The Western Indigenous Pipeline Group says Canada’s finance minister intends to favor First Nations along the Trans-Mountain pipeline route when taking ownership bids.

Chief of the Whispering Pines First Nation near Kamloops, Mike Lebourdais, says Bill Morneau included that in a letter recently sent to his group.

“In his letter he references the impacted First Nations along the right-of-way, and so that’s the 55 folks who have agreements with Kinder Morgans, the former owners, and now the current owners, TMX. And so those are the ones he’s referencing and those are the ones he wants to talk to and hear from,” Lebourdais says.

“We’re still meeting with those ministers who make those decisions on who can own what in the pipeline. And so once they become available to us we’ll go meet with the ministers and put our proposal in front of the them. In the mean time, we continue to meet with the proponents along the pipeline.”

The Western Indigenous Pipeline Group will be asking for 51 per cent ownership, and is one of three First Nations groups looking to buy into the pipeline.

Earlier this month, the federal resource minister Amarjeet Sohi says the federal government doesn’t plan to rush to sell a stake, but says it will consider First Nations bids for the pipeline it bought for $4.5 billion dollars last year.