A protest by members of the Tobique First Nation over a deal they say should provide them with free electricity escalated over the weekend with the seizure of an NB Power truck.

The Tobique protesters argue NB Power committed to the free-power deal in exchange for allowing the Crown corporation to build a hydroelectric dam on the Tobique River in the 1950s.

The protest began more than a year ago after NB Power went looking for hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid electrical bills, organizer Hart Perley said.

Perley and others have set up camp at the generating station, located in the northwest part of the province, and have been allowing NB Power employees access only if they check in with the protesters.

'He didn't stop and report to the protesters. The security that we have went down and seized his vehicle, brought him to our encampment and I called the RCMP to tell them what had just occurred.'— Hart Perley, protest organizer

On Friday, an employee failed to do so.

"He didn't stop and report to the protesters. The security that we have went down and seized his vehicle, brought him to our encampment and I called the RCMP to tell them what had just occurred," Perley said.

The RCMP and NB Power asked the protesters to give the truck back, Perley said. They have refused.

RCMP Sgt. John DeWinter hesitated to call the protesters' actions illegal.

"There's a process that had been acceptable to both sides and inadvertently somebody forgot to take a step that was acceptable, and that's where we are," DeWinter said.

NB Power won't comment

NB Power is refusing to comment on the dispute or its relationship with the band.

Rick Brewer, New Brunswick's aboriginal affairs minister, met with the protesters Monday afternoon.

"We hope to work with the First Nation and with the power corporation and bring a positive resolution," Brewer said.

On Tuesday, Perley said the Tobique protesters also asked Brewer to have garbage that has sat on a local hill since the dam's construction moved off of reserve land.

"At the time they were constructing the hydro dam, they used a portion of land to leave their barrels of pesticides and herbicides, [PCBs], and so on and so forth," she said.

"And the hospital from the neighbouring town of Perth was also using that as a dump site for whatever it is that they needed to get rid of."

The Tobique hydro dam was put into service in 1953. It is a 20-megawatt facility, one of the smallest of NB Power's seven hydro dams.

The Mactaquac dam, the largest of the utility's hydro units, can produce up to 672 megawatts of power.