whose governance is affirmed through treaty, whose lands are marked by a highway named in honour of that work was being told, in practice, that her identity did not meet the requirements of a provincial system.
And in northern and remote communities, this is not abstract. Movement matters in very real ways. Access to groceries, medical care, education, and family often requires travel over long distances, sometimes 150 kilometres or more. Public transportation is limited or non-existent. The ability to drive is directly tied to independence, safety, and wellbeing. Without it, options narrow quickly.
This reality cannot be separated from the broader context of safety. Across Canada, the crisis of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls has made it clear that lack of safe, reliable transportation places people at risk. When young women are left without access to licensed mobility, the implications extend beyond inconvenience. They shape how safely someone can move through the world, and whether they are forced into situations that carry greater vulnerability.
What makes this moment even more difficult to reconcile is the broader landscape of identification policy in British Columbia. Today, ICBC accepts permanent resident cards and student visas as primary identification for obtaining a driver’s licence. Individuals who are new to this country who are here as guests, are able to access recognized pathways to mobility through these documents.
At the same time, a wide range of secondary identification is accepted, including Métis Nation BC citizenship cards, foreign birth certificates, laminated status cards, and even documentation issued upon release from correctional services.
And yet, citizenship cards issued by Treaty Nations such as the Nisga’a Nation are not consistently recognized within this framework.
This creates a contradiction that is difficult to ignore. A system that is capable of recognizing international identity and a broad spectrum of institutional documentation is still struggling to fully recognize the identity of Nations whose rights and governance have been formally negotiated and upheld within this country.
This is not a question of comparing one form of identification to another. It is a question of coherence, of ensuring that recognition is applied in a way that reflects both legal realities and lived experience.
To understand why this matters, it is important to remember that for Indigenous peoples, the ability to move freely has not always been guaranteed. The pass system, enforced in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, restricted movement by requiring permission to leave reserve communities. Mobility was controlled. Access to opportunity, family, and land was mediated through colonial authority.
While the pass system is no longer formally in place, its legacy remains visible in the ways systems continue to shape who can move and how. Driver licensing, in this context, is not simply administrative. It is part of a longer history of mobility, access, and control.
The Road to Reconciliation report, which ICBC has referenced as an important and influential document, speaks directly to these histories. It acknowledges the systemic barriers Indigenous peoples have faced in accessing driver licensing and identifies transportation as a critical component of safety, equity, and participation in society. It reflects work that has been carried forward with care, including through community engagement and advocacy efforts such as those led by All Nations Driving Academy.
And yet, this moment remains.
A young woman, ready to begin learning to drive, turned away because her Nation’s citizenship card was not recognized.
This is where accountability lives, not only in the development of reports or commitments, but in the everyday application of policy. In the lived experiences of people who must navigate these systems. In the moments where recognition is either extended or withheld.
Highway 113 stands as a powerful symbol of what has been achieved through persistence, negotiation, and Nation-led governance. It tells a story of recognition that spans generations.
But recognition cannot live only in symbols. It must live in systems. It must live in policy.
It must live in the small, everyday interactions that determine whether someone is able to move forward or is asked to step back.
Because those moments shape more than access, they shape belonging.
At All Nations Driving Academy, we see firsthand how access to licensing affects safety, opportunity, and connection within communities. We also see where systems are working and where they are not yet aligned with the realities they are meant to serve.
This is not about criticism for its own sake, it is about alignment.
It is about ensuring that the commitments reflected in documents like the Road to Reconciliation are carried through into practice in ways that are consistent, respectful, and equitable.
Because the right to move safely, freely, and with dignity should not depend on whether someone’s identity fits within an incomplete framework.
It should reflect the full recognition of who they are.
This article is offered in recognition of those who carried the Nisga’a Treaty forward across generations, and for all who continue the work of protecting and advancing the rights of Indigenous Peoples today. as authored by Lucy Sager ~