The city submitted 394 written questions as part of the National Energy Board’s regulatory review process but said the Texas-based company did not respond to 40 per cent of them, covering everything from emergency management plans to compensation in the event of an oil spill.
“We submitted almost 400 questions and only about 248 of them were answered,” said Sadhu Johnston, deputy city manager. The rest “were quite inadequate in the way they were answered, with either no answer or only partial answers.”
[quote]As interveners we are trying to assess the proposed project and are finding it quite difficult to get information on the project. That does make it hard for us to fully evaluate the proposal and to prepare our experts and our expert testimony to ask the right questions and formulate an opinion.[/quote]
Both the city and the province submitted requests to the energy board Friday asking the regulator to compel Kinder Morgan to respond to the outstanding requests.
Province stonewalled too
Proposed Kinder Morgan tanker terminal expansion
The B.C. Environment Ministry issued a statement saying they had submitted more than 70 information requests to the company through the board, dealing with maritime and land-based spill response, prevention and recovery systems.
“In a number of cases, Kinder Morgan’s responses to the information requests do not provide sufficient information,” the statement said. “That makes it difficult for the province to evaluate whether the Trans Mountain expansion project will include world-leading marine and land oil spill systems.”
As part of the board review of the pipeline that would link the Alberta oil sands to Port Metro Vancouver, the company had to respond to more than 10,000 questions submitted by hundreds of groups and individuals granted intervener status by the board.
No direct, oral questioning of Kinder Morgan
Under new rules for the regulatory review, there is a strict timeline and the board decided not to allow direct oral questioning of company officials. All questions must be submitted in writing ahead of hearings set to begin in early 2015.
It’s a very restrictive process, Johnston said.
“It’s really become quite undemocratic, the way the NEB is running the process,” he said.
[signoff3]
The city said the responses it did receive made it clear that the company will not cover the first responder costs incurred by Vancouver in the event of disaster and it said the responses from Kinder Morgan raise questions on the economic feasibility of the project.
Weaver: Answers ‘simply unacceptable’
B.C. Green MLA Andrew Weaver has also complained about the responses provided by the company to his 500 questions.
BC Green MLA Andrew Weaver
He filed a motion with the energy board Thursday asking for full and adequate responses and a revised review timetable to incorporate “new and reasonable” deadlines for information requests and evidence.
“Many of the answers I received are simply unacceptable,” Weaver, a Nobel Prize-winning climate scientist, said in a statement.
Kinder Morgan declined a request for an interview.
Scott Stoness, vice-president of regulatory and finance for the company, said in an emailed statement that Trans Mountain believes it provided robust responses to questions “that were within the scope of the regulatory review.”
Some of the information is market sensitive or would be a security risk to release, he wrote.
“It is normal in regulatory processes that there are debates about whether questions are appropriate and/or in scope,” Stoness wrote.
[quote]We understand some interveners may not be satisfied with the answers we provided. That is why the NEB process allows for interveners to make motions on the responses we submitted.[/quote]
They will have another opportunity to question the company and to submit their own evidence later this year, he said.
To many, the recent decision by the Harper Government to approve the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline – a project it has so emphatically been pushing – is not surprising at all. What was surprising was the relative lack of fanfare in which the announcement was released. As Jennifer Ditchburn noted, there was no MP, let alone the minister responsible, to make the announcement: just a simple press release four paragraphs long entitled “Government of Canada Accepts Recommendation to Impose 209 Conditions on Northern Gateway Proposal”.
In this release, the government highlighted the role of the (emphasized) independent panel in making the recommendation. It noted that this is another step in a long, thorough process. It urged Enbridge now to demonstrate how it will meet the 209 conditions the independent panel put forth, as well as the additional work Enbridge has to do to “fulfill the public commitment it has made to engage with Aboriginal groups and local communities along the route” (ignore for a moment the fact that the “duty to consult” is 1) the Crown’s responsibility, not Enbridge’s; or 2) one would assume extends to Coastal First Nations that are adamantly opposed to the pipeline due to spill potential, and isn’t restricted to First Nations living along the pipeline Right-of-Way). Finally, it stated:
[quote]It [Enbridge] will also have to apply for regulatory permits and authorizations from federal and provincial governments.[/quote]
Enbridge faces big hurdles with First Nations
All of this seems all well and good. Shortly thereafter, the First Nation groups stood up to voice their continued opposition and, to be clear, the “duty to consult” provision will likely be the most difficult hurdle for Enbridge to overcome – especially in light of the Supreme Court’s Tsilhqot’in decision, which closely followed the Enbridge announcement.
What was more intriguing for me was the response from BC Environment Minister Mary Polak. She noted that this was just the first of BC’s five previously stated conditions. She then went on to note that “the Federal government also highlights the fact that there are important permitting decisions that are properly the jurisdiction of the provinces.” Interesting.
Harper couldn’t reject Enbridge
What is interesting is that in no plausible scenario could Stephen Harper reject the Northern Gateway pipeline, given this government’s behaviour in backing the oil industry generally speaking, doing its best to discredit environmental opposition and going so far as to label such opposition “radicals” with an ideological agenda, and criticizing the Obama administration for delaying its decision on Keystone XL.
Once the Joint Review Panel gave its approval – subject to its conditions – the door was wide open. The problem is the political opposition, not only within the “radical” environmental circles, but broadly speaking in British Columbia is increasing. 300 scholars signed a letter arguing that the Joint Review Panel was fundamentally flawed, particularly because it included upstream oil sands development as a benefit, while excluding the environmental and climactic costs associated with such development.
[signoff3]
Numerous polls have come out showing increasing opposition to the project (to be fair, the polls do vary,depending on whether pro-pipeline or anti-pipeline framing is given to the questions – yet even the most pipeline-friendly polling questions show 50% opposition). If Harper rejects the project based on political calculations, it looks bad, particularly to his base in Alberta. If he approves the project, he potentially loses BC in the 2015 election, which doesn’t look bad, it is bad.
The question is whether the Northern Gateway project has become such a political landmine that Harper has essentially written it off (knowing the likely outcome of First Nation challenges in court) and is searching for a way to reject the project, without him rejecting the project.
Where does BC govt stand?
Enter British Columbia. It is at this point that the comments made by BC Environment Minister Polak seem much more significant. Opposition to Northern Gateway is significant. Christy Clark has issued five conditions which must be achieved in order for her to approve the project. One of them – “Ensuring British Columbia receives its fair share” – seems almost impossible, given the structure of federal equalization payments.
In either case, it is a way for Premier Clark to publicly look like she is saying “help me find a way to yes” when she knows, politically, that she’ll have to reject it anyway. If public opinion in BC is truly in opposition to the extent that it seems, and the Federal Government’s press release makes me think that it is, then rejecting the pipeline is a political win for Premier Clark.
In addition, it would take the Northern Gateway off Stephen Harper’s agenda and let him focus his attention on other, less politically volatile pipeline proposals. The emphasis of the provincial role in issuing permits by the federal government, and shortly thereafter re-emphasized by Minister Polak could very well be coincidental. Unless this is exactly what Stephen Harper wants.
Geoff Salomons is a University of Alberta Political Science PhD student studying environmental policy, democratic theory and long-term policy problems.
The statue ‘Ivstitia’ (Justice) guards the entrance of the Supreme Court of Canada (Sean Kilpatrick/CP)
The BC Liberal Government just couldn’t leave well enough alone. In choosing to appeal the Tsilhqot’in First Nation’s BC Supreme Court victory over land title and rights, the government set in motion a chain of events that could have profound consequences for its future resource development plans.
The Tsilhqot’in won a landmark legal victory affirming title and rights over 200,000 hectares of their traditional territory, west of Williams Lake, at the BC Supreme Court in 2007 (with limited rights to an even larger area). The 17-year case was the longest and arguably most important in the provincial court’s history. But at the lowest level of the courts, its ramifications remained unclear – especially as they applied to other territories.
Then, the BC government decided to challenge the ruling – initially winning a small victory in 2012 at the Court of Appeal, which undermined key aspects of the lower court’s decision. But the move would ultimately backfire.
BC government its own worst enemy
Like other seminal aboriginal rights cases such as Haida and Delgamuukw before it, in choosing to appeal the Tsilhqot’in case, the province ultimately made matters much worse for itself by entrenching the substance of the lower-court decision in the highest judicial precedent of the land, when the Supreme Court of Canada handed down its verdict this week. The SCC’s decision maintained the nation’s title and rights to 170,000 square hectares – essentially affirming the BC Supreme Court’s original ruling.
The choice of the Liberal government to roll the dice with the higher courts was likely motivated by two factors: 1) Its fixation on the proposed Prosperity Mine at Fish Lake, in Tsilhqot’in territory; and 2) Concerns over the broader implications for its resource development program throughout province if the BC court decision stood.
By proceeding with the challenge, the government failed spectacularly on both accounts.
The Fish Lake that got away
The province’s unrelenting support for Taseko Mines’ Prosperity project saw it clash with the Harper Government on several occasions. It rubber stamped the mine’s first iteration, only to watch federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice shoot it down after the panel reviewing it identified serious environmental and First Nations issues.
While all this legal wrangling over the mine was going on, the province was appealing the separate-but-related BC Supreme Court decision on the nation’s title and rights.
When the company submitted a new proposal for the mine in 2013, it too was rejected in February of this year. The company, still unwilling to take “no” for an answer, is now seeking a judicial review of the second rejection – but this week’s SCC decision surely must represent the final, final nail in the coffin for Taseko’s ill-fated mine.
What does ruling mean for Enbridge, other projects?
The SCC ruling’s impact on other contentious resource projects, like the proposed Enbridge and Kinder Morgan pipelines, remains to be seen. “Just because the Supreme Court of Canada has issued this claim doesn’t mean that the government is going to start giving all the land back to the aboriginal people,” says Garth Walbridge, a Métis lawyer.
[quote]But it could have a serious economic impact. The size of the boulder that Enbridge is rolling up the hill to get their pipeline built just got much bigger today, because the First Nations in that part of the country now have much much bigger say in whether or not Enbridge can go ahead.[/quote]
In pushing the case to the Supreme Court of Canada – and losing, big time – the BC Liberal government has ensured that these questions will be central to all resource development in the province going forward.
November 2011 injunction case over Prosperity Mine
Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard is putting green jobs on the back burner (Photo: facebook)
One thing Stephen Harper, Justin Trudeau, BC Premier Christy Clark and new Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard all share in common is the dated notion that economic and sustainable development are competing concepts that need to be reconciled, with great difficulty. And in hard times, the economy must take precedence.
New Quebec government disappoints with green jobs policy
Among its first public statements on the natural resource sectors and environment, the new Quebec Liberal government announced:
A one-year strategic environmental evaluation study (SEE) of the development of fossil fuels in Quebec to be completed in 2015
The continuation of the strategic environmental evaluation (SEE) of the shale oil potential of the pristine Anticosti Island
A new variant of the previous Charest goverment’s Plan nord, a key component of the Liberal an economic development plan calling for the development of mining potential in Quebec’s northern most regions
Approvals for small hydro facilities on rivers all over Quebec.
What has become clear with the above and other pronouncements by the Couillard government to date is that it is preparing the terrain with inadequate or smoke screen environmental analyses to facilitate full-tilt fossil fuel and natural resource development in the province.
China invests $70 billion a year in renewable energy
It will do so without assessing the economic costs and benefits – only paying lip service to the opportunities of the green economy. With regard to the latter point, China is now the world leader in clean energy technologies, having installed 28 GW of new wind and solar capacity in the single year of 2013 while also being a world leader in electric vehicles. Meanwhile, there are currently 3.5M jobs in the EU green sectors.
Accordingly, in a May 30, 2014 press release, the Liberal government stated that while it is favourable to the development of fossil fuels in Quebec, it wanted to assure the population that the environment would be protected and safety would be addressed.
As for the rationalization of its interest in the development of the fossil fuel sectors, the Couillard government argues that while awaiting the shift to a green economy, it’s best that Quebec produce its own fossil fuels, rather than importing them. A rather strange line of reasoning since the prime focus on fossil fuels and other non-renewable resources diverts funds that could otherwise be directed towards to the high-growth and high-job-creation green sectors.
Investing in the green economy would offer better returns on public funds and the logic of Couillard’s yesterday’s economy club could entrench new fossil fuel economic dependencies, thus further impeding the migration to a green economy.
Shale gas and oil moratorium in jeopardy
Quebec currently has a moratorium on shale gas development. But all the signals are that the new Quebec government wants to put an end to this moratorium, under the guise of an environmental report which said that with certain precautions and regulatory tweaking, all will be well. Nothing to worry about.
[signoff3]
Indeed, Couillard and company want us to think that a one-year strategic evaluation study (SEE) on the development of fossil fuels in the entire province will be more exhaustive than: 1) the two-and-a-half-year study on the development of the shale gas in the St-Lawrence River valley; and 2) the findings of the Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE) (the public consultation office on the environment), which is now reviewing shale gas issues a second time.
Some very substantive, scary, empirical evidence is coming to the fore, but, as with the case of the early reports on the impacts of smoking on human health, the private and government lobbies for shale gas development are implying that the absence of hard, one-to-one cause-effect data means the practice of fracking is safe.
Concerning shale oil, the Quebec Liberals said they will be an investment partner with the private sector to explore the shale oil potential on the of the pristine and huge Anticosti Island. The exploration will proceed this summer, long before the Strategic Environmental Evaluation on the matter is completed in 2015!
As for the much-touted economic benefits of the industry, we only have to look south of the border to see that the shale gas sector in the US is going through a boom to bust cycle, because after one has drilled to get to an easy to access sweet spot in a given well, it’s too expensive to go after the rest. US shale oil is on the same path and a decline in shale oil production may come as early as 2016.
Offshore oil development: Old Harry
The Old Harry potential offshore development area is on the Quebec-Newfoundland border, not very far from the Îles-de-la-Madeleine (Magdalen Islands), an area for which the economy is largely about fishing and tourism.
Couillard has already indicated he will sign an agreement with Harper for the development of fossil fuels in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence. The 2014-15 Budget confirms this intention.
Proposed offshore oil development at Old Harry (Council of Canadians)
With the possibility of developing Old Harry on the horizon, a 3-year, 800-page strategic environmental evaluation report on the Gulf, published in 2013, highlighted the deficiencies of exploration and development technologies – and the biological and human impacts of spills in the region. These risks are particularly high, given the region is covered with ice for much of the year. The study concluded that Quebec does not havethe capabilities to deal with a tanker spill.
The fishing industry in the Gulf represents $1.5 billion/year and tourism $800 million, while the development of Old Harry site on the Quebec side of the border would only generate about $300 million
Included in the “package” of Coulliard’s gung-ho development of the fossil fuel sectors are favourable views on pipelines running through Quebec to ship tar sands oil for export as well as meet Quebec “needs”. Such is the case with respect to the TransCanada Energy East pipeline to bring Alberta bitumen to the Cacouna port, in the eastern section of the St-Lawrence River.
In this region, any spill would be devastating to both the fragile beluga population and a dozen important natural marine habitat zones. A spill during the winter would be especially destructive, since there aren’t any adequate means to clean up bitumen in the presence of ice. It would also be devastating to the tourism industry, with $80 million in annual revenues.
Under the Couillard government – not all that different than the position of BC’s Christy Clark government on pipelines – Quebec would take all the risks as a transportation region for the sake of something in the order of 200 jobs. The main beneficiaries would be the exporters of the bitumen to foreign markets via tankers from Cacouna, carrying 80,000 to 200,000 tons of bitumen.
Despite Quebec’s surplus electricity capacity, for which hydro power represent 94% of the supply, the new Quebec government favours building more dams – much like the BC Liberal government’s private “run-of-river” policy.
Carried over from the preceding PQ government without any changes proposed by the Liberals, on Hydro Quebec’s, site one finds a glowing synopsis from Hydro-Québec on the 1550 MW Rivière Romaine projects. The web site informs us that, in the name of sustainable development and clean energy supplies for future generations, the 3 new power stations make sense. No mention is made of Québec’s electricity surplus or that the Romaine is one of Québec’s last “damable” wild rivers.
Not content with having targeted all of Quebec’s great rivers with high hydro power potential, the new Couillard government has also announced approvals for small hydro facilities on rivers with modest hydro potential.
In this regard, this article – “10 Things You Should Know About Dams” – offers a global portrait on dams to the effect they are are far less environmentally friendly than their proponents care to admit.
Plan nord, Version 2.0
The Couillard government picks up where Jean Charest left off, with an enhanced version of the former Liberal premier’s Plan nord. What Couillard has not factored into his economic vision is the fact that natural resource prices – relative to the prices of finished products manufactured with these very resources – have been declining for the last half century.
Subsidizing cement factories, cutting electric car budget
Last but not least are the following two amazing decisions of the Couillard government.
First, there is the amazing approval under an Liberal austerity Budget 2014-15 of the Port-Daniel cement facility, in the easternmost part of Quebec – the Gaspésie area. The government allotted $450M to support the $1B project, despite the fact that existing cement factories in Quebec are operating at 60% of capacity.
Moreover, the intention is to use the petecoke residues from petroleum/tar sands bitumen refining as a fuel. Petcoke is cheaper than coal but has much higher emissions.
Second, to keep his promise to the preceding PQ government, Couillard has agreed to maintain the transport electricification initiative. However, unlike the PQ, which allocated $500M for this initiative, the Couillard government has de-funded it, with responsibility transferred to Hydro-Québec. Meanwhile, the Liberals are putting a similar amount of funding into the unnecessary and high-GHG emission Port-Daniel cement plant.
This while China’s BYD is manufacturing electric buses and cars and recently built an electric bus manufacturing plant in California. Meanwhile, two Quebec urban transit commissions – the STM serving the Montreal area and the STO serving the Gatineau area – have run pilots projects with BYD electric buses.
That said, battery manufacturing and electric motor stakeholders in Quebec all have to take a back seat to the top priority given to the mining industry under Plan nord. So does the Volvo-owned Nova Bus urban transit facility in Ste-Eustache, which is working on the development of an electric bus.
Also reflecting Couillard’s sense of priorities are the nomination of his economic Executive and Cabinet ministers, with the Minister of Finance Carlos Leitao, President of the Treasury Board, Martin Coiteux, and Jacques Daoust, Minister of l’Économie, de l’Innovation et des Exportations (Economy, Innovation and Exports). All of them have strong economic backgrounds.
By contrast, the Minister of Développement durable, de l’Environnement et de la Lutte aux changements climatiques (Sustainable Development the Environment and Climate Change), David Heurtel, has no background in environmental fields.
As for the Minister of Énergie et des Ressources naturelles (Energy and Natural Resources) Pierre Arcand, he was the Environment Minister in the previous Liberal Charest government, where he played the role of an eternal apologist for weaseling out of the responsibility for defending the environment.
It’s clear that the environment will not play a key role in Philippe Couillard’s government – despite the clear financial benefits of investing in the green economy.
Sen. John Hoeven has been unable to gather the votes for his pro-Keystone XL bill (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)
By David Espo, The Associated Press
WASHINGTON – Senate supporters of the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline conceded Thursday they lack the 60 votes necessary to pass legislation authorizing immediate construction of the project, but said they remain hopeful of prevailing.
“At this point we’re still working to get 60,” said Sen. John Hoeven. R-N.D., as he and Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., introduced a bipartisan bill to end the delays and build the proposed oil pipeline from Canada to the United States.
Landrieu, who chairs the Senate Energy Committee, faces a tough re-election challenge this fall, and has said she will use all her power to make sure the project is built.
In remarks on the Senate floor, she said supporters of the project think:
[quote]There is so much potential for Canada, the U.S. and Mexico … to become completely not only energy independent, but an energy powerhouse for the world…what signal does it send if America is not willing to do its part when it comes to production right here?[/quote]
11 democrats support bill, but still not enough
In their statement, Landrieu and Hoeven said the legislation has the support of 11 Democrats and all 45 of the Senate’s Republicans, a total of 56 of the 60 that will be needed. “A vote on the bill is expected in the coming days,” they added.
The obvious targets for additional support include six Democrats who voted in favour of a non-binding proposal 13 months ago that expressed general support for the project: Sens. Michael Bennet of Colorado, Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Chris Coons of Delaware, Tom Carper of Delaware, Tim Johnson of South Dakota and Bill Nelson of Florida.
Among the group, Casey noted he has twice before voted in favour of the project, and said it was “probably a good guess” to assume he will do so again.
Carper said he is undecided, and intends to meet with Landrieu, Hoeven and others in the coming days.
Johnson, Coons and Nelson indicated Thursday they do not support the legislation to require construction.
Senators want to know where Obama stands
In an interview, Johnson said he wants to know President Barack Obama’s position. Ian Koski, a spokesman for Coons, said the lawmaker “believes the law makes clear that it’s up to the (Obama) administration to make permitting decisions like this one,” and not up to Congress.
Nelson’s spokesman, Ryan Brown, said the Florida lawmaker favours the pipeline’s construction, but won’t vote for the legislation because it permits the oil that would flow through the project to be exported.
Bennet could not be reached for immediate comment.
The proposed pipeline would carry oil from Canada to the United States, where it eventually would reach Gulf Coast refineries. Supporters say it would create thousands of jobs and help the United States get closer to a goal of energy independence. Opponents include environmentalists who say the project wouldn’t create much permanent employment once it was finished, and say it would reinforce the nation’s use of an energy source that worsens global warming.
White House delays Keystone decision indefinitely
The legislation is the latest response in Congress to the Obama administration’s recent announcement that it was delaying a decision on the pipeline indefinitely, citing a Nebraska court case relating to the project.
The House has voted previously to approve construction of the pipeline.
The White House has not taken a formal position on the legislation, although Democratic officials in the Senate as well as Republican lawmakers say they expect Obama likely would veto it if it reaches his desk.
In a sidebar dispute, some Republicans said the vote should occur on an amendment to energy efficiency legislation that is expected to reach the Senate floor in the next few days. That would present Obama with a more complicated choice, since large numbers of lawmakers in both parties are likely to favour the broader measure.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas., said a vote on a free-standing bill that deals only with the pipeline is insufficient “because it will never see the light of day. The president’s not going to sign it.”
He said the pipeline’s fate is in the hands of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., “and how serious he and our Democratic friends are about this issue.
Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Alan Fram contributed to this report.
Namgis First Nation-grown closed-containment salmon ready for market (Photo: Kuterra.com)
Part 2 of DC Reid’s appeal to Canadian Senator and Olympic hero Nancy Greene Raine, who recently came out in support of a massive increase to open net pen salmon farms on BC’s coast. Read part 1 here.
While Nancy Greene Raine has taken a stance to push in-ocean fish farms, there is a lot of science that she likely does not know. And I doubt she realizes she is taking a stand against wild BC salmon. The bullets from my earlier article are discussed further here, with links for readers to go and read the documents and come to their own conclusions.
Alternate solutions are real and available
Inside Kuterra plant (Kuterra.com)
Just yesterday, the Namgis First Nation announced it has just changed the entire game for fish farming in BC and around the world. What terrific timing – just as DFO was throwing open our pristine ocean for in-ocean fish farms and their huge environmental damage, land-based Atlantics are now on stream and selling for a premium as an environmentally safe product.
Our aboriginal friends are standing up for wild salmon and our environment. This is one fish farm system that I, Nancy Greene Raine and the citizens of BC can support. Well done Chief Bill Cranmer and the Namgis First Nation, Port McNeill, BC.
Cohen Commission highlighted DFO’s conflict of interest
It would be good for Raine and the other senators to get a more balanced look at the issues than what DFO and fish farms present. Nancy, please look at these issues more closely, and then stand on the side of wild BC salmon.
DFO is conflicted in supporting the industry over wild salmon. In his $26 million Judicial Inquiry, Justice Bruce Cohen told them in bold face recommendation 3 of his 1200 page report, Vol 3, Chapter 2 page 12, that DFO had to be stripped of supporting farmed fish and get on with the priority of protecting wild Pacific salmon:
[quote]The Government of Canada should remove from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans’ mandate the promotion of salmon farming as an industry and farmed salmon as a product.[/quote]
This is clear and unequivocal. Nancy Greene Raine and the other senators on the fish committee need to read what Cohen said. His 75 recommendations are in Volume 3, Chapters 2 and 3.
Governments, scientists and testing are in conflict
Staff and resources circulate from the companies to governments and monitoring systems deal with farms as clients rather than being adversarial like police. Fish farms fund lots of research, conflicting scientists. And Cohen evidence showed clearly that fish farms, governments, both provincial and federal, and scientists are in conflict of interest with one another.
For example, Clare Blackman worked for the provincial body that chose fish farm sites, and now works for Marine Harvest. Cohen evidence shows the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) does not want to find ISA and other diseases in farmed salmon. Their Moncton lab was shown not able to find ISA.
Fish farms aren’t about jobs and revenue
The Fish farm industry is fond of stating that it provides $800 million in revenue and 6,000 jobs in BC. This is not true. The only real report, from Stats BC – which ironically has DFO’s name on it though DFO does not say so – shows categorically that fish farms result in few jobs and very low revenue. The report says all BC aquaculture results in a measly $61.9 Million in BC GDP.
This compared with the other parts of the fishing sectors – sport, commercial, processing – contribute 600% more at $605.5 Million, a full 90% of the contribution to GDP.
When you consider that the commercial sector has dropped 1,400 jobs since fish farms set up shop, and wild salmon are down 50%, this strongly suggests that fish farms don’t result in increased employment at all. Wild salmon disappear and fish farms jobs replace those lost in other sectors.
Let me add that the real number of actual jobs in fish farms is far below the econometric analysis, with its multipliers, suggests. I was astonished to sleuth out there are only 795 actual jobs in BC fish farming. That’s all – nowhere near 6,000 – in fact there are only 13.35% of what they claim.
Almost double the employment has been lost from the commercial sector alone. This results in fewer processing jobs, and impacts sport jobs and revenues, too. Let’s assume a marginal 10%: this means 840 jobs from sport’s 8,400 multiplier jobs and 240 from processing’s 2,400, since 50% of the wild salmon died in the presence of fish farms.
And, once fish farms set up lighting and feed machines, employment drops, and herring and wild salmon have been lured into the nets at night, some eaten, and some in the presence of disease and the ever-present lice. These are the public’s fish, and they are the ones we care about. Lights out.
Fish farms a net job loser
The Stats BC report says all of aquaculture (including shellfish and other fin fish) provides only 1,700 jobs. Add the loss in the other sectors together, 840 + 240 + 1,400, and the total realistic loss is 2,480 jobs in the rest of the fishing sector. This strongly suggests that fish farm replace jobs they eliminate rather than adding anything to the province’s job numbers. And do remember this is not the actual number of jobs in fish farming – only 795, less than half. We would have more than 300% more jobs in the other parts of the fishing sector if fish farms were eliminated and DFO took substantial action on the Wild Salmon Policy as Cohen told them to.
Fish farms are not about jobs and revenue. They are a boom bust industry. Most importantly, it is the workers who suffer the job losses – the very people Raine seeks to employ. 13,000 to 26,000 workers lost their jobs in Chile circa 2008 from its ISA outbreak (63 workers were killed working at fish farms, too). And what do you do with a quarter billion dead fish? Here in BC, Marine Harvest let staff go just before Christmas a couple of years ago. The problem? A disease called Kudoa, which turns farmed salmon flesh to mush. Marine Harvest lost $12 million last year to Kudoa – in fact, BC has way more of this parasite than Norway.
Farms want expansion without using the space they already have
Fish farms want to expand by 19,140 metric tonnes (mt) right now but they don’t use what they already have, putting out a max of 83,000, even though they have 280,000 mt authorized. They have never used their current capacity, so why do they want more? This does not make sense, unless these will be sold off as quota on a spot market, as they are in Norway at 10 million crowns, or it improves share prices, sometime in the future.
The people of BC do not support selling off of free quota for big bucks. We want wild salmon. In Chile, it has been noted that fish farms want more sites because they need to move from diseased areas that they create.
On-land fish farms offer solution
A Kuterra employee shows off one of its land-raised fish (Kuterra.com)
The big fish farm companies say land-based closed-containment can’t be done because of the high cost of land, electricity, etc. This is not true – they just want to continue using the ocean as a free, open sewer. On-land recirculating systems use one tenth of the electricity by using a heat pump. They use less land because fish tanks can be stacked one on top of the other. And the fish are protected from all ocean diseases and their own diseases are isolated from other fish, a huge improvement.
With tank covers, the sewage methane can be collected, used to make electricity or heat, and the excess put back into the grid to make money. Water temperature can be set to maximum growth, unlike the ocean that varies all over the place, hardly ideal. Same with optimal photo-period. The sewage can grow hydroponic vegetables for cash. Or be composted and sold for cash.
Recirculating the water saves up to 98% of it. Putting in a current makes the fish line up and thus more fish can be put in the tank, making even more money. In fact, I have a list of 66 different on-land systems comprising more than 8,100 on-land fish farms around the world.
In-ocean fish farms are old-tech dinosaurs compared with on-land systems. See my list. The last major conference on closed containment was held in Shepherdstown, Virginia, in September, 2013. Tides Canada has the more than 50 presentations here. Even Norway, where the BC industry is from, is doing closed-containment studies, for Pete’s sake.
Fish farms dump sewage costs on public, environment
And the senators want to triple the size of the industry? Nobody wants to pay for the current sewage dumped into our ocean, let alone triple the tripled cost of fish farm sewage. I have looked at sewage treatment in North America and Europe, and it’s clear that no one wants to pay a bean for anyone else’s sewage. Why would we pay for fish?
Fish farms produce more sewage than the entire human populations of many countries, Scotland and Norway included. It’s pretty even in BC, too.
Fish farms kill seals, sea lions and other animals
My estimate for sea lions killed by the fish farm industry is 11,469 up to 2011 – at least the ones they count. Greene may not know that many of these sentient creatures drown and realize they are drowning when they are caught in the nets. The rest are humanely dispatched with a bullet through the head – if you think that’s humane.
I keep asking for the autopsy of that whale found dead in a fish farm net last year on Vancouver Island, but DFO keeps telling me it isn’t available. Hmm.
And in Skuna Bay, where Norwegian giant Grieg tries on the “we are sustainable, organic” spin, 65 sea lions were killed and they got a fine for so doing of $100,000. So a sea lion is worth $1,538 to DFO and fish farms. Many would say that should have been the day all fish farms came out of the water. And, get this, they don’t count otters, seagulls, eagles and so on. Watch this seagull die in a fish farm net.
DFO’s own report shows that harbour seals are basically extirpated where there are fish farms. As seals don’t migrate more than 10 km, when the kill stats go down, it means local extinction, not ‘nuisance’ seals moving on and fish farms not killing as many – you cannot kill what you have already killed.
The DFO report said the figures I used are conservative and that killing seals, sea lions, and other pinnipeds must stop. But the killing goes on, in BC and all over the world – Marine Harvest operates in 22 countries. And fish farms want to expand in the ocean in BC?
Fish farm diseases
There are several dozen fungal, microbial and viral diseases. Because the fish are packed together, which stresses them, cortisone is released, which is an immune system depressant. They then pick up any old infection and among the million fish, it gets reproduced so many times that it changes to a virulent strain and the fish die. Then taxpayers pay for them – $5.56 million for dead diseased fish in BC last year – $50 million across Canada, last year. Government paid $135 million of our tax money on the east coast since 1990. We don’t want to pay.
But we do care about wild fish. Here is an example: Dr. Kristi Miller, on the Cohen record, showed that 25% of farmed chinook in Clayoquot Sound had both HSMI and ISA (both are Norwegian diseases that should not be in the North Pacific – DFO let them in on eggs). That is roughly 125,000 per farm. There are 22 farms in Clayoquot Sound, and it is a UN biosphere reserve.
How many wild fish are there? DFO’s number is a pitiful 501 chinook in six streams in 2012 and the Kennedy Lake sockeye run was wiped out in the early nineties and has not come back. Little wonder why. Same outcome for those Owikeno sockeye in Rivers Inlet, where the first two ISA positives for wild sockeye fry came from.
In Chile, ISA resulted in Cermaq reportedly losing $323 million, while Marine Harvest lost 1.4 billion Euros. A quarter of a billion dead salmon. ISA is only one disease. There is also IHN IPN, kudoa, SLV PRV, HSMI. The list goes on.
Cohen on fish diseases
When the two Routledge Owikeno sockeye fry came back with a weak positive, and inconclusive from the Gagnon lab in Moncton; with a positive, with more work needed from Dr. Are Nylund in Norway; and, a positive on the same fry From Dr. Fred Kibenge in PEI, DFO and the CFIA were rocked.
Then, thankfully, someone leaked a DFO report – the Kibenge report – showing ISA in BC waters. DFO saddled Cohen with 500,000 documents but missed its own report on the worst fish farm disease – they considered all results for ISA were false positives – but should have sent the document to Cohen anyway. They did not.
DFO’s scientist Kristi Miller and her viral signature work, showed that ISA was in Fraser sockeye back to 1988 – and recently, some sockeye components died up to 90% on the spawning beds from PRV. Cohen reopened the already closed Commission, strictly on fish farm disease issues, and then out spilled all the evidence on fish farm diseases, particularly, ISA and HSMI, (soon followed by PRV) and then IHN in Clayoquot Sound last year, for which we the taxpayer paid multinational billion dollar corporations $5.56 million for their diseased fish.
Incidentally, Minister Ashfield, changed the Gagnon finding to negative – perhaps on the semantic issue of having a virus does not mean having a disease. In other words he mis-spoke, saying something he knew not to be true. He should have reported his own lab’s words, and DFO ignores, in public, the Miller evidence and the two world class labs of Nylund and Kibenge, finding the same thing.
BC is no place for fish farms
Here is the point: the North Pacific is the worst place in the world to have fish farms. That is because there are 10 species of wild salmonids from California, up through BC, Alaska and all the way down the west north Pacific shore to Korea, perhaps a billion fish. Fish farms should not have been let in the water here as now all those wild fish could be lost. More fish farms means Greene’s support could help result in the biggest manmade fish disaster in history.
In Chile, they use antibiotics by the tonne, literally. During the climax of the ISA crisis in 2007, the industry used 385.6 metric tonnes of antibiotics. In 2010 that fell to 143; and in 2012 it climbed again to 337.9.
To put such use in perspective, that is: 743,380 pounds of antibiotics. Disease follows fish farms. ISA has pretty much been constant in Norway since the industry fish changed a freshwater ISA virus to a virulent saltwater form in the 1980s. If you read global fish farm news, you find that Chile is on the edge of another ISA disaster which they don’t report on much – remember those strict laws, well, they tend not to mention those in the same breath as the reports of ISA come in – but the antibiotic use is the evidence of tonnes of disease.
Global public opposition
There comes a point everywhere in the world when the people realize fish farms kill wild fish, trash the ocean and the people want them out of the water. This has happened in BC, NS, NB, Scotland, Ireland, Norway itself, the Faroe Islands and will, shortly, in the USA, in Maine. In Denmark they have already moved 50% of fish farms onto land. I just received a request for my research from a newspaper in Tasmania, Australia.
We need – and our wild BC salmon and all the species that depend on them – need us to get fish farms out of the water. If they want to set up shop on land and control their problems, that’s fine; if they want to go home that would be better. The Norwegian coast, is like BC, with long fjords, and the genetic damage has ruined the wild Atlantic salmon in rivers. The sewage is so bad it is more than all the people in Norway. Just as it is in Scotland and pretty much in BC.
In fact, the public being against fish farms has become a global movement with citizens reaching out to find each other around the world and become better informed. This is how I found out that in Atlantic Canada taxpayers paid $135 Million to fish farms for their dead diseased fish – including BC, the past year’s payment was over $50 million. No one wants to pay a dime of our tax money on fish farms that kill their fish with disease caused by too high density. They need to be on land. And the bigger the farms, the bigger the problem,
In the first week in April, 2014 Marine Harvest in Norway announced that it was forgoing putting in smolts because it feared a full $4 billion loss with all the fish dying from sea lice. This article was pulled from the internet in less than a week (I know because I query other people who follow global fish farm news and they confirmed this); then CEO Aarskog announced that sea lice were the biggest problem in Norway, and for anybody with a solution to get in touch with him asap. This is right now in 2014, the CEO of Marine Harvest, the same Marine Harvest that operates in BC in 2014, right now.
In Norway, sea lice are resistant to lice chemicals and it lobbied the EU to accept an endosulfan limit in fish that is one hundred times higher than before. And the PCB, dioxin, and PCB-like cancer causing chemicals, level is also a factor of ten above all other meat type products in Europe. See the graph – it is not pretty.
Back in Canada, in Nova Scotia, Cooke Aquaculture was caught using the illegal lice chemical, cypermethrin, for two years. When the news hit – facing a $33 million fine and up to 99 years in jail – Cooke said it wanted to study the case evidence, and within a few months of silence, the NS government gave Cooke $25 million for aid.
After receiving the $25 million, Cooke ultimately paid a $500,000 fine from Kelly Cove farms for using illegal chemicals for two years. This kind of behavior, and money from government, is all too common in fish farming in Canada. Read on.
Cermaq sees big losses in Chile
But first, in Chile, Cermaq lost 15% of its Atlantic salmon crop to lice in 2012-13. And Chile is openly acknowledged as the dirtiest fish farm country in the world – increasingly moving south to operate largely within the pristine Patagonia UN biospheres. In main production areas to the north, the limiting factors are: disease, lice and fish farm pollution. When production hits 650,000 mt, no more fish can be grown because ‘nature’ kills them all.
At its peak level of 650,000 mt that means they lose more than the entire harvest, and largest output ever recorded in BC, to lice. That is how bad sea lice problems are. But the people of BC don’t really care about fish farm fish deaths – we care about wild salmonids, and there are 10 species that can be killed by lice – and other non-salmonids like herring.
Chemical restriction gutted for BC farms
So what is happening in BC? Here, DFO has announced that it will drop from the already environmentally gutted Fisheries Act, S 36 – for releasing deleterious substances into water – to give the fish farms the right to try any chemical they want.
The annual Norwegian cost to treat sea lice is $170 million and world wide over $300 million. Cypermethrin kills lobsters – and that was how it was determined that Cooke had been illegally using it in its Kelly Cove farms – as well as other crustaceans, for example, crab and shrimp. Krill, shrimp-like crustaceans, are the step above plankton in the wild salmon food chain in BC. We don’t want them killed.
Do note that the article shows that cypermethrin causes gene mutation, organ abnormalities and cancers in mammals. The chemical is suspected to be carcinogenic in humans.
The strictest laws in the world?
You will find that governments and fish farms around the world repeatedly use the phrase: ‘fish farms operate under the strictest (or among the strictest) environmental laws in the world’ in the country in question, (when anyone complains about their environmental damage). The claim is not true because, in the past year, fish farms have said this in Chile, Scotland, Norway and Canada. As the laws are different in each country, the claim cannot be true.
And, of course, Chile is acknowledged as the dirtiest fish farm country in the world, euphemistically referred to as having ‘sanitary problems’. Not to mention that it may have laws, but that is a different thing from enforcing the laws. For example, read fish farm news in Chile and you will find, that though its chemical use is high, Chile does not report most cases of ISA.
In Canada, the claim is even more untrue because the laws don’t apply all the way across the country. There are different jurisdictions operative on the west coast and on the east coast, both federal and provincial.
Furthermore, in Canada, the claim is more untrue because the Fisheries Act and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act were both gutted a year ago in a federal omnibus bill (an egregious occurrence in itself). But it is even worse than this.
Minister Shea and the DFO ADMs state in the senate video noted in this article, that S 36 of the Fisheries Act, already gutted a year ago, will be further gutted so that fish farms will be able to use whatever deleterious substances they want – say, SLICE, cypermethrin, endosulfan, hydrogen peroxide – on lice and for other reasons.
Norway want laws to ‘deal with Aboriginals in Canada’
And there has been a call for an Aquaculture Act, presumably to eliminate the provincial laws, further weaken laws against the use of chemicals and permit fish farms to use the ocean as a free open sewer, as they do now around the world. Here’s another Canadian nuance: from time to time you will see the Norwegian CEOs saying in the press that there need to be rules to deal with aboriginals in Canada, meaning they don’t want to have to deal with each individual First Nation. They want them rounded up, I suppose.
Industry wants laws gutted even further
There is another issue: as soon as fish farms claim the laws are the strictest in the world, they then use that as an excuse to argue that the laws are too strict and to keep jobs and revenue in the country in a competitive world, the laws need to be relaxed. Or they will move on, which they do anyway because fish farms are a boom and bust industry. Marine Harvest operates in 22 countries, and disease takes one third to one half of all aquaculture animals, as noted above in the Kibenge presentation.
And as I have said, the enforcement staff in BC are swamped with duties and few in number. I may see one every five years or so in the field. And, of course, laying off scientists means that other duties with respect to fish farms also do not get done.
Advice for Senator Greene Raine
I suggest that someone who knows Nancy Greene Raine sit her down and tell her that it is wrong to stand against wild BC salmon. And her name is going to be badly tarnished by associating herself with fish farms.She should be on the side of these up to 90% of sockeye dying from PRV on some Fraser tributary spawning beds, too diseased to spawn. Ask DFO to stand by wild BC salmon, and eliminate fish farms from our pristine waters. They sure don’t stand by wild BC salmon right now in 2014.
As BC’s First Nations are showing with their on-land, closed-containment operation, there is a better way.
We want fish farms out of our pristine ocean and put on land, or they can go back to Norway. More than 100,000 British Columbians have signed a petition urging Premier Clark to refuse any expansion leases in BC.
I doubt Nancy Greene Raine knew this and probably needs time to gather independent information and think things over. As it is, she is out of step with the entire province. And I doubt she has considered how soiled her name will become if she gets on the fish farm side of this issue rather than standing with wild BC salmon.
Fish farms tied to wild salmon die-off
There are only 50% of wild salmon left in BC since fish farms set up shop here. Does she want to be the name associated with the loss of wild salmon? I wouldn’t think so. This is the science.
In all fairness, I think she, and the other senators on the committee are just innocents and believe what DFO and fish farms tell them about jobs and revenue, rather than looking at the science themselves. See Gail Shea talk to the senators, Feb 25, 2014.
Jobs over science, environment
In the senate video, the three DFO ADMs make the case that the only thing that stands in the way of expanding the fish farm industry, is that the regulations on sea lice drugs need to be rationalized. And the Senators agree there should be nothing in the way of new jobs and revenue.
It also came clear that Swerdfager/Beven/Gillis have little knowledge of BC salmon. They suggest salmon are milling about in the ocean in any old place and when it comes to spawning time, they go to any old river. Only someone in Ottawa could be so out of touch – too bad it is DFO. And they ignore the many problems with fish farms.
Thriving salmon run doesn’t pass by fish farms
For the record, salmon have set out-travel routes, grid like precision in the open ocean where they feed and set return-routes, and they not only come back to the same river, but spawn within 100 yards of where they hatched. And so on with succeeding generations.
That is why, for instance, that the Harrison component of the 100 subcomponent Fraser sockeye run is coming back in record numbers. Historically they returned at about 38,000, but now are nearing 400,000. This is because, unlike other Fraser sub-components, they migrate out to sea through Juan de Fuca Strait where there are no fish farms, rather than Johnstone where there are. They don’t get killed by fish farm diseases, or lice and ocean survival has been good.
I took the bait too…until I read the science
Now, back to Swerdfager et al. They suggest the only wrinkle is that lice chemical thing, and the senators agreed – it’s about jobs after all. But the ADMs didn’t let on that the Harper Government has already gutted the Fisheries Act and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act and let go 200 scientists, many in BC. And they didn’t say what a huge problem that sea lice really are. The most recent example of many is Norway where lice are so resistant to pesticides, SLICE etc., that chemical use has gone up 80-fold in a decade. That’s how bad lice can be.
To be fair to Nancy Greene, in the beginning, I thought saving wild salmon in the ocean and feeding a hungry world sounded good, too. But then I started finding holes in the arguments. Instead of saving wild salmon, the science shows that fish farms kill them. And fish farm salmon will never feed a hungry world. That is because they cost too much, and can only be sold to first world consumers. In fact, in Chile, the industry destroyed the small fish in the ocean such as anchovies and jack mackerel, to feed their fish.
Farmed salmon gobble up other fish species
The anchovy should have been the protein for the poor mouths of the world, say Chileans, but they were fed to fish farm fish. Today, fish farms say they are moving on to ‘improve’ their feed, but do not acknowledge their role as important contributors to the massive declines – in other words they have no choice but to move on from fish-based feed. Today, boats are scouring the Antarctica, and down the food chain to catch krill for fish feed, if you can believe it. And off Chile the Asian fish farms are still scooping up what wild fish remain and taking them to Asian fish farms, largely prawns – the only industry dirtier than Chile’s fish farms. Read global news on www.thefishsite.com, for a while.
A deceptive industry
I am a citizen of BC and make no money out of this, but I became aghast at the deceptiveness and intransigence of fish farms around the world. I realized how bad fish farm companies were when I read an article on how they neutralized an article by Albany, New York, scientists – Hites et al, in Science, January 9, 2004 – on the cancer causing chemicals in farmed salmon – PCBs, dioxins, POPs and so on.
The article reads like a Hollywood movie, and it came clear to me that every claim fish farms make has to be ground proofed. Read this Spinwatch article. It leaves you feeling you would not have believed corporate citizens could sink so low. See if they don’t remind you of tobacco CEOs.
Farmed salmon and chemicals
And just so that you know, the Hites group has gone on to publish many more articles on chemicals in farmed salmon in the decade since. It’s become world news. In fact, the biggest story out of Norway, where the BC industry is from, in the past year, is doctors and scientists repeatedly warning Norwegians not to eat farmed salmon, particularly women, pregnant women, and children, because of the chemicals in the fish. For a collection of these articles, see here. Cancer causing PCBs, for example, take more than 50 years to be washed from the body.
So farmed fish is full of many kinds of chemicals, the cancer causing ones from feed, then SLICE, endosulfan and a host of other pesticides and antibiotics. The cancer causing chemical problem is currently causing big problems for the Scotland industry – they tried to maintain the fiction they were sustainable and organic. If they said it long enough perhaps people would believe it.
Closed-containment is the answer
The solution to this and most other problems is and has always been taking the farms out of the water and growing the fish on land in closed containers, like the Namgis project on Vancouver Island. I don’t think Raine has much acquaintance with the real problems, so here is a list I will send to her. You might want to contact her too: nancy.raine@sen.parl.gc.ca.
DFO is conflicted with fish farms.
The Cohen Commission told the Harper government to remove the conflict and make DFO get on with saving wild salmon.
Fish farms are not about jobs and revenue. They are a net negative to the economy.
Fish feed has cancer causing, and other chemicals in it.
Diseases kill one third to one half of all aquaculture products around the globe.
Wild salmon decline more than 50% where fish farms are introduced around the world.
Fish farms already have triple the capacity than what they use in BC. They do not need expansions.
On land fish farms solve virtually all problems of in-ocean open-net fish farms.
Fish farm sewage costs are astronomical and no one wants to pay for them.
Fish farms kill seals, sea lions and other animals around the globe.
Cohen Commission reconvened over fish farm diseases, when ISA was demonstrated in wild salmon.
Aquatic animal disease is part and parcel of aquaculture.
Scientists and doctors tell Norwegians not to eat farmed salmon because of the chemicals in them.
Public opposition to in-ocean fish farms is growing around the world.
Sea lice chemical use grows dramatically.
Governments and fish farms like to claim they operate under the strictest laws in the world, which is not true, and then fish farms push for weakening the laws.
Tune in for my next article that discusses these negative impacts of fish farms.
The PQ’s Pauline Marois and Pierre Karl Péladeau (Photo: Graham Hughes/CP)
It is not unusual to hear and read about Québécois saying they don’t like any of the four options offered in this election. What is often referred to as mudslinging/insults – between Philippe Couillard of the Liberals (PLQ); Pauline Marois of the Parti Québécois (PQ); and François Legault of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) – has become the main focus on this election campaign. To her credit, Françoise David of Québec Solidaire (QS) has managed to stay away from the mud.
[quote]Sadly, in this election, there isn’t any party proposing a road map for a prosperous, inclusive and green Quebec.[/quote]
What happened to the issues people care about?
Two leaders’ debates failed to rise above the mudslinging and the all-important issue of health was treated as an organizational or structural challenge.
Worse, the environment is one of the forgotten issues for the 3 main parties.
Only 4% of Québécois consider the Charter of secular values a priority issue, but the Charter has been and continues to be central to the campaign of the PQ, and by ricochet, for the other parties as well.
In the midst of all this, Philippe Couillard is trying to distract attention from the PLQ’s record of corruption and their weak platform by saying that Pauline Marois, if elected, plans on holding a referendum – which two thirds of Québécois don’t want – during her next mandate. Pauline Marois’s reply is that there will be no referendum until such time as the Québécois are ready, thus providing herself with very elastic time lines.
Sadly, in this election, there isn’t any party proposing a road map for a prosperous, inclusive and green Quebec. Many Québecois, federalists and independentistes alike – and myself included – feel like orphans in this campaign. In effect, a recent poll gave low marks on “integrity” to all four leaders.
Environment takes back seat to resource economy
For his part, Philippe Couillard’s vision for the economy is a re-run of an old Jean Charest movie to the effect that Quebec will generate much of its new wealth from the mining and export of raw natural resources from northern Quebec – the old economy tunnel vision.
The environment doesn’t even rank as an important election issue for Couillard.
Indeed, Couillard omitted the environment from the moment he submitted his vision as a candidate for the leadership of the Liberals. For the 2014 election campaign, continuing along the same lines, other than rhetorical messages that resource development practices would respect the environment, the environment gets little to no attention from Couillard – not all that different from Stephen Harper in this regard.
In replaying Jean Charest’s “Plan nord” to pour government money into infrastructure for developing northern resources, Philippe Couillard has simply added a few bells and whistles for a “new and improved” plan.
For its part, the PQ is equally focussed on a resource economy – the economy of the past – and has its own version of a nebulous Plan nord which it pairs with lottery-like, high-risk government investments in shares of shale oil activities for Anticosti Island in the Gulf of the St-Laurent (St-Lawrence River).
The reality is that the UN Conference on Trade and Development has indicated that resource economies are formulae for trade deficits because the price of raw resource exports relative to high-tech manufactured goods has been falling for more than a century.
I am not sure what planet Couillard and Marois live on, but they seem to have not noticed that China, the EU, and even the US, are well-engaged in the emerging global green economy. In effect, the green sectors are now among the highest job creation sectors of our times. There are currently 3.5M jobs in the EU green sectors, 1.2M jobs in EU renewables and the German green sectors employ more people than the German auto sector.
To be fair, however, Marois, while favouring investing government money in shale oil exploration on Anticosti Island, also claims to be interested in promoting a green economy. Against the backdrop of Quebec’s emerging electric vehicle industrial base – which includes manufacturers and developers of batteries; electric motor wheels; urban and intercity electric buses; and charging stations – the PQ platform proposes $517M over 4 years for the electrification of transport. But in the final analysis, this is a small sum of money that won’t go very far in supporting the electric vehicle sector in Quebec when spread out for charging stations, vehicle rebates, subway and commuter extensions, leaving little for supporting innovation and the development of a local industry.
In any case, it’s hard to say where all the money for Marois’ many electoral promises will come from because Quebec is broke – the cupboard is bare.
Pierre Karl Péladeau and the Charter of Secular Values
Not to be outdone by the Liberal nonsense, the PQ, to make itself attractive to nationalist right wing voters, has offered us its anti-Muslim secular Charter; its draconian greed representative, Pierre Karl Péladeau; and, the icing on the cake, its hysterical, anti-anglo, paranoiac outburst on the invasion by Ontario anglos of Montreal voters’ lists (where there are 2 English, as well as two French, universities).
If one believes the PQ, a miniscule percentage of anglos and non-Christians wearing religious symbols are to blame for Québec’s incapacity to realize its “noble” identity.
The Charter’s purpose is supposedly to promote the equality of the sexes and the neutrality of state by eliminating the wearing of religious symbols by public sector employees – because these symbols are associated with the inferiorization of women and the undermining of government neutrality. Trouble is that the equality of the sexes exists in places like BC and California and the neutrality of their respective state institutions is not undermined by having a female doctor with a headscarf treat a patient.
The Charter is, in effect, political theatre for the purposes of cultivating a sense of fear, while exploiting ignorance of the other/unknown, in the regions of Quebec which have little to no multicultural presence.
On March 31st, in a seemingly desperate attempt to head off criticism regarding years of judicial battles that would follow the adoption of the Charter, Pauline Marois spoke of using the “notwithstanding clause” to permit exemptions from the Quebec and federal charters of rights and freedoms. In reality, in the event of the adoption of the Charter as proposed by the PQ, one should still expect legal battles that go on for years, plus generalized civil disobedience in the greater Montreal area – which represents half of the population of Quebec.
Does Marois plan on building lots of prisons for this battle?
CAQ and QS: The other parties
The CAQ is a Quebec version of the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC), with its plan to reduce the size of government and offer a $1000 reduction in personal taxes. This CAQ/CPC formula would not only result in a deterioration of government services, it would also lead to greater deficits and consequently further justification for cuts – a vicious circle.
Meanwhile, the QS is focussed on the re-distribution of the wealth and a green Quebec but doesn’t seem to have any interest in, or knowledge about, creating wealth and developing a green economy. QS doesn’t even appear to be aware of the relationship between the green economy and job creation.
Also, as amazing as it may seem, QS is so disconnected that it is unaware that a green economy is as diversified as a resource-based economy and includes nearly every economic sector. Consequently, when the QS says it will finance going green by redistributing the wealth to invest in public transportation for all parts of Quebec, it reflects how naive or inept is the QS.
By way of magic, the QS’ fluffy platform for a green and equitable Quebec suggests these goals require an independent Quebec. With only 9-10% of the vote in Quebec, it may be argued that the QS stands a better chance of realizing its re-distribution of wealth and green objectives by joining with progressives from the rest of Canada.
Moreover, addressing the green economy challenges is like addressing the challenges of poverty and as such does not lend itself to the short wish list of QS generalities. Rather, a holistic approach is required so that a wide range of measures can converge in a synergistic manner to produce transformative change. A combination of fiscal and legislative initiatives, policies, programs and projects, incentives/disincentives and other related measures are essential for a successful migration to a green economy.
Four bad choices
In the final analysis, for progressives with their feet on the ground, all four parties are unattractive.
As for which party is more corrupt or deficient in integrity – the PLQ or PQ – under the circumstances, it doesn’t really matter. Unless, of course, one feels the choice boils down to a corrupt federalist party versus a corrupt “independantiste” party.
Accordingly, whatever the results on April 7th, a word of caution about the pundits’ explanations of the results: don’t buy any of it. Too many will not have voted for something they want.
While Tom Mulcair has made some hints about the creation of a provincial NDP party in Quebec,for those wanting an option offering a path to a prosperous, inclusive and green economy, there isn’t anything available for April 7, 2014.
Alex (right) and father (left) riding dirt bikes. (Photo: Matt Sutton’s Facebook)
by Matt Sutton
In November, 2013, I drove to Lacombe, Alberta, to visit my Dad and his family, accompanied by my best friend Alex – a chemical engineer technologist at Imperial Oil, responsible for conducting research on how to clean up tailing ponds.
My Dad has worked in Alberta’s oil and gas industry for twenty-two years.
Both Alex and myself have been shaped by this multi-billion dollar industry, Alex working in it and me having grown up in a household financially supported by it.
This reality was reflected in our trip to Lacombe.
[quote]I was aware of northern Alberta and Fort McMurray before I knew what the oil and gas industry was.[/quote]
David ‘Vivuki’ is an idiot
After a day of dirt biking on my father’s acreage, we sat down for dinner and within minutes discussion about the oil sands, Neil Young and David Suzuki joined us at the table.
“David ‘Vivuki’ is an idiot,” stated the eight-year-old at the table.
“It’s Suzuki, sweetie,” corrected her Mother, “but that’s right, he’s an idiot.”
At the time it was hilarious hearing her numerous attempts at saying the name ‘Suzuki’, but as I look back now the meaning of this dinner table discussion scares me.
Growing up in an oil and gas family, I have first-hand experience of the benefits the industry offers. My Dad always had a job, and subsequently, I always had new toys and my family always had a meal for dinner.
But for me – and I suspect many like me – it has also created a lot of confusion about how we should respond to the debate over an economy that has clothed us, but is also controversial in many other ways.
Alberta’s economic promise
My Dad left his home in England at 18 and joined the British Military. He spent the following decade fixing England’s tanks internationally. Then, at some point, he met my Mom, had me and my sister, left the army and settled in Calgary, Alberta.
Being a heavy-duty mechanic, he began work with a drilling company and moved up the ladder of the oil and gas industry. Today, he is a maintenance manager for a coil tubing company which conducts drilling internationally.
As a kid, I didn’t understand the ins and outs of what my Dad did, nor did I really care – similar to the way his fiancé’s eight-year-old daughter doesn’t understand who David Suzuki is – she only understands what she hears.
I knew my Dad worked on drilling rigs up north and that meant he was gone all the time. I remember him being in a place described to me as ‘up north’, or sometimes it was ‘Fort Mac’.
I was aware of northern Alberta and Fort McMurray before I knew what the oil and gas industry was.
Trading family time for toys
But my Dad missed a lot – hockey games, skateboard contests, birthdays and school concerts – and the reasoning for it was always, “Your Dad has to work.”
A oil sands operation in Fort McMurray, Alberta (Photo: Chris Krüg)
Looking back now, I still wish he could have been there, but without that work I never could have played hockey, I never would have had skateboards and I would not have gotten Gameboys, CD players, or new skates for my birthday.
Now that I am older and attempting to find my place in the world, having become more aware of the public debate surrounding the oil and gas industry, I face a great deal of confusion.
On one side, I am being shown the horrific damage to the environment caused by these companies taking oil from the ground, the ecosystems they have destroyed and the way they are jeopardizing the future of our planet.
On the other side, I see an industry responsible for my Dad always having work and for my life’s privileges.
Does opposing the oil and gas industry’s actions make me ungrateful?
Does agreeing with the oil and gas industry’s actions make me ignorant?
I am constantly unsure. In Alberta, it feels like I’m not supposed to question what’s going on. I’m supposed to be appreciative of the ways it makes my life and my cities economy better.
Same old corporate oil answers
At some points, I have asked my Dad questions about the oil sands, what he thinks and what it all means to him, but it always seems to be the same corporate oil answers:
[quote]We need oil, there’s not much you can touch in a day that doesn’t come from oil.
How come there’s a big fuss about Alberta but nobody cares about drilling in Saudi Arabia? Is it different because it’s not in Canada?
Yeah there’s pollution but nowhere near as much as they’re emitting in China.[/quote]
These are just some of the answers I’ve received from my Dad in the past, and although these things are true and I appreciate the conversations we have, they do not provide answers. They are all responses that simply divert my attention away from the topic I originally brought up.
Matt Sutton (Photo: Jon Peters)
Most of the time I feel like I will never find truth. Most who provide an argument on the situation seem to be making money off of it one way or another, and that makes it difficult to discover the truth.
Both sides overreaching
Every time I look into the left side of the conversation I find the same frustrations as I have on the right. Everything seems blown out of proportion with both perspectives.
For example, Neil Young’s private jet and tour buses are enormous consumers of the same fuel his lyrics stand against. I don’t blame him though – if I had the money I’d probably have a private jet too, and I’m not saying that I think the message of his songs are wrong. My problem is I don’t know how I’m supposed to believe his conviction when his actions do not align with his words.
The same kind of things can be said about David Suzuki, another spokesman against the oil sands. Suzuki writes frequently against the oil sands, describing them as ‘scary’ and relating the suits behind the oil companies to the mythical ‘bogeyman’ his children used to ask him about. Suzuki then says, “or maybe there’s something more frightening to consider. Perhaps the bogeyman is us – the public that places short-term economic value of the tar sands above the priceless value of our environment and our earth.”
To be honest, I don’t very much appreciate Mr. Suzuki saying that I, or any other hard working citizen is any kind of bogeyman who values money over the environment. Especially when money is not something he has to worry about.
If being frustrated because another millionaire is making me feel bad for appreciating the money generated from the oil sands wasn’t enough, I found it even harder to listen to David Suzuki’s arguments after hearing the accusations that he made up some information in an opinion piece saying cyclones were an environmental threat to the great barrier reef. When asked about this claim, Suzuki’s response was “that one, I have to admit, was suggested to me by an Australian and it may be true that it might be a mistake, I don’t know.” Is it just me, or does saying that an idea was suggested to him by an Australian make it any less frightening that he wrote it in his article without double checking first?
The trial of David Suzuki (Photo: The Royal Ontario Museum)
If David Suzuki had such an easy time putting false information into an article about climate change in Australia, how do I know he’s not doing the same thing here? This is why I have a hard time believing either side of the oil sands argument.
It is examples such as these that frustrate me about the environmental side of the argument. They take things out of context or exaggerate them beyond reason to belittle the oil industry, the same way that the oil industry will downplay issues to make them seem better in the public eye. It is equally frustrating on both sides and makes me feel like neither are being honest.
That said, it is not just the battle between the oil and gas industry and environmentalists that exists this way – nearly every conversation has two different parts from each side that aren’t necessarily honest, and that’s why I got into journalism in the first place, to discover the truth.
I believe the truth is balanced somewhere between the environmentalists comparing the oil sands to Hiroshima and the oil companies calling their reclaimed lands ‘lush’.
My job now, and everybody’s job for that matter, is to listen. Listen to everything said and try understand that although those comments may be exaggerated and both sides may be wrong sometimes, if everybody listens to each other then there is hope for a truth. A truth that I will be willing to accept from both sides.
It is important now more than ever to pay attention to what is going on and listen to everything being said about the oil sands regardless of what you believe and regardless of which side the information is coming from because neither side holds the full truth.
It is going to take a lot of time, patience and cooperation but I do believe the truth is out there to be found.
Matt Sutton is studying journalism at Mount Royal University in Calgary, AB.
Justin Trudeau addresses a progressive think tank in Washington, DC (photo: Chip Somodevllla/Getty)
Justin Trudeau wants to project a young, fresh face, representing all the good things that Canadians want – a man who would do politics differently. But the gap between reality and fairytale is extraordinary.
If one looks at what he has said to date, one finds a man with tired old ideas; a limited understanding of, and sensitivity for, many major issues; and a puppet serving Bay Street, Big Oil and other powerful interests. The same powerful interests served by the Harper administration.
A middle class fairy tale
Most telling is Trudeau’s supposed concern for the middle class. Though 80% of Canadians have seen their revenues decline or stagnate over the last 3 decades – income inequalities are at an all time extreme – Trudeau, like Stephen Harper, has concluded that low corporate taxes are the way to go for maintaining what they perceive to be a prosperous and rich Canada.
But Trudeau goes one step further to the right than Harper. He has repeatedly expressed the view that now is not the time to lower the corporate tax rate, implying that, at a later time, a lower corporate tax rate could be an option.
To put all this in context, the lowering of corporate tax began with the Liberals and was accelerated by the Conservatives. The result is that: 1) At 15%, Canada has the lowest corporate tax rate in the G8; and 2) approximately $575B lies dormant in corporate liquidity.
Together, these factors imply that having the lowest corporate tax offers very few competitive advantages and that a better distribution of the wealth could be achieved with higher corporate taxes and fewer fiscal escape clauses/deductions. The additional accrued revenues could be invested in economic development and regional diversification; youth employment; health; innovation for the jobs of tomorrow; public transportation and other urban infrastructure; day care – to name just a few examples.
In his own clumsy fashion, Trudeau has confirmed Kevin Page’s analysis in that he recognizes that the Liberal Party of Canada’s (LPC’s) own Harper-like policies on wealth distribution would produce Harper-like results. To be more specific, to prepare Canadians for such an eventuality, or the “necessity” of this Bay Street accommodation, Trudeau has indicated that the post election LPC budget could very well be an austerity budget.
In other words, there is a disconnect between Trudeau’s supposed concern about the middle class and reality. In the absence of any serious attempt at redistribution of the wealth – something in which Trudeau appears not to believe in – he can only offer a middle class fairy tale. This is a backdrop for many Trudeau’s positions on other issues.
No wonder Justin has described income splitting as “a decent idea”, even though 85% of Canadians would receive no benefit, while the majority of the top 1% of income earners would get $6500 and up. So much for his preoccupation with the middle class.
Appeasing Big Oil, denying science
Turning to the environment, once again Trudeau has much more in common with Harper than most think, particularly when it comes to the denial of scientific evidence. It’s high time to debunk the myths about Trudeau’s “concerns” in this domain.
Trudeau’s position on Keystone XL is case in point. According to Justin, the opposition to Keystone XL to transport tar sands bitumen to the US Golf coast is not based on scientific evidence. Yet life-cycle emissions related to tar sands – from the extraction stage to the refining and production of major quantities of the by-product pet coke for use as a cheap, dirty fuel; and to the final consumption as fuels – place tar sands-derived substances in the range of 20% to 25% more emissions than those associated with conventional petroleum.
As if this extreme denial is not enough to put Trudeau in the same Big Oil camp as Harper, Trudeau has also complimented Premier Redford for promoting Keystone XL with references to Canada’s good environmental record! Trudeau has been critical of Harper for not doing the same – despite Harper’s disastrous environmental legacy.
This is absolutely astounding! After Harper’s dismantling of environmental protection legislation, weakening of the environmental impact analysis process, muzzling scientists, decimation of Canada’s environmental research capabilities especially as it relates to the impacts of climate change and the monitoring of Canada’s emissions, pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol, and much much more, Trudeau, like Harper, perceives the environment as a PR challenge rather than a Mother Earth/humanity state of health challenge.
But the denial doesn’t stop there. Trudeau bases part of his support for Keystone XL, as is the case with Stephen Harper, on the recent US Dept of State report which suggests that the environmental impacts pertaining to the approval of Keystone XL will be minimal.
Never mind that this report was written by authors close to the petroleum industry who concluded that if the US cannot import unrefined tar sands derivatives, the US would get it’s petroleum from elsewhere.
Never mind that a rejection of Keystone XL would be a US and global game-changer, sending a clear signal to the globe that the US is serious about reducing its dependency on fossil fuels and will be looking to clean tech to address tomorrow’s energy needs.
Indeed, under these circumstances, it should come as no surprise that Trudeau did not distant himself from Jean Chrétien’s January 2014 remarks to the effect that it makes no sense to restrict tar sands development because we are going to need petroleum for a long time to come.
Falling behind Europe on emissions reduction, green economy
And the denial goes a notch higher when it comes to Trudeau’s views on national solutions to address climate change. In keeping with the Liberals’ conciliatory legacy with Big Oil, this time, in reference to cap and trade, he claims that this environmental concept doesn’t have scientific merit. (Cap and trade is a model which penalizes companies that exceed their emissions limits and rewards companies that reduce emissions below their targets by being able to sell their credits to firms in the proceeding category.)
Never mind that Europe has had an Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) since 2005 and that the ETS has proven to be a potent compliment to other environmental policies. The results are such that at least 25 EU nations have been identified as likely to meet or beat the EU target 20% reduction of emissions by 2020, relative to 1990 levels.
Never mind that Germany has exceeded it’s Kyoto Protocol goal of a 21% reduction in emissions by 2012 with an achievement of a 25% reduction, all while having one the world’s strongest economies and a clean tech sector that has become bigger than the German auto sector.
Never mind that China has become the world’s largest investor in clean tech – with $67.7B and $61.3B invested in renewables in 2012 and 2013, respectively – and is now planning to introduce the first of seven pilot cap and trade schemes in Shenzhen.
As a former Government of Canada employee who worked in the field of sustainable development, it comes as no surprise that Trudeau’s “thinking” on Big Oil is both conciliatory and wishy-washy. Emissions spiked up during the previous Liberal reign – as has been the case with the Conservatives at the helm.
The Liberals’ oil-friendly legacy
This LPC legacy was so because of, among other things: 1) the absence of effective legislative and fiscal measures; 2) the party’s continuation of generous subsidies for the fossil fuel sectors; and 3) a fossil fuel-friendly mindset as reflected in the Stéphane Dion proposal, prior to the Liberals’ defeat, to invest billions of government funds in the fossil fuel industry to help that “impoverished” sector reduce its emissions.
It is becoming increasingly evident that Trudeau is vague as to his environmental plans because of his alignment with Big Oil, a longstanding Liberal tradition.
Poor judgement, top-down leadership and Harper similarities
Further on the denial of science, but in a different context, is the matter of the unusually long time – over a year – that it is taking for Health Canada to approve for use in Canada the drug Mifepristone (a.k.a. RU-486), the abortion drug. This, despite the fact that the drug has been in use around the world since 1988, when it was first approved in France.
Given the views on abortion of the minister in question, Rona Ambrose, the delays are suspect. But all Justin Trudeau could say on the exceptional delays is that he is not a medical expert. Imagine the implications of him being in power with his weak judgement, when this is combined with his not wanting to upset Big Pharma and right wing groups.
Equally telling on Trudeau’s poor judgement and flippancy, was his “performance” on the Radio-Canada TV show Tout-le-monde-en-parle, on Feb 23, 2014. The Ukrainian Ambassador to Canada, Vadym Prystaiko, quite aptly called for Trudeau to apologize for his “joke” on the show to the effect that Vladimir Putin would not be in a good mood to discuss the Ukrainian turn of events because of the defeat of the Russian men’s hockey team in Sochi. As the Ambassador said, 82 deaths in the clashes between security forces and the demonstrators is no laughing matter.
Trudeau’s lightweight Senate proposal
As for the Senate, I have saved this for near the end because I think we should go beyond the scandals of the moment, to the stuff that has implications for all Canadians. Let’s get real. The case has yet to be made as to why a different Senate, made up of unelected officials and appointed by another group of unelected officials, would improve Canadian democracy. More important, with Senate retirements not mandatory until age 75, it means it would take at least two decades before this so-called different Senate would take shape.
Add to the Trudeau Senate cocktail the way in which he went about springing the news on “Independent” former Liberal Senators. Here one discovers Harper-style, top-down leadership, with no consultations outside a small inner circle. Due to the absence of internal consultation, Trudeau not only surprised Liberal Senators, but his entire caucus! Or is this another case of poor and gratuitous judgement?
Justin opposes divisive politics – except when it suits him
While Justin Trudeau presents himself as a uniter, not a divider like Harper and Quebec Premier Pauline Marois, delegates at the Feb 2014 national convention in Montreal expressed the view that a Marois majority would help the party gain votes in BC and Ontario. In other words, the LPC hopes for a PQ majority in order to falsely represent the LPC in English Canada as the saviour of national unity. This is wedge politics that places party interests above national interests in order to target specific regional voters. This is the kind of traditional LPC trick that turns off Québécois.
No wonder only 10% of the LPC delegates at their convention in Montreal, Quebec were from Quebec.
During the orange wave in Quebec, the NDP gains were in part the result of former Bloc voters shifting over to the federalist NDP. This is the way to unite Canadians, by presenting a progressive alternative for all parts of Canada – with the same themes/messages in every region of the country.
Trudeau and Harper: Other similarities
Finally, there are a host of other matters where we find Trudeau and Harper very much on the same page – such as Trudeau’s views that: 1) the sale of Nexen would pave the way for free trade with China and a more prosperous middle class; 2) health is primarily a management issue, rather than a financial challenge; and 3) guns are an integral part of Canadian culture.
Summing up the LPC policy positions to-date, it is clear is that Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau are on the same Bay Street/Wall Street, Big Oil team.
Why would we expect anything different from Justin in 2015?
