First Nations chiefs have secured a meeting with Prime Minister Mark Carney and Canada's provincial and territorial premiers, set for October 2025.

Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak, the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN), confirmed the news after speaking with premiers at a conference in Charlottetown. The premiers have committed to showing up. Woodhouse Nepinak shared the development with The Canadian Press.

She also said she is pushing premiers to promise the October meeting will not be the only one.

The broader context here is about who is responsible for what in Canada. In this country, the federal government and the provincial governments each have their own areas of authority. But when it comes to First Nations communities, the lines are not so clean. Indigenous services, child welfare, infrastructure, sharing resource revenues and policing all involve both Ottawa and the provinces — and First Nations governments say they have their own authority too.

That can lead to a pattern where the federal and provincial governments each say the other should be handling a problem. A meeting that puts the prime minister, all thirteen premiers and First Nations chiefs in the same room can help break through that kind of standoff.

Woodhouse Nepinak's request that premiers promise future meetings matters because of how Canada's political system works. A single meeting can happen and then be forgotten. A meeting that happens again and again builds its own momentum — staff to prepare materials, a running list of topics and a way to hold people accountable over time.

The commitment from the premiers is specific. They have not just said they are open to a future meeting — they have agreed to attend this particular October session with the prime minister. That now puts the pressure on the federal government to confirm and host it.

The conference where this deal took shape — the Council of the Federation — is a regular gathering where the premiers co-ordinate their positions on shared concerns. Woodhouse Nepinak's choice to use this venue to get the commitment suggests she was deliberately working through the provincial side of the relationship.

She also chose to announce the meeting right away, rather than waiting for a joint statement from everyone involved. That puts the commitment on the public record and makes it harder for any premier to back out.

October gives officials time after the summer break to prepare briefing documents and work out an agenda. The specific topics have not yet been confirmed, but a national-level meeting like this typically covers a range of issues.

First Nations chiefs have been asking for this kind of session for years, according to the Globe and Mail. Getting the meeting is the result of sustained pressure.

Whether the October session leads to real results or becomes a regular event will depend on whether Woodhouse Nepinak succeeds in getting premiers to commit to future meetings.