The chickens are, at long last, coming home to roost! The Campbell Government’s Energy Policy, now Christy Clark’s, is being seen for what it is – an egregiously ideological giveaway to large corporations. Even that Liberal suck, the Vancouver Province calls the policy “folly”. Yes, after 8 years of silence, of indifference, the Province in one word describes a policy it has, by its silence condoned for nearly a decade – a policy they and the rest of the media could have likely stopped had they chosen to deal with it. Meanwhile, the Vancouver Sun, having a Fellow of the Fraser Institute, Fazil Milhar as editor of the Editorial Page, has indeed by its silence kept the spotlight off this massive giveaway of our province.

The evil consequences of BC’s current energy policy, drafted in large part by Alcan in its move way from smelting aluminum into a big-time energy producer, are many.

As official spokesman for The Common Sense Canadian, I’ve spoken throughout the province and found one constant obstacle: people find it difficult to believe that any sane government could come up with such a policy. They’re starting to realize that they’re right – no sane government would:

• Forbid BC Hydro from developing any new public power projects (Site C, exempted, is not a “new” project – it’s been on the books for decades)
• Give all development to private companies with secret sweetheart deals
• All but give them licenses to use our rivers (the original price for a private power water license was around $170)
• Force BC Hydro to buy this private power at almost 3 times what they pay for it or some 9-12 more than they can make it themselves, thus placing BC Hydro in a position that if they were in the private sector, they would be headed for bankruptcy.

That’s right folks – these private power projects can’t store much energy, meaning it must be used when it’s created. Because they can’t generate much power when their rivers are low, which they generally are except during the annual spring run-off – when we need their power the least – BC Hydro gets stuck with power it must use or sell at a huge loss.

One cannot blame people for not believing this. It is indeed incomprehensible. But it’s true.

It’s so hard to believe that the NDP in the ’09 election didn’t make this into the big issue of the campaign.

The worm has turned – not implying that the NDP are worms! – and the leading candidates for their leadership have clearly stated that there will be no more of this sweetheart cronyism and that the secret contracts must be opened up to the public’s scrutiny.

You will recall that during the Liberal Party’s leadership process this environment/energy issue wasn’t debated at all. It was if it simply didn’t exist! Assuming that the NDP select either Mr. Farnworth or Mr. Horgan, this issue is automatically in the forefront of the debate and must be dealt with – as long as the NDP keeps its nerve.

On a related matter, John Cummins, leader of the Conservative Party, has long been an ardent foe of the Liberals’ Energy Policy and even if, which I don’t believe, the NDP were to lose their nerve, the Conservatives won’t. With no seats going into the race, and with Mr. Cummins’ reputation for fighting for what he believes in, the Liberals will finally be forced to face the music.

Finally, what will Mr. Campbell do now?

On the Liberal leader election night, Mr. Campbell was said to be in Washington, DC. This is not the time of year he normally takes a vacation there and it would be interesting to know what his itinerary was.

My guess is that some plumy directorships will be coming his way from grateful titans of industry.

As Bridge players say, may I review the bidding?

Gordon Campbell has gone into retirement but anyone who thinks he won’t be rewarded by industry for all his hard work for them ought to be showing some interest in Florida swamp lands.

The part of Campbell’s tenure that most concerns me is his record on Independent Power Projects (IPPs), where he employed the well known theory that if the lie is big enough and you let it run for enough time, people will believe it.

On the IPP issue Campbell not only used the “Big Lie” technique, he was much aided by a tame if not captive media. It’s important to note this, for one can fool the public either by dealing with the issues thoroughly or not at all. The BC mainstream media has chosen the latter method and it’s worked magnificently for Campbell.

 There is a new factor which I’ve dealt with in the past but it’s come to the fore forcefully thanks to economist Erik Andersen.

 First let’s examine what we know about IPPs.

• They create environmental nightmares      
• They have sweetheart deals with BC Hydro which has been mandated by the government to give them
• Most IPP power comes at a time BC Hydro doesn’t need the power
• Even though it doesn’t need the power, under the “take or pay” clause BC Hydro must take it
• BC Hydro, having been forced to take IPP power has two choices – export it at less than half of what it was forced to pay for it or use it at 12 times what it can create its own power for.

I can’t believe this situation which rivals and perhaps exceeds the crooked mayor who gives long term sweetheart deals to his brother-in-law.

What Campbell has done is to bury these facts from the public by stating the egregious falsehood that BC needs private power because it must import power. This scares people who fear that without IPPs we will literally be in the dark. The crucial point is that if BC was short of energy, the last place they could get it would be IPPs which produce the bulk of their power during the annual spring run-off.

A new wrinkle has been added: BC Hydro is seeking permission from the BC Utilities Commission for massive rate increases, ostensibly for renovations and stuff like that.

In their proposals and indeed in their other financial statements you see the Sherlock Holmes famous dog barking scenario where the whole point of the case was that the dog didn’t bark. So it is with these sweetheart deals. For what’s missing from this whole mess is a financial statement from BC Hydro that shows the ever increasing liabilities of some $50 BILLION to these IPPs which will cost it well in excess of a billion a year for up to 40 years! We’re talking about in excess of $1 billion a year and growing! . As the late American senator Everett Dirksen once said “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money.”

All of these deals have a COLA clause to cover any inflation that might occur!

Pretty neat, huh! How would you like a deal like this where, no matter what you do, you can’t go broke?

There is no doubt that under these circumstances if BC Hydro were in the private sector it would be seeking bankruptcy protection. The only reason BC Hydro is not bankrupt is that it has a steady flow of income which can be raised if necessary – you and me and BC industry who must pay more and more to cover BC Hydro’s commitments and shortfalls.

Why aren’t we being told by the government about this mess – about how we are sacrificing our environment so that companies like General Electric can literally steal our power?

In fact it’ worse than that for governments are actually granting money to these huge wealthy companies.

We’ve been taken for fools by the Campbell government and the pliant media. Gordon Campbell gets praise whereas he should get his second sojourn in the slammer.

The dog hasn’t barked and the biggest giveaway BC has ever seen goes unexplained by the government and unnoticed by the media.

Rumors are flying as Christy Clark hits the premier’s office running, including an election for next September. This will happen if the premier decides that as time goes on her chances of winning will not likely improve.

The NDP leader will not have had much time to present his platform.

The NDP may emerge from their leadership convention snapping at each other – which is normal for them.

Premier Clark may have won the HST debate.

After some time in the Legislature, the new Liberal government, whose best argument is that Campbell has left, may present a new and better image even though they all participated in supporting him.

The downers are significant, one of which could be fatal – the combination of a strong NDP leader and a threat to the right wing by a John Cummins-led Conservative Party.

There is, of course, a huge issue Premier Clark wants to avoid until she has a mandate…it’s called BC Hydro.

Hydro, were it in the private sector, would now be heading for bankruptcy protection. And this leads to another rumor this time from Cope 378 (the union representing many BC Hydro workers) which raises the specter of BC Hydro being split in three and some if not all of the pieces being sold privately. An interesting fact is that when Hydro puts its case to what’s left of the BC Utilities Commission they conveniently overlook the some $50 BILLION in commitments to private power companies.

This raises the name Rich Coleman who is the new Minister of Energy and has made noises about holding Hydro’s feet to fire re: their proposed significant raise in electricity charges. Minister Coleman is seen as a tough, hard-nosed guy whose appointment is supposed to have telegraphed a message to a population not too keen about an increase in rates that BC Hydro will have to deal with.

I smell a rat – no offense Mr. Coleman.

If the minister truly wants the public t know about their energy company he will announce that he will release the cozy contracts virtually given to private companies and will do so immediately. He would restore zoning rights to local governments. He would make it clear that as government policy Independent Power Producers (IPPs) would receive no licenses and no environmental permits until the whole energy plan is out in the open. He would also restore independence to the BC Utilities Commission.

I don’t believe these things will happen because Premier Clark does not want the Energy policy and the ruinous, sweetheart contracts to be an election issue. My bet is that Coleman will mount some sort of inquiry which delays public debate until the election is, safely he hopes, behind him. Coleman will bob and weave and avoid. A combative man by nature – so I’m told – Coleman will bluster, equivocate, play the role of the Ink Fish and generally confuse the voting public.

This technique will be met with opposition from the Common Sense Canadian, opposition which will take Damien and me around the province. After recent events on Vancouver Island in Port Alberni and Tofino a couple of weeks ago, will be in Williams Lake and Quesnel this coming weekend, followed by the Okanagan the week after. By the time we’re finished we’ll have visited every region of the province carrying the message of the financial horror the government has visited on BC Hydro and showing the calamitous environmental damage this policy causes.

We will support politicians who stand for saving BC Hydro and our environment and oppose those who don’t. No more complicated than that.

But there is more to it than just that. We cannot with our limited resources fight all the battles under the environment ‘brolly but we stand with those who fight fish farms, battle to keep the ALR intact and stand by opposition to shipping Oil Sands crud by pipeline and tanker through BC and down its coast.

Does this mean we’re anti-business? An emphatic no! We’re against bad business.

Fish farms can stay if they’re in closed-containment. If the fish farmers say they can’t handle that we say this means you need BC to subsidize you by allowing you to ravage the environment and our wild fish. In effect, the damage that happens to our wild salmon becomes a dividend in the hands of foreign companies.

With pipelines one must remember that there are no risks involved but certainties waiting to happen. The consequences will be – not might be – horrific damage to our precious environment.

We stand shoulder with those who fight to preserve farmland. Quite apart from all other valid arguments, why would we, given what we see happening around the world, jeopardize our food supply?

Neither Damien or I support any political party and certainly not socialists. I ran and won against the NDP twice and if the circumstances were the same today as they were in 1975 and I was that young again, I’d do it all over again.

BUT…the issues we at the Common Sense Canadian are concerned with are not about left and right but right and wrong.

As we go into the campaign flat out, I hope you will support us as we battle to save our power company and our environment.

 

This would seem to be as good a time as any to make out a wish list for premier to be, Christy Clark. These are in no particular order.

May we please have back out our right to make a judgment as to matters which happen in our own backyard? Such as Independent Power Producers’ (IPPs) plans for a private power plant? Or a double pipeline for oil from the Tar Sands? It would seem that the wish to develop trumps the right to people’s wishes.

Here is the inconsistency: If a town wants to put in, say, a Walmart, councils listen to people BEFORE making a decision, but the provincial government doesn’t believe in consulting people and only lets the public in when it’s a done deal and government and the company are pretending to let the public make suggestions as to the environmental standards to be followed. Apart from all else, Dear Ms. Clark, no one for a moment thinks that either the government or the company gives – forgive the vulgarity – a fiddler’s fart about the suggestions made.

May we please see copies of the deals forced on BC Hydro for IPPs and have full disclosure of their contents and accompanying documents. Please don’t tell us that they must be kept secret for confidentiality purposes. The whole process is phony – the public knows that and since the government has access to these contracts, we the people respectfully ask that you make them public.

Once they are public, please have a judicial process to determine whether or not these deals are conscionable. No one expects you to cancel a deal just because someone made a good deal through an open process, but if these contracts are, as many suspect, sweetheart deals, we ask that you cancel them and, if necessary, see the IPPs in Court.

With the deepest of respect, again, Ms Clark, may I suggest a bench mark of fairness.

If BC Hydro has been forced or is being forced into what’s called “take or pay” deals, surely this is a point of fairness for an independent adjudicating process. If, as is expected, Hydro has been  forced to take power it doesn’t need then either export it at a 50% or more loss or forced to use it and thus pay from 10% on up more than they can produce it themselves these contracts are unconscionable and the contracts should be deemed void.

You probably know, ma’am, that the British Columbia Utilities Commission has said that these contracts “are not in the public interest” of British Columbians. May we, again with respect to this energy policy, suggest you tube it. Get rid of it.

Let me, with deference, move into the environmental issue.

Notwithstanding the assurances given by Finance Minister Colin Hansen, these projects are scarcely “run-of-river”, leaving the flow of the water undisturbed, nor are they small projects run by small companies.

Now again, with respect Ms. Clark, you may not be familiar with Mr. Hansen’s statement but if you Google “Colin Hansen private power” you will see his grandfatherly talk in its entire 1 minute and 51 seconds of untruths. Indeed, I’m sorry to say that Mr. Hansen could not have stated the opposite of the truth with greater particularity.  If you wish a hard copy transcript I would be pleased to send you one and, if you so desire, a copy for each member of your caucus.

I certainly don’t wish to seem pedantic or be rude but it must be said.

BC Hydro and the provincial government which you will soon head talk about “appreciable fish values”. These are weasel words designed to imply that none of the Pacific salmon, Chinook, Coho, Chum, Sockeye, Pinks, and Steelhead, is endangered. Quite apart from the fact that this is clearly not the case in many projects, including the Pitt River proposal, other fish are valuable and critical to the ecologies their river sustains. These include Cutthroat Trout (actually the 7th Pacific Salmon), Dolly Varden and Bull Trout (the last two being Chars). There are other species like Arctic Char, Rocky Mountain white fish, sturgeon and so on which also sustain their river’s ecology. If the words “appreciable fish values” are taken on their plain meaning, there’s not a bit of running water in the province that doesn’t contain these values.

I believe – and I hope you don’t think me rude – that an elementary mistake has been made both with IPP projects and fish farms. The “Precautionary Principle”, so important to fair science and good legislation, has been upended so that instead of the user of the water being required to prove the environmental safety of the proposal, the onus has been shifted to the public. I’m sure if you took a moment to reflect on this – and I can provide you with loads of evidence that this is happening – you would immediately reinstate the Precautionary Principle. One name I can give you now: the highly respected John Fraser, who could hardly be called a leftist, is an excellent person to contact on this point.

Still on the subject of the environment, so far as I’m aware there is no process, no responsible part of government, to evaluate the totality of the environmental disruptions that are permitted – the aggregate impact if you will. This should happen and should be done by an independent body with the chairperson appointed by the Legislature and reporting to them.

Again, with deep deference, may I suggest that these issues will be very much in play from now until the next election. You simply cannot wish them away. You have two options as I see it – you can pretend that these matters are all unimportant or you can take immediate and firm steps to deal with them. We at The Common Sense Canadian devoutly and respectfully urge you to follow the latter course.

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British Columbians mourn the death of a great citizen, Allan Williams, QC.

To Marjorie, his wife of 62 years, and his family I know I speak for all BC when I say about Allan, “Well done thou good and faithful servant.“