Prior to any discussion of this specific project described as the “West Coast Oil Pipeline” As a former practising lawyer and as a Member of Parliament who respects the process of statutory interpretation, I wish to put on record the following.

It is important to note that this is the first use of the Building Canada Act (formerly known as C-5) to be used to designate a project of national interest.

Therefore, it is precedent setting.

The process by which the Privy Council reaches its decision should create a predictable pathway for future projects, and decision makers.

So far, I submit, this government is not off to a good start.

The project description in the notice on the Canada Gazette is factually incorrect. More on that error below.

Ideally, the decision-makers should have clear direction from the law creating the process. Unfortunately, that is difficult as former Bill C-5 only provides the illusion of guidance.

First to the definitions.

The definition of “national interest project” is tautological:

‘national interest project means a project named in Schedule 1.”

The excerpts below make it clear that while the word “criteria” is used, the term is not used in a usual sense to guide a decision. Criteria are provided following the decision. While the word “factors” is used, with the listing of areas of critical public concern, as in the use of the word “criteria,” there are no required elements of a proposal to be satisfied. The “factors” are only suggestions and not requirements. Had they been requirements, the legislation at section 6, would have used the word “shall” and not “may.”

National interest
4.1 (1) The Governor in Council may, by order, for the purposes of section 5, define national interest.

Criteria
(2) In order to promote transparency and predictability, an order made under subsection (1) must set out specific criteria that must be met by the proponent of a project in order for the project to be found to be in the national interest.

Report
(3) If an order is not made within 15 days after the day on which this Act comes into force, the Minister must, within five sitting days of the end of that period, cause to be tabled in each House of Parliament a report that sets out the reasons for the delay and the expected timeline for the making of the order.

Power of Governor in Council
5 (1) If the Governor in Council is of the opinion that a project is in the national interest, the Governor in Council may, on the recommendation of the Minister, by order, amend Schedule 1 to add the name of the project and a detailed description of it, including the location where it is to be carried out.

Factors
(6) In deciding whether to make an order under subsection (1) or (4) in respect of a project, the Governor in Council may consider any factor that the Governor in Council considers relevant, including the extent to which the project can
(a) strengthen Canada’s autonomy, resilience and security;
(b) provide economic or other benefits to Canada;
(c) have a high likelihood of successful execution;
(d) advance the interests of Indigenous peoples; and
(e) contribute to clean growth and to meeting Canada’s objectives with respect to climate change.

These flaws, consisting of a complete lack of guidance to Privy Council, leave the Cabinet with unrestricted political discretion in deciding what is in the “national interest.” The process by which this legislation was rushed through parliament has resulted in a dramatic diminution in the role of Parliament- the Legislative branch of government and a massive increase in the power of the Executive branch – the Prime Minister’s Office and Cabinet. Due to a programming motion brought forward by the governing party and supported by the Official Opposition, Bill C-5 went from Second Reading through committee, clause by clause, Report Stage and Third Reading between Monday June 16, 2025 to Friday June 20, 2025. Senate did as instructed and the bill had Royal Assent without proper study.

This decision will be the first under the Building Canada Act. As such, it would be wise for the Privy Council to establish by precedent what the Cabinet will require of all future projects to be considered in the “national interest.”

The Green Party strongly urges that any project must be supported by an independent assessment of the economic viability of the project. A cost-benefit analysis must be transparent and verified by a third party, such as the Parliamentary Budget Office demonstrating that it is a project that will finish on time and in the black.

Such an analysis is consistent with what we demand of regulations. The Treasury Board’s Policy on Cost-Benefit Analysis, effective September 1, 2018, says:

“Canada’s regulatory policy, set out in the Cabinet Directive on Regulation (the directive), requires departments to analyze the costs and benefits of proposed federal regulations. This Policy on Cost-Benefit Analysis (the policy) outlines mandatory requirements for departments when undertaking such analysis as part of a Regulatory Impact Analysis.

This policy is supported by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat’s (TBS’s) Cost-Benefit Analysis Guide, which provides detailed guidance on how to analyze the costs and benefits of proposed regulations.

This sets out a template the Privy Council should adopt as a mandatory pre-condition to any project being listed on Schedule 1 as in the “national interest.”

Especially, as in this case, where public funds are underwriting the project, taxpayers need to know if the project is good value for money. Previous history with political decisions to spend tens of billions on a pipeline without such analysis should serve as a cautionary tale for decision-makers now. The TransMountain pipeline, built by the Crown corporation created for this purpose spend over $34 billion in public funds. While it is reported the TMX “makes money” it has not yet transferred funds to the government sufficient to pay the annual interest costs on the debt on the $34 billion spent in its construction.

Similarly, the public was told the TMX pipeline would diversity our fossil fuel energy exports. However, the Spring Economic Statement in 2026 confirmed that 90% of Canada’s fossil fuel exports still go to the United States. Most of the tankers loaded with diluted bitumen head south to the USA, not East to Asia.

Prior to deciding a second pipeline to British Columbia is in the “national interest” there must be a transparent cost-benefit analysis that examines the market for unprocessed bitumen in other markets.

As Peter Nicholson (a former Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy in the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada and currently serves as Chair of the Board of the Canadian Climate Institute) wrote recently https://sagecanada.substack.com/p/a-pipeline-isnt-a-field-of-dreams “If you build it..” it is not at all clear that there will be sufficient production of bitumen from Alberta to keep the proposed pipeline at 100% capacity.

“The central question is not whether Canada would like another west coast pipeline. It’s whether the oil industry itself sees a commercial opportunity large enough to justify building, and filling, one. A pipeline is not a “Field of Dreams”: it cannot be built simply on the hope that production will eventually materialize. Before committing tens of billions of dollars, investors need confidence that sufficient oil will be available over several decades to generate an adequate return. If there is no convincing answer to that question, the pipeline should not be built.” Peter Nicholson.

Most promotion of the pipeline is predicated on the false claim that Alberta’s production of bitumen has been hampered by federal regulations of various types. This is not the case. In fact, Alberta’s bitumen production is at an all time high.

The volatility of oil prices due to war and other Geo-political stresses must also be assessed. Bitumen is an inherently expensive form of fossil fuel to produce, while also of inherently low value. It remains a solid that must undergo an expensive upgrading process to become synthetic crude. It is only synthetic crude and not bitumen that can be refined. When world oil prices drop below $80/barrel, it is a losing proposition to mine bitumen.

So too should the impact of alternatives for the Canadian economy be assessed. Primary should be consideration of economic impacts for Canada in upgrading and refining raw bitumen in Canada for use in Canada, enhancing self-sufficiency and jobs within Canada. Failure to consider such domestic production alternatives is astonishing given the down-side economic risks, and prior to consideration of other negative impacts.

2. Error in Project Description in Canada Gazette

The failure to accurately describe the project is deeply concerning, with both market, economic and non-economic impacts in any analysis.

The “West Coast Oil Pipeline” was posted in the Canada Gazette. https://gazette.gc.ca/rp-pr/p1/2026/2026-08-01/html/sup1-eng.html

I have bolded the factual error in the Canada Gazette.

The Canada Gazette published a notice on August 1, 2026, to consider listing the West Coast Oil Pipeline Project as a national interest project under the Building Canada Act (details via the Major Projects Office).

Project Overview

• Route: Runs approximately 1,250 km from Bruderheim, Alberta, to a deepwater marine loading facility near Delta, British Columbia.

• Capacity: Transports up to one million barrels of crude oil per day.

• Cost: Estimated between $35.2 billion and $43.7 billion.

• Leadership: Advanced via a partnership involving Trans Mountain Corporation, the Alberta Petroleum Marketing Commission, and Pembina Pipeline

The Project Description from the Government of Alberta makes it clear the product to be shipped is diluted bitumen. The market analysis for the product being shipped is very different for crude oil than for dilbit (diluted bitumen). Crude oil has a much larger range of options to reach refineries that can process crude. Diluted bitumen is far less attractive to industry destinations. Dilbit is essentially a solid at its terminus. The Diluent, used only to allow a solid to be shipped by pipe, is removed after shipment. The solid bitumen must be upgraded to synthetic crude in order to be refined. The Koch brothers in the United States built up refining capacity to handle Venezuelan heavy oil, with processes that also work for oil sands bitumen. Canada used to have 40 refineries. We now have 17. Few of them can upgrade bitumen. So any market review of the viability of the proposed project must consider which refineries are capable of upgrading bitumen. Approximately one third to one half of the bitumen Canada is currently shipping to China is used to pave roads.

In addition to market considerations, shipping dilbit instead of crude oil has significant impacts in the event of a spill. Oil spill response technologies have been designed to manage spills of conventional crude, no technology exists to eliminate the devastating impacts of an oil spill, but conventional crude is more likely to be contained in floating oil booms. Dilbit on the other hand behaves quite differently. The first spill of dilbit that identified this difference was the 2010 freshwater spill in the Kalamazoo River. Enbridge made numerous errors in response to the break in its pipe, all documented by the US National Transportation Safety Board. The dilbit separated. The heavier bitumen sank to the river floor while the “diluent” volatilized into the atmosphere, making people in adjacent neighbourhoods unwell.

https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/Pages/DCA10MP007.aspx

In 2016 the Royal Society of Canada literature review found that there was insufficient science that dilbit can be cleaned up. DFO studies have found it will separate in a spill in the marine environment, with the bitumen forming oil balls that sink. Natural Resources Canada relied on tests in freshwater vats to which salt was added, the same approach used by Kinder Morgan in its Gainford Alberta “study” that ran for 10 days only. DFO used its real-life facilities in Dartmouth that replicate the ocean environment, using actual sea water. Luck has been with us thus far and no spill of dilbit has occurred on Canada’s coasts. Most experts agree that it is only a matter of time before a dilbit spill occurs. It is not clear that we have adequate technology to deal with such a spill. The likelihood is that the bitumen will sink to the ocean floor while the diluent volatilizes and makes people sick, including increasing their lifetime cancer risk.

3. Impact of the new pipeline routing

The new proposed pipeline route, although advertised as though it “twins” the existing route actually vastly increases the risk to BC wild salmon by running the pipeline along the Fraser River to reach the new (and disastrous) proposed Roberts Bank terminal.

3a: The original Roberts Bank 2 project and threats to Species at Risk

While the promotional materials from the federal government emphasize that there have been many studies on the Roberts Bank expansion, they fail to mention that the studies were for a container port expansion, not for a pipeline terminus and oil tanker port.

Nevertheless, the environmental review of the earlier proposal for the Roberts Bank expansion made it clear it would cause permanent environmental damage threatening numerous species.

In March 2020, the Canadian Impact Assessment Agency concluded that the Terminal 2 expansion project will:

• Cause detrimental impacts on threatened Chinook salmon populations from the Fraser River that feed endangered Southern Resident killer whales.

• Destroy the legally-protected Critical Habitat of Southern Resident killer whales by increasing underwater noise and disturbance, thus reducing the whale’s ability to find and capture their Chinook salmon prey.

The Panel also concluded that these impacts could not be mitigated, offset, or compensated for by the measures proposed by VFPA. Offsetting describes the act of restoring or creating habitat elsewhere to make up for lost habitat as a result of a project.

Of particular concern is the threat to the global population of the Western Sandpiper. The Impact assessment panel acknowledged this threat but lacked sufficient science to make specific findings.

This article in The Narwhal is essential reading for decision-makers prior to fast-tracking a bulldozer over the survival of a species.

“Tiny birds, and their tiny superfood, could decline due to ‘irreversible’ effects of Vancouver port expansion

The Roberts Bank Terminal 2 expansion at Canada’s busiest cargo port could be fast-tracked by the federal government. It’s a major stop for 3.5 million western sandpipers to eat and recharge while travelling the entire Pacific”

By Steph Kwetásel’wet Wood

Photography by Isabelle Groc

Nov. 3, 2025(Updated May 15, 2026

“Microscopic organisms make up the food — called biofilm — which supports the round, fluffy western sandpiper. Biofilm provides the little shorebird fuel as it makes an epic journey between Peru and Alaska. Thousands of western sandpipers fly in artistic murmurations and gently poke their pointy beaks into the mud, scooping up biofilm with hairy tongues. Biofilm is part of the foundation of the food chain that also supports crabs and fish, bears and whales.”…

“Bob Elner, scientist emeritus with Environment and Climate Change Canada and adjunct professor at Simon Fraser University, said evidence suggests this unique richness is due to the spring influx of fresh water from the Fraser River into the salt water, which causes a “shock” in the tiny diatoms, causing them to be highly active and pulse out rich omega-3 fatty acids and other nutrients.

Elner said Roberts Bank “is the largest old unaltered, intertidal estuary” in the province; equivalent banks have been impacted by development. He closely studies western sandpipers, but said they aren’t the only creatures that may decline as a result of changing the biofilm.

“Really, it’s much bigger than that, because those same fatty acids [in the biofilm] are responsible for the eulachan fishery, salmon fisheries and it goes up to orcas and marine mammals. It’s really that transfer of fat — these fatty acids — through the system,” …

“The risk this will occur is very, very high, and the outcome is very predictable — species-wide impact, but also impacts at the fisheries level.”

Shorebirds are one of the “fastest declining groups” of birds in the world, he added. “Much of it, in my professional opinion, is tied to the removal of these sources of active biofilm.”…

“I believe in science,” he added. “The science has been ignored.”

https://thenarwhal.ca/roberts-bank-terminal-western-sandpiper/

Back in April 2023, when the permits were granted. I pointed out that the so-called “binding conditions” would not protect the multiple species at risk.

The excerpt below is from Hansard on June 13, 2023:

“Mr. Speaker, I am rising tonight in Adjournment Proceedings, at a later time than usual, with it being just about one o’clock in the morning, to follow up on a question I asked in question period on April 27. Just before Earth Day, the Government of Canada approved a massive nature-destroying project, a controversial one that has been fought by British Columbians since 2013 when it was first put forward. It is called the Roberts Bank terminal expansion.

I asked the hon. Minister of Transport how it could be justified, with the opposition and the clarity the environmental impact assessment, itself, found, and it is very rare to get such strong language from an environmental assessment review, that there would be significant and irreversible adverse effects that threaten the survival of a number of species. Still, as the Minister of Transport explained, the project was approved because it had 370 binding conditions, and somehow this devastating project was going to be magically purified through those conditions.

I also included in my question my favourite of the conditions, number 14.7.1, which requires that they paint the cranes to be used at this massive port expansion in a colour that is compatible with the surrounding landscapes. The minister responded that there were other conditions as well. I have gone through all those conditions, and there is no doubt that this project threatens the survival of numerous endangered species. The Fraser River estuary is rich in biodiversity, and the environmental assessment points to numerous endangered species with 102 species at risk.

… It is a $3.5-billion project, and it is going to add $3 billion in added GDP, so what are a few species when we really come down to it? This is an absolute violation of everything the government says it stands for.

The Minister of Transport, … said, “the economy and the environment go hand in hand.” No, the economy goes to the bank. The species at risk go to their graves. This will cause species at risk to go extinct.

Besides the very endangered southern resident killer whales, besides the endangered salmon and so many species, I want to mention one in particular because it is so clear that it cannot be moved somewhere else. One of the conditions says that the people are going to find places in mud flats to create more food for this particular species, the western sandpiper. It has a very interesting, almost hairy tongue that manages to get into something called “biofilm” and gets all its nutrients from that. Over 3.5 million western sandpipers, which makes it look like it could not be endangered, but that is the whole global population, stop at some point every single year on Roberts Bank. The biofilm is specific to that area. People cannot move it around. Experts say they cannot move this bird around, so “endangered” mean nothing to the government when its eyes are flashing with dollar signs.” ….

{and this from the former Parliamentary Secretary, Irek Kusmierczyk ‘s response:

“The conditions include protections for marine mammals, including for Southern Resident killer whales. The Vancouver Fraser Port Authority will be required to ensure that the project does not increase underwater vessel noise in the Salish Sea, an important part of minimizing disruptions to the whales…

“These conditions rely on the existing and planned work by the Government of Canada, including all the protection measures in place to reduce the impact of marine traffic on the southern resident killer whales. The announcement in budget 2023 of $152 million to protect endangered whales shows our commitment to doing this important work.

The other conditions imposed on the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority include more than 100 measures to protect the local fauna, as well as develop and implement an adaptive management approach to prevent any adverse impacts on migratory birds. They also set out the requirement to use emissions free handling equipment and to provide enough provisions to the ships when they are docked at the terminal.”

In closing I raised two other points, now forgotten – opposition from the trade unions and the existence of an alternative:

“ The International Longshore and Warehouse Union says that this approval of Roberts Bank threatens jobs because the way the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority wants to operate it is automated. The union thinks it is going to wipe out jobs.

By the way, let us look at the other alternatives. There was another proposal from Global Container Terminals for half as much footprint and less environmental damage. It was not great, but they decided to go with the Roberts Bank, the biggest and most damaging project.” https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/house/sitting-212/hansard

3b: The revamped Roberts Bank 2 project as terminus of new dilbit pipeline

It needs to be asked if the expansion and repurposing of the Roberts Bank expansion, now to include a terminus for a new dilbit pipeline and deep-water port for oil tankers for shipping this hazardous product are bound by the previous conditions. Certainly, the new oil terminus on Roberts Bank will increase shipping and noise and further erode critical habitat for SRKW.

As other briefs have mentioned, notably from the US communities of Washington State on the San Juan islands, this whole area is in a highly active seismic zone. In the case of a large earthquake, this area will experience a rapid disappearance, in a process known as “liquefaction.” The impacts on the adjacent communities and ecosystems are wholly different with the repurposing of a container terminal on Roberts Bank to an oil tanker port and dilbit shipping area.

None of this seems to be considered important, or even moderately interesting, to our new government.

The implicit assumption appears to be that the Roberts Bank project has had sufficient consultation with Indigenous Nations and rights holders and adequate environmental review and study. The ongoing court case from the Lummi Nation of Washington State is being ignored, as is the opposition of Chief Harley Chappell and the Semiahmoo First Nation near Surrey BC.

The reality that this project is substantially different from that first proposed – just as the difference between “crude” and “Dilbit” appear to have escaped the notice of this build fast government. Facts matter. Details matter. Think first, plan well, and then build. This government has ignored facts and science to race to completion for a project without an economic case.

4. Indigenous opposition is strong to dredging Burrard Inlet, to expanding Roberts Bank and to new pipelines

On August 9th, 2026 the Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UNCIC) sent an open letter to the federal and Alberta governments:

Wildfires and Floods are Devastating Communities; Canada and Alberta Must Stop Expanding the Fossil Fuel Industry and Respect First Nations Rights https://www.ubcic.bc.ca/ol_wildfires_floods_idwip2026

On August 13, Athabasca Chipewyan Chief Allan Adam supported the UBCIC: “If the B.C. chiefs say no, I respect what the B.C. chiefs want. ”

5. Climate impacts

If this project is fast-tracked, who can ever believe this prime minister on any issue ever again?

This excerpt is from Hansard, Question Period on October 17. 2025. It was a solemn pledge just hours before the House of Commons voted on the November 4, 2025 federal budget.

Right Hon. Mark Carney (Prime Minister, Lib.):

“I can confirm to this House that we will respect our Paris commitments for climate change, and we are determined to achieve them.

I can confirm with this House that consistent with our Kunming-Montreal commitments, the nature strategy will be released in the coming weeks.”

Since that statement, climate commitments have been broken. Where the budget pledged no Investment Tax credits for enhanced oil recovery, that specific pledge was violated ten days later in the October 27 MOU with Alberta. The government’s climate credentials, never strong, lie in tatters.

The entangled projects of expanding Roberts Bank, dredging Burrard Inlet and building a new pipeline ensure we violate commitments to nature and endangered species as well as to climate.

The government’s own internal process, working with scientists within Environment Canada and Climate Change and academics from across Canada has issued a peer-reviewed, authoritative update. It was released in early September 2026. The review is chilling in confirming the degree to which our economy, communities and ecosystems are at risk. The report makes it clear that dangerous levels of additional warming with attendant negative and dangerous changes for Canadians are now “locked in” by changes to the chemistry of the planetary atmosphere that are irreversible.

These impacts include more extreme drought, flooding, heat domes, wildfires and dangerous weather events of many kinds. The report, unfortunately, could give rise to complacency. If these are “locked in,” why try?

This tendency to complacency is reinforced as analysis after analysis demonstrates Canada is not on track to meet our internationally legally binding commitments under the UNFCCC Paris Agreement.

The most recent assessment from the Canadian Climate Institute finds that we will not hit our 2030 goal, even the initial one tabled with the UNFCCC by the previous administration of former prime minister Stephen Harper in May 2015.

https://climateinstitute.ca/news/canada-more-than-20-years-behind-2030-emissions-target/

According to the Canadian Press article (link below). The office of Environment Minister Julie Dabrusin said Ottawa is still committed to reaching net-zero by 2050 through “a pragmatic and durable approach.”

https://www.ctvnews.ca/climate-and-environment/article/canada-wont-even-hit-2030-emissions-target-by-2050-new-study-suggests/

This statement is typical in attempting to confuse the public with a bait and switch approach to our Paris target.

Our legally binding commitments are those tabled with the Secretariat of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. Under the terms of the Paris Agreement, these targets, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) can be changed at any time, but only to be “ratcheted up,” only to be increasingly ambitious in reducing emissions.

Our initial NDC, from May 2015 was an INDC, pre-Paris and stated as an “Intended NDC”. The Harper target was 30% below 2005 levels by 2030.

In April 2021 the former administration of Justin Trudeau increased our target to 40-45% below 2005 levels.

That remains Canada’s legally binding commitment.

Public and media confusion was created (and I believe deliberately) when the previous government introduced the Climate Accountability Act, C-12, which I opposed for this reason. It ignored our Paris target. It rejected any mention of the core Paris global goal to hold global average temperatures as far below 2 degrees C as possible and to strive to hold global average temperature increase to no more than 1.5 degrees C of warming, as compared to global average temperatures before the Industrial Revolution. Instead, C-12 introduced the target of “net zero by 2050.” This target CANNOT replace the Harper 2030 target nor the Trudeau target for 2030. It amounts to a massive retreat. It creates the false notion that getting to some far distant destination -2050 – is possible and avoids 2 degrees C of global average temperature increase, It cannot. The use of Net Zero by 2050 in the Climate Accountability Act was an act of duplicity by ECCC having confirmed in advance with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers that they would go along with the NZ by 2050 goal. Of course they did. It allows growth in emissions for decades with some fanciful notion of rapid cuts at the last minute. As was made very clear by the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, April 4, 2022, the only way to avoid exceeding 2 degrees C is for rapid cuts in global emissions, at the latest before 2025.”

Canada must do far more than is currently anticipated, starting with rejecting any new fossil fuel infrastructure- whether for fracked gas or mining bitumen.

The only fossil fuel infrastructure consistent with reaching Paris targets and building Canada’s economic sovereignty would be expanding Canada’s domestic refinery capacity, particularly to upgrade bitumen to synthetic crude for domestic refining for domestic markets.

The Green Party has advocated ceasing importing any foreign petroleum products and using only Canadian oil until our reliance on fossil fuels is completely phased out. This strategy, “Mission Possible,” was released in 2019. The current proposal is to ship out unprocessed solid bitumen to foreign, primarily US, refineries, exporting domestic jobs with the raw bitumen.

What we learn from the recent Environment Canada report is critical.

The report makes it clear that impacts on Canadian communities, nature and our economy could get very much worse based on global average temperature increase and the extent to which all nations, but particularly the big polluters, like Canada, reduce emissions and how quickly we, collectively do so. That message needs to be incorporated into this government’s thinking- and quickly.

https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/science-technology/changing-climate-report-2026/cccr-report-summary-en.html

To say the issue requires collective global effort does not absolve our leadership of the requirement to save Canadian lives and communities and other species. Canada has always “punched above our weight” to use Lloyd Axworthy’s phrase.

We are the worst performer in the G-7 on climate.

If even at this late date, we changed course- and committed to the world that we were going to cease reliance on fossil fuels, claim an Energy super-power status as a “Renewable Energy Super Power” and commit to meeting our targets, reject any new fossil fuel infrastructure and use regulations (CEPA part 4) to require facilities to slash their emissions, we could be a leader, encouraging other nations to do the same. The going off oil projects has positive implications for our foreign policy. Shut down all Russian oil. End the dependency on fossil fuels globally that drives war and geopolitical uncertainty. IT aids our efforts to modernize our economy through an east- west north-south electricity gird of 100% renewable energy. This will require a restructuring of our current electricity generating and distributing system. This is the ultimate challenge in reducing interprovincial trade barriers. Only through a tough and frank conversation, transparent so all Canadians can identify the challenges in moving to much cheaper electricity – everywhere can we make it to anything close to our Paris goals.

Our children’s lives and our grandchildren’s future security depend on our actions in the next few years. So, it must be worth it to take the challenge seriously.

On June 17, 2019, the House of Commons voted that we are in a climate emergency.

Building a new pipeline will only confirm that we are a Parliament of liars.

The post Response to Canada Gazette post of August 1, 2026 to recommend the West Coast Oil Pipeline as a project of national interest appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands)
2021-06-04 11:03 [p.7966]

Madam Speaker, I rise this morning on a very sombre occasion. It is June 4, the first anniversary of the killing of a beautiful young mother and member of the community of the Nuu-chah-nulth. Chantel Moore was killed a year ago today. As I speak here, the hon. member for Fredericton is with Chantel Moore’s mother at a memorial service in Fredericton.

It has been a year since Chantel Moore was killed. We know the name of her killer. He is a member of the Edmundston, New Brunswick police force. He killed her on the threshold of her home. She was shot five times. This was in the course of a wellness check.

I am wearing yellow. It was Chantel Moore’s favourite colour. Her mother would like us to wear yellow for all of the indigenous people who have been shot, killed and injured by police forces across Canada.

Since Chantel’s killing, two more members of the same indigenous nation have been shot by the RCMP. This must stop. Let us fight for Chantel Moore, her memory and the truth.

The post Elizabeth May’s statement one year after the killing of Chantel Moore appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Speaker: Ms. May
Time: 15/04/2021 18:17:52
Context: Questions and Comments

Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP): Madam Speaker, this may be my only opportunity to speak to the legislation before us.

I am deeply troubled by the fact that this government, which professes the high purposes of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples appears in practice to decide that free, prior and informed consent means to continue to coerce first nations until they give consent to a decision that has already been made. I refer to the Trans Mountain pipeline as an example, which the Government of Canada bought without conferring with first nations, as we should have done. It continues, as elected members of council of the first nation in my territory, which I am honoured to represent, the territory of the WSANEC Nation, have told me that the TMX, now a Crown corporation, comes to them offering money to try to get them to stop objecting. That is not free or prior consent, and yet that is what is being practised right now—

Arif Virani (Parkdale—High Park)
2021-04-15 18:19 [p.5712]

Madam Speaker, this is an important issue. It is an issue that is obviously a dynamic one and an issue that will be considered on an ongoing basis.
However, what I was about to relate from Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond I think captures the idea in response to the member’s question. She said, as counsel for the AFN, that “The idea that free, prior and informed consent is some kind of a veto is simply not supported, and that is not how it’s operationalized.” That is an important point to register.

With respect to the timing of the negotiations and the timing of the outreach to first nations communities, be they elected leaders, hereditary chiefs or other individuals, that is a very valid point that the member is raising, and something that we will continue to work on as a government and as all parliamentarians to ensure that this consultation is sought at the earliest possible opportunity.

The post Government claims to support free, prior and informed consent, but bought TMX without it appeared first on Elizabeth May.

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Tomorrow is both Commonwealth Day and International Women’s Day – as well as the birthday of two dear friends – so a shout out to Amelia Clarke in Waterloo and my dear adopted mom Dorothy Cutting on Salt Spring Island!

International Women’s Day changed my life.  Forty-one years ago, March 8, 1980, my best friend, Liz Archibald Calder (now of White Rock, but then in Whycocomagh) convinced me we could do an amazing thing – and actually drive all the way into Sydney, Cape Breton to go to the pub for a big feminist party.   That’s a four-hour round trip and I did not routinely, or ever actually, visit pubs or, on reflection, do anything fun.   I had just run for parliament, starting the “small party” that was to become the Green Party.  I had spent the last five years of my life fighting the pulp mill and its plans to spray our forests with toxic insecticides. The pub! In Sydney! This was an amazing idea.

The headliner of the night was Rita MacNeil. In those days, Rita was not THE Rita MacNeil. She was a politically radical singer with a small fan base of radical feminists- all the way to Toronto where people loved her.  It would be a number of years before she became the more grandmotherly CBC Christmas special version of herself.  That night she was barefoot on stage and belting out, “Tell it like it is, Sisters.”

At some point in the festivities, a slightly inebriated woman lawyer introduced herself saying she had heard me debating the pulp company executives in the media. “You know, you should really be a lawyer- go to law school.”  And I said the truth – that I had always wanted to be a lawyer, but that I didn’t even have an undergrad degree and I was pretty stuck waitressing and cooking in my parents’ restaurant.

And what she said next was what changed my life – “You don’t need an undergrad degree…at your age and with your work fighting budworm spraying, you should apply as a mature student.”

The next day I phoned Dalhousie Law School and spoke to the admissions department. I had only two weeks to pull together an application.  By September, I was sitting at a desk in a lecture hall – still waitressing and cooking in the summers. as I worked my way through law school.

I sometimes wonder what course my life would have taken if not for that International Women’s Day celebration. Not to mention that if not for the women’s movement, it is unlikely law schools would have opened the door to mature students.  It was an innovation intended to increase the number of women in a mostly male profession.

Now I am one of 100 women MPs in Parliament.  It took 100 years to reach the first hundred women MPs, with Agnes McPhail being the first in 1921. Since October 2020, we have one hundred all serving together!

Changing my celebratory tone, apologies for more bad news.  In reflecting on the last week, I am drawn back to the perennial, inescapable reality of systemic racism in Canadian law enforcement. I have been following the shocking story of the brutal treatment of a young doctoral student from Guinea, falsely arrested by the Montreal police. Thank God they didn’t kill him – but given the abuse Mamadi Fara Camera endured, they well might have done.

Closer to home, another indigenous man was killed last weekend on a “wellness check.”

The killing at the hands of Tofino RCMP happened on Meares Island in the Opitsaht community within the Nuu-chah-nulth Nation. That is the same nation devastated by the June shooting of Chantel Moore by Edmundston, N.B. police.  Chantel Moore was also killed in a “wellness” check.  The investigation into her killing by the Quebec police oversight body was given to the New Brunswick government in December. The family has been denied any details.

I have been working with Judith Sayers, president of the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council, and a group of Senators to try to open a set of committee hearings into the killing of indigenous peoples during “wellness checks.”

Paul Manly, Jenica Atwin and I are determined to get answers.   It is beyond unacceptable that more people in the Nuu-chah-nulth Nation have been killed by police than due to COVID.

Closing with some good news. (My daughter wrote me that she had found the last GSM particularly depressing – apologies to all!)

In response to my rant last week about the fake “big win” on climate, Christa Grace Warwick from Pender sent me this real “big win”: The Ktunaxa Nation and environmental groups have succeeded in a 30 year fight to stop an appalling ski resort. Instead, a new Indigenous Conserved and Protected Area (ICPA) has been established over a larger area of the Purcell Mountain range. Thanks to Environment and Climate Change Minister Jonathan Wilkinson for a $16 million boost to make this a reality!

Good news too on the Fairy Creek forest protectors and the injunction threat. The threat remains, but the judge refused to grant the loggers an injunction. Instead, she has given the protectors’ lawyers three weeks to better prepare their case.

Lastly, this citizen, volunteer effort to explain why Bill C-12 is so inadequate really cheered me.  Please watch the YouTube and help share this excellent piece of work far and wide.

Happy International Women’s Day!

And for Commonwealth Day, later today you can watch their Trees for the Wild event. (See details below).

Much love and rock on sisters!

Elizabeth

P.S.  Please sign and share this e-petition to the Parliament of Canada to support the COVID “long haulers!”

1. Recognize and label long COVID as a health syndrome;
2. Create a registry system for long COVID patients, include this data in Health Canada’s daily case count, and consider these patients “Unrecovered” or “Not Infectious”;
3. Swiftly fund robust, targeted research of COVID-19 and long COVID; and
4. Establish clinics for diagnosed long COVID patients, whether COVID-19 tested or not, to address medical, cognitive, psychological, rehabilitative and employment issues.

“Trees in the Wild” ZOOM event on the Great Bear Rainforest on Sunday, 07 March 2021 2:00 p.m. (PST)…….registration is available on EventBrite.

Tickets

Tickets for Trees In The Wild – A Conversation About The Great Bear Rainforest can be booked here.

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Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands)
2021-02-17 18:30 [p.4191]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the minister very much for his work in this area. I want to also commend him for acknowledging the extraordinary work of former member of Parliament Romeo Saganash, and all the work that was done when it was a private member’s bill.

I agree with the comment from the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre, but I have a sense, which I want to put to the hon. minister, that we will be disappointed. Article 19 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples makes it clear that before projects, administrative or legislative changes can happen that affect indigenous peoples, the state party, in this case Canada, must ensure free, prior and informed consent.

We bought the Kinder Morgan pipeline, and knew at the time we bought it that it was opposed in court by the Tsleil-Waututh, the Musqueam and the Squamish. We know that to this day it is opposed by the Tsartlip Nation. I do not know how we can go forward with the notion of free, prior and informed consent when many projects across Canada have been undertaken and, in the case of Trans Mountain, subsidized to the tune of $17 billion in public funds in direct opposition to, and in violation of, the notion of free, prior and informed consent.
I know that, as the Minister of Justice, this is not exactly his responsibility area, but how do we square that circle?

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The post Happy National Indigenous People’s Day appeared first on Elizabeth May.

FREDERICTON – At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam warned that Indigenous communities would face disproportionate risks from the virus. Limited access to health care in remote regions, substandard housing, poverty and underlying health conditions are among the issues of concern.

Green Party caucus critic for Crown-Indigenous Relations and Indigenous Services, Jenica Atwin (MP, Fredericton) notes that historic underfunding and institutional racism have left Indigenous communities particularly vulnerable to COVID-19.

“The challenges Indigenous communities are facing are complex and varied. There is no one-size-fits-all solution,” said Atwin. “What is clear is that the administration of relief programs and government aid needs to be Indigenous-informed and -led. This must include adequate and sustained funding for Friendship Centres and Native Women’s Centres as key service providers. The $15M announced by the Federal government so far is totally inadequate. And First Nations communities must be funded, informed, and empowered to protect their membership.”

The Coalition for the Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples recently stated that where Indigenous communities have required suspension of certain activities in their territories, restricting access of workers, tourists, cottagers, and others, this must be respected. However, work on projects such as Coastal GasLink (CGL), the Site C dam, LNG Canada and the Trans Mountain pipeline(TMX) continues, with employees being flown in and out, despite requests by local Indigenous communities to cease these activities. Workers, housed in close quarter on-site camps, pose a serious health risk to nearby Indigenous populations.

Lorraine Rekmans, Green Party shadow cabinet critic for Indigenous Affairs, noted the legal nature of Indigenous people’s rights in Canada: “This includes a commitment to free, prior and informed consent on any actions that impact Indigenous communities,” said Rekmans. “Canada’s priority must be to work in partnership with communities to protect Indigenous citizens from any risk, including the risk of community transmission from workers who are entering Indigenous territories.”

Green Party Interim Leader Jo-Ann Roberts added: “Not only do we need to respect the authority of Indigenous communities over their territory now, but we need to ensure that they are at the centre of decision-making and planning as Canada rebuilds, and the global economy starts rolling again in the coming weeks and months. Indigenous peoples must no longer be treated as an afterthought in Canadian decision making.”

# # #

For more information or to arrange an interview:

Rosie Emery

Press Secretary

613-562-4916 ext, 204

rosie.emery@greenparty.ca

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I just spent some time in jail.

Along with friends and colleagues Jody Wilson-Raybould, and Senator Pao Woo and Senator Kim Pate, on Friday morning I visited the William Head prison outside Victoria. In the evening, we toured a hell-hole of a detention centre in the basement of the Vancouver airport. It has served for decades as the “temporary” facility for people on their way out of Canada under deportation orders. It is about to be closed and replaced with a much more humane facility to open soon in Surrey.

Greens work on more than any one issue at a time. Restorative justice and humanity in our correctional facilities really matter. Before being a senator, Kim Pate worked her whole life for the rights of the incarcerated and fairness in our justice system. So she is making it a priority to get parliamentarians to tour jails.

The William Head facility is a model for the world. In the words of one prisoner we met, the place “re-humanizes people who have been dehumanized by maximum and medium security prisons.” Sadly, isolated as it is on Vancouver Island, near Metchosin, it is not celebrated within our prison system. Many of the staff report, not to the warden, but to bureaucrats on the mainland who fail to support the work being done to prepare inmates for a return to society. The prison lacks programmes that used to exist. There are no longer opportunities for getting high school and post-secondary degrees. If not for dozens of local volunteers who assist in the facility, opportunities to travel into Victoria and start making links there to mental health supports and volunteer opportunities would simply not exist. Perched on a tiny spit of land, the prison needs only one fence and gate – the ocean on three sides provides the other “walls.” The programmes for indigenous inmates include a carving shed where amazing artwork is being created.

I have much more work to do to support the amazing staff team there.

Meanwhile, between prison visits I watched the appalling press conference held by our prime minister. I had thought I knew what was going on due to meeting with the PM, meeting with and talking with Ministers Marc Miller and Carolyn Bennett (often through the week) and Paul Manly talking with the hereditary chiefs. The “we have run out of patience” line on Friday seemed at odds with the prime minister’s speech on Tuesday:

“Patience may be in short supply…And that makes it more valuable than ever.” (As also noted in this column from Paul Wells https://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/four-days-worth-of-justin-trudeaus-patience/)

As I write this, I am deeply worried that Justin Trudeau is responding to polls that tell him the Conservative message of impatience is gaining strength.

Until his press conference I thought we were making progress. The RCMP have said they will withdraw from Wet’suwet’en territory. The hereditary Chiefs say they need to confirm that has taken place.

Another hopeful change of circumstance: the BC Environmental Assessment Office has held back construction approval on a length of pipeline through the most contested length of route and asked Coastal Gas Link to return for more consultation. That is another helpful opening.

We need time and space- without construction – for the Crown to meaningfully engage with the hereditary leadership.

We need – as Greens and as supporters of reconciliation – to avoid taking sides within the Wet’suwet’en nation, but to stay with the path to reconciliation as guided by Supreme Court decisions. The hereditary chiefs must be consulted. They cannot be pushed to one side. Premier John Horgan rolled the dice gambling that his government can bulldoze through the objections of hereditary chiefs – whose role in governance of land and title has been established by the Supreme Court (in Delgamuukw) and by the BC government in treaty negotiations (see this interview with a BC treaty negotiator. https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/treaty-negotiator-letter-wetsuweten-1.5469932

Horgan decided to support Coastal Gas Link and ignore the compromise route proposed by the hereditary chiefs. This conflict and all the blockades are directly due to politicians who claim to be committed to UNDRIP, but feel free to ignore it if it gets in the way of their short-term agenda.

Resolving this matter without violence is my number one concern. I remember Oka and Ipperwash. If they clear one blockade with violence, others will spring up. This is a very complicated matter. It is a real test of Canada as a people. It is a test of our leaders. And, so far, they are failing.

I hope and pray that my missive next week can share good news. And I hope that the Cabinet rejecting the Teck oil sands mine is still possible.

Stay the course and never give up.

In love and hope,

Elizabeth

This weekly blog is published by Elizabeth’s EDA in Saanich-Gulf Islands. You can sign up for it here.

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This weekend of Valentine’s Day is also a time marking Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. This year is the thirtieth annual series of events and marches.

On Wet’suwet’en Territory, The Hereditary chiefs and matriarchs were holding a ceremony to honour the memories of the missing and murdered indigenous women when they were arrested on February 10, 2020. The hanging of red dresses along fences posts and trees has been a powerful symbol of those missing mothers and aunties and sisters and daughters. No one image spoke so powerfully to me of the failings of our government to meet its obligations to indigenous people as those of RCMP officers removing the red dresses. I guess any reminder of murdered and missing women is a threat to Coastal Gas Link.

There is a connection. The Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls reported its conclusion that large resource projects and labour camps pose a threat to vulnerable indigenous women and two-spirited people. Hitch-hiking is the only mode of transit for those without cars. Greyhound service is gone. And the camps – “man camps” as the MMIWG report labels them – create risks. Not that every construction worker is a threat to women, but some are. Violence and addiction increase in such settings.

This article in The Narwhal by Sarah Cox includes photos of the RCMP taking down red dresses. It also points out that John Horgan’s claim that the company has all the permits it needs is incorrect. https://thenarwhal.ca/rcmp-exclusion-zone-called-unlawful-as-police-arrest-matriarchs-at-unistoten-healing-camp/

This week’s massive response in solidarity actions across Canada have been inspiring – or horrific, depending on where you sit. This week I have heard friends say “we cannot have mob rule.” The news media wants to focus on what this costs our economy. All I can think is, with all the clear warning the BC and federal governments have had, what did they think would happen if the RCMP moved on to Wet’suwet’en territory to arrest Hereditary chiefs? We tried to tell them that full nation to nation consultation was required. Did they think that the resistance was down to a few individuals, who could be easily hauled away to enforce an injunction that turns our national police into private cops?

One of the strongest summaries of the “rule of law” argument came in this strong letter (slightly edited and published in the Globe and Mail) from one of my favourite constituents – Ronald Wright:

“As one who wrote about the Oka Crisis in my book Stolen Continents, I had a strong sense of foreboding when I heard BC Premier John Horgan invoke the “rule of law” to justify using force against the Wet’suwet’en pipeline protesters. Those same words were used often during the Oka Crisis by the government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1990.  Have we learned nothing in thirty years? Of many parallels, these stand out:

“1) Like the Mohawks, the Wet’suwet’en have never lost their ancient sovereignty as an independent people. Under international law there are two ways for a people to lose their sovereignty: by armed conquest, or by signing it away in a treaty. Neither is the case here.

“2) Like the Mohawks, the Wet’suwet’en have an ancient system of self-government that predates European occupation and is still alive. In the BC case, this is exercised by hereditary chiefs, who have consistently upheld their people’s rights since outsider encroachment began.

“3) The elected band councils set up under the Indian Act merely administer the small territories defined as reserves under the Indian Act. They have no jurisdiction over traditional territories beyond those boundaries, and no authority to make ‘agreements’ on what may be done there.

“With the Delgamuukw decision of 1997 and the Tsilqot’in decision of 2014, the Supreme Court has upheld aboriginal rights in BC and has said that the Wet’suwet’en unceded territory –in other words, land never transferred to Canada – may cover as much as 22,000 square kilometres. This means that neither the federal nor provincial government has any right to enforce its will there.  It is British Columbia and the RCMP who are breaking the rule of law.”

We must continue to push back on those who refer to the “rule of law” as though those who respect indigenous rights – and s 35 of the Constitution, for that matter – are outside the law. The fact is that economic damage and inconvenience for many travelers are the cost of Canada continuing to pretend we won a war and can do whatever we want to this land’s first peoples and the land that is their territory. Reconciliation and UNDRIP talk are in the air, but the mind-set of our governments appears hard-wired to fossil fuel extraction.

Meanwhile, there was news from 10 Downing Street. COP26 now has a president, replacing Claire Perry O’Neil, UK’s former Energy minister, whom PM Boris Johnson fired two weeks ago. More senior UK Tories, David Cameron and William Hague refused the role. It falls now to former secretary of state for international development Alok Sharma to steer COP26 in Glasgow to a successful conclusion.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/feb/15/alok-sharma-cop26-success-climate-change?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

A great deal of the success or failure of COP negotiations rides on the skill of the president. To get a successful result in November at COP26, Sharma not only has to build a strong team serving his presidency, he has to start crisscrossing the globe to build relationships, test ideas and press for early commitments to much improved targets and plans. When I look back at the dozen climate sessions I have attended, the character of the president is a huge factor. Laurent Fabius who succeeded in Paris, Patricia Espinoza who rescued climate talks in Cancun in 2010 as well as Stephane Dion who led the COP11 talks in Montreal are all remembered as spectacular chairs. The disaster in Copenhagen in 2009 was largely the fault of Prime Minister Rasmussen who fired his Environment minister half-way through the talks and took over himself. Rasmussen relied on back-room dealing and bad faith negotiation. But to most people watching these cumbersome, lumbering formal sessions, among and between 194 countries, the idea that it can all come down to a handful of people and their own talents may seem far-fetched. The world is depending on someone I had never heard of until yesterday’s announcement. With every day bringing more and accelerating bad news – locusts, storm surges and the hottest January on record, we all need to hope that Alok Sharma is a miracle worker. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/feb/13/january-hottest-earth-record-climate-crisis

Have a great long weekend. Paul and Jenica and I are back in Parliament starting Tuesday!

Love and thanks,

Elizabeth

P.S. some friends asked me to attach links to some of my recent media and articles:

My interview with Evan Solomon on CTV where I try to explain the legal foundation of Wet’suwet’en land rights: https://podbay.fm/podcast/1039513210/e/1581551460

My article on the rising costs of the TMX (formerly Kinder Morgan pipeline): https://www.nationalobserver.com/2020/02/12/opinion/elizabeth-may-asks-what-cost-canada

And lastly, friends have asked for a link to the wiki page leading to a Renaissance of Green Party vision and values. “GreensTogether”.

This weekly blog is published by Elizabeth’s EDA in Saanich-Gulf Islands. You can sign up for it here.

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