It began with a court decision but quickly turned into a heated national controversy for North America’s oldest corporation.
In April 2025, the Hudson’s Bay Company received court approval to sell thousands of artifacts and art pieces it has collected since its incorporation in 1670.
Long held in storage or select exhibits, the collection includes more than 4,400 objects ranging from paintings to fur-trade-era friendship agreements, textiles and archival documents – many of which are believed to have cultural, ceremonial and political significance for Indigenous communities across the country.
The auction will be overseen by the Vancouver-based Heffel Gallery. Ontario Superior Court Justice Peter Osborne determined the sale could proceed if it struck a reasonable balance between the company’s debt restructuring process and the interests of its creditors and stakeholders.
Hudson’s Bay, which filed for protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, is dissolving remaining operations under financial strain. The sale of cultural assets is part of that exit strategy, but the court’s decision didn’t come without warning signs.
Justice Osborne heard from Asad Moten, a lawyer representing the Attorney General of Canada and other federal government bodies.
“Canada cautiously does not oppose” Hudson’s Bay’s move to auction off its artifacts, Moten said. “I say cautiously because Canada has not been afforded a chance to catalogue the artifacts.”
The court then ordered that a full inventory be shared with federal officials and representatives of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs (AMC). Still, the ruling set a dangerous precedent: allowing a private company to liquidate cultural and historical items before communities tied to them could identify, review or claim the items.
In a statement, the AMC, the Assembly of First Nations and Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) called for the immediate return of any sacred cultural artifacts in the collection.
“Our history is woven into the fabric of HBC’s beginnings, and reclaiming these artifacts is essential to honour and preserve the contributions and heritage of our ancestors,” said MKO Grand Chief Garrison Settee. “This is a matter of ethics. This is a matter of justice.”
Settee and others lobbying to stop the auction say there has been no meaningful communication with HBC, the courts or the federal government.
AMC Grand Chief Kyra Wilson said selling such items “without full transparency and consultation with impacted First Nations” would extend “the colonial dispossession of First Nations’ lands and belongings that the HBC directly profited from for centuries.”
“Reconciliation needs to come with action,” she added, calling for a First Nations-led process to determine their rightful ownership.
HBC’s origins are inseparable from colonization. Its earliest operations were built on Indigenous knowledge and trade networks, especially in Waskaganish, where the company first landed in 1668.
Charles Hester is Waskaganish’s Director of Culture, Sports and Leisure and an unofficial historian. He noted that the Cree not only welcomed the traders, but advised them where to settle.
“If it wasn’t for our people, I don’t think Hudson’s Bay would have been that successful. Our ancestors helped build Canada by helping Hudson’s Bay.”
The fur trade wasn’t imposed on the Cree, it was integrated into their economy, and Cree leaders became essential to its success.
“When they came in, it was our people that suggested they establish here on the river, because this was a trade route that goes to all the Cree communities, all the way to Labrador. So, they just had to plug into that trade route – everything was already established.”
Hester says this legacy is part of why Cree people have long been successful in business. “We’ve been doing business with our European settlers for 350 years now. So, it’s not something that’s new to the Cree.”
Hester himself was part of that tradition. “When I was 11 or 12 years old, I went out with my grandparents and I spent the winter with them out on the trapline,” he recalled. “That year I managed to trap six martens. That was my first paycheque ever – it was from the Hudson’s Bay Company.”
But the centuries-long relationship brought change as well. Hester pointed out how the commercialization of traditional practices altered community values.
“Traditionally when you went out and got a moose, you shared your kill with the Elders or with the widows at no cost,” he said. “But now everything has a cost. There was a dollar value placed on everything, and I think that changed Cree society.”
That contrast between legacy and current practice is also felt by Indigenous business owners today.
Jason Thompson, owner of Superior Supplies Inc. in Thunder Bay, says he’s still waiting on an $80,000 payment from HBC for a contract completed nearly a year ago. His company, which supplies paper products, signed the deal in September 2023 and was told payment would come within 90 days. But as the deadline neared, communication from HBC dried up.
“As we were approaching the 90-day mark, that’s when the ghosting and the lack of communication really started,” said Thompson, who is from the Red Rock Indian Band.
Now, with HBC in insolvency, he fears the money will never come. “My ultimate worry is we’re never going to see a dime.”
The experience cuts deeper than a financial loss. It challenges the sincerity of corporate commitments to Indigenous economic reconciliation.
“The horrors and atrocities for us Indigenous people are well-documented,” Thompson said. “Yet this is how they’re going to proceed – without even entering into any dialogue.”
With thousands of items on the auction block and Indigenous businesses left in financial limbo, Thompson wonders: “What does reconciliation really mean if they won’t even pay their bills?”
At the heart of the backlash is the demand for transparency. While HBC argues it will eventually detail items for sale, critics say the very act of initiating an auction without consultation undermines reconciliation and the rights of Indigenous nations to their own heritage.
Governor General Mary Simon, whose family history is tied to the HBC through her father’s position as a former company post manager in Nunavik, also weighed in on the issue.
Simon emphasized that any Indigenous artifacts held by HBC should be returned to their rightful communities. These items, she noted, “belong to the people,” and their repatriation should be treated with the same seriousness as other international efforts. Pointing to negotiations with the Vatican to return Indigenous belongings to Canada, Simon called for a similar process with HBC.
The auction process is still in its early stages. While the court approved HBC’s right to work with Heffel Gallery, a final list of items has not been publicly disclosed, and the timeline for a sale remains uncertain.