Mr. Speaker, the National Energy Board expert panel that reported this week included prominent industry people, such as Brenda Kenny of the Canadian Pipeline Association and Hélène Lauzon of the Quebec Business Council on the Environment. The report was damning.

This is an agency that has no credibility whatsoever, and needs to be massively overhauled. Coupled with the expert panel on environmental assessment, it is clear that the bogus process upon which Kinder Morgan was subjected to a sham of a review does not have any credibility.

Will the government reconsider approving a pipeline that should never have been approved?

Jim Carr – Minister of Natural Resources

Mr. Speaker, the member knows that when we took office, there were a number of major infrastructure projects under review. We established a set of principles that would govern how they would be reviewed, and one of the important ones was that no proponent would be asked to go back to square one, which I am sure members of the House would agree is fair.

We knew and announced at the time that this would be an interim step leading to a longer term reform of environmental assessment in Canada, a reform and a process that is now well under way.

The post Parliament: Will the government reconsider pipelines approved through the deeply flawed NEB process? appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Elizabeth May said:

“The Green Party of Canada continues to call for the restoration of environmental assessments based on the principles of the original Canadian Environmental Assessment Act (CEAA), brought forward under former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. This Act was repealed in 2012 by Stephen Harper’s omnibus budget bill C-38, which eradicated core principles of the CEAA process including:

• the importance of public engagement and participation;
• the examination of ‎alternatives;
• assessment of cumulative impacts;
• and a complete review of environmental and socio-economic impacts.

“Today’s report makes many positive recommendations, like the establishment of a public federal government database to house all baseline and monitoring data, as well as the authority by all levels of government to compel expertise from federal scientists, and to retain external scientists to provide technical expertise. Under the current broken system, it is ludicrous to accept at face value scientific data that originates from the very companies who have a biased stake in the outcome of their project assessments.

“I’m encouraged the panel recommends abolishing the failed experiment of sending energy project assessments to a cluster of agencies – such as the National Energy Board and the Canada Nuclear Safety Commission. Neither of these agencies are competent to conduct environmental reviews. The Panel recommends that a single authority have the mandate to conduct and decide upon environmental reviews on behalf of the federal government and that this body should be established as a quasi-judicial tribunal empowered to undertake a full range of facilitation and dispute resolution processes.

“The robust practices promised by the Liberals to incorporate scientific evidence and protect our environment are addressed, as is the need to assess climate change impacts holistically. I note disappointingly that the Harper-era climate targets remain the benchmark for evaluation.

“The Liberals have the opportunity to restore the public’s faith in environmental assessments, and to implement what was promised by Chretien’s 1993 Red Book to establish the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency as more like a CRTC-independent body, capable of conducting assessments.

“I encourage all Canadians to read the Expert Panel report and share their views until May 5, 2017 at LetsTalkEA.ca. I will also make my submission on this report publicly available in the coming weeks.”

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I couldn’t agree more with Mayor Fortin that citizens of southern Vancouver Island must have a say, and a definitive say, about the proposal to dramatically increase bitumen-loaded tankers through our waters. I am also an intervenor in the Kinder-Morgan National Energy Board hearing process. By reducing the process to largely a paper exercise, by eliminating the opportunity for oral cross-examination, the weakness of Kinder Morgan’s evidence may escape public exposure.

I first appeared before the National Energy Board as counsel in 1980. It is a quasi-judicial body and cross-examination is an essential element of the process. In fact, only under Harper has the NEB started denying the right of cross-examination. The fact that Stephen Harper wants the NEB to report quickly is not sufficient justification for eliminating the rights of intervenors. I have retained respected lawyer Clayton Ruby to represent me to challenge the process if cross-examination is not allowed.

I have worked my way through the 15,000 pages of Kinder Morgan’s application. I believe its length is intended to impress and intimidate. It is long because it is duplicative and contains masses of irrelevant and bogus material. I have found some amazing bloopers. They claim that dilbit (the mixture of bitumen and toxic condensate they are shipping) will behave just like crude in the marine environment. We know crude is a disaster when spilled, but we know from the Enbridge Kalamazoo River spill that dilbit is worse and impossible to clean up. In an appendix, I found the technical report setting out KM’s evidence. It was a test conducted in Alberta over a thirteen day period. Contractors for Kinder Morgan put salt water in tanks and then dumped in dilbit. Then they stirred and took other action they claimed approximated wind and wave action in the natural environment. The tanks held 26.5 m3 (7,000) gallons. Additional tests were done in a 1m x1m x 1m fish tank and in plastic five gallon pails. The five gallon pail and fish tank research went awry, even according to the researchers:

“Errors occurred in the fish tank, because the spill was installed in a manner that resulted in a large amount of dispersion at the outset, due to air ingestion, and the resulting slick was larger than the ruler and developed an asymmetric form.”

In other words, this so-called research was conducted by a team over 13 days that didn’t have a ruler the right size to measure a spill in a five gallon bucket. That is not the only example of shoddy work in the KM application. Another intervenor spotted that the model KM used to forcast oil spill dispersion, which KM claimed in the report was a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency approved method, was a draft EPA publication which had failed at peer review. KM had emoved the word “draft” from its submission. This is tantamount to fraud.

We must not allow the NEB process to be a paper exercise. We need to be in the room with the right to cross-examine Kinder Morgan.

Elizabeth May, O.C.
Member of Parliament
Saanich-Gulf Islands

Leader
Green Party of Canada

Originally printed in the Victoria Times-Colonist.

The post Letter to the Editor: Give Capital Region a Say on Pipeline appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Debate has been about how best to export raw, virtually unprocessed bitumen — as much as possible and as quickly as possible. Meanwhile, the eastern half of Canada depends on imports of foreign oil from Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Kazakhstan, Venezuela, and Norway. As Gordon Laxer of the Parkland Institute tried to point out to a Parliamentary committee (before the Conservative chair ordered him to stop talking and stormed out of the room), Canada has no energy security.

I feel some responsibility for this shift in debate, as I was the first political leader to point out that there was something wrong with the picture.

RELATED: Sign the petition for an oil-free coast.

Unlike the US, we have no Strategic Petroleum Reserves. If there was a blockade of foreign oil or an economic embargo, those in Eastern Canada would have to wait for tankers to bring them bitumen for processing through the Panama Canal and up the eastern seaboard. As bizarre as that sounds, it was the solution offered by a Suncor executive when asked in committee about the vulnerability of eastern Canada to embargos.

Oppositional Canada

The irony is that the dividing line of foreign oil to the east and Alberta oil for the west was the result of deliberate government policy—aimed at helping the Alberta oil and gas sector. Back in 1961, the National Oil Policy decreed that eastern Canadians (east of the Ottawa River) would only receive imported oil while those in the West had to purchase Alberta product. By deliberate policy, Eastern Canadians became dependent on foreign oil, while Alberta oil was consumed by those in western provinces and exported to the US. Now it is time to think like a country.

The Solution: Shipping East?

However, the current proposal also makes no sense. Former New Brunswick Premier Frank McKenna has proposed shipping unprocessed bitumen to St John, New Brunswick, to put it in tankers to export it from there. Others are proposing refining it in New Brunswick.

The first decision point is Enbridge’s application to reverse its Number 9 pipeline. This pipeline was built in the 1970s and had originally flowed west to east. It was reversed in the 1990s as the markets favoured cheaper foreign oil.

Now, Enbridge is applying to reverse it once again, running a different product, dilbit, from west to east. The request to the National Energy Board is being considered in two stand-alone applications; Line 9A (Sarnia to North Westover) and Line 9B to Montreal.

From there the bitumen would likely go south through New England. When I was in Washington DC, I heard from quite a few Congressmen and Senators that they do not want those pipelines over their territory.

Bitumen

The nature of bitumen and diluents in pipelines is a critical issue in why the Green Party oppose pipelines of unprocessed product to either coastline. So, before talking about the direction of pipelines, we need to talk about the product.

Even after the extensive and intensive process of extracting the viscous material known as bitumen from the soil in which it is found (generally about 10% by volume), it is still not processed to even the level of crude oil. Crude oil can flow. Bitumen cannot. It has the consistency of peanut butter, so needs to be mixed with something else to flow. That something else is called ‘diluent’—a mix of undisclosed chemicals. The most commonly used diluent is a natural gas condensate, similar to Naptha. The public does not know the make-up of any particular diluent. Some have more benzene than others—benzene is a well-documented carcinogen.

The resulting so-called dilbit product is about 30% diluents and 70% bitumen. We do know a lot more about dilbit than we used to. And we did a lot of that learning through the 2010 Enbridge dilbit spill in the Kalamazoo River in Michigan. We know it both floats and sinks; that it is far harder and far more expensive to clean-up than unprocessed conventional crude. The Kalamazoo spill is still not cleaned up.

Meanwhile a debate rages about whether dilbit is more likely to cause pipeline failure. Cornell University found that between 2007 and 2010 pipelines carrying dilbit had a spill-rate three times higher than pipelines carrying conventional crude. Oil sands products have a higher sulfur and a higher acidic content than conventional crude and those properties could explain its increased corrosive nature.

This finding led to the Department of Natural Resources to commissioning a study by a group called Alberta Innovates Technology Futures (ATIF). That study compared dilbit and conventional crudes and concluded the types of corrosive compounds between the two products were comparable. So we have labwork versus the real life rate of spills in US pipelines. At the moment, despite what Harper’s Cabinet ministers claim, the science on the corrosive nature of dilbit is not settled.

Meanwhile, if local residents along the Number 9 pipeline wish to speak before the NEB hearings, or even submit a letter, they are required to fill out a 10-page form, and are also encouraged to submit references and a resume! This is an NEB effort to meet the new requirements imposed by the horrific overhaul of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act that took place last year in the Omnibus Budget Bill (C-38).

Unlike the previous CEAA, which was premised on a fundamental commitment to rights of public participation, the Harperized CEAA restricts access to only those ‘directly affected’. The NEB has made this restriction even worse by demanding that any citizens who want to make comments, fill out the forms and apply within a two-week period—which will close before this article will be in print.

Refineries In Alberta

So, what should be done? The best environmental, economic and climate outcome would be to slow down the boom-and-bust cycle of constant expansion in the oil sands. What the late Peter Lougheed used to describe as the ‘traffic jam’ of feverish expansion in the oilsands prevents the construction of ancillary infrastructure, like upgraders and refineries.

The hyper-inflationary bubble that sits on northern Alberta is what makes it cheaper for Big Oil to build a $7 billion pipeline to Texas, rather than build facilities in Alberta. Any reasonable carbon plan would set a level of managed growth for oil sands production—say 2 million barrels of oil a day (more than the current 1.7 million barrels, but less than Harper’s goal of 6 million barrels of oil a day). That level of production could cool down the capital and labour markets enough to build upgraders and refineries near the resource. Then, we could be talking about shipping—by pipeline, truck or train—a finished product whose properties are better understood. Shipping a product with a far lower risk of environmental impact in the event of spills.

If we are thinking like a country, we should get Alberta oil to Eastern Canada, but we should not ship bitumen + diluents.

The post Pipelines to the east? appeared first on Elizabeth May.

“10,000 barrels of dilbit, a mixture of bitumen and toxic diluent, were spilled in Arkansas last week. Citizens in Toronto and everywhere along Enbridge’s Line 9 have legitimate concerns and tough questions to ask the NEB. Muzzling their opposition is against basic principles of natural justice. These new barriers to free speech would not stand up to judicial review,” said Green Leader Elizabeth May, Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands.

In their fight against Omnibus Bill C-38, the Greens tried to prevent the destruction of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act (CEAA). Green Leader Elizabeth May put forward amendments –rejected by the Conservatives– to protect rights for public participation, which were once fundamental to the CEAA. The terms used in C-38 restrict public participation to those “directly affected”. “It is that terminology that has led to the abuse we witness today, but even with that restrictive language, the NEB has made it even more restrictive by adding its own two-week timeline,” said May.

“Enbridge plans to pump dilbit, with added benzene, a notorious carcinogen, through our neighbourhoods using an aging pipe system originally built for natural gas. What would a spill near Lake Ontario mean for the water supply of millions of people?” asked May.

“After muzzling scientists, Stephen Harper muzzles citizens. Add his obsession for the oil business and his disregard for Parliament in the mix, and you’ve got a great example of Harperland in action,” said May.

The post Enbridge’s Line 9: Needing Permission to Talk About a Pipeline Going Through Your Neighbourhood? Welcome to Harperland. appeared first on Elizabeth May.

As a New Year’s Resolution, I knew it was a long-shot—but so are many New Year’s Resolutions. So, like most of us this New Year, I will re-commit to some unfulfilled 2012 resolutions — including seeing Stephen Harper leave office (one way or another) within 2013.

Crystal-ball gazing is notoriously prone to failure, but let me make some likely predictions. Within the continuing attack in the House of Commons against the fabric of Canadian criminal law, we will see more bills that assault Charter rights through a ‘tough on crime’ agenda. The Conservatives are bound to return to the internet snooping bill, C-30, famously described by Vic Toews as representing a choice of standing with the Conservatives or standing on the side of child pornographers.

Up early in February will be C-43, titled the act for the ‘faster removal of foreign criminals act’ but which, actually, can limit access to Canada to people who are not criminals at all. The bill gives the Minister of Immigration the right to deny a claimant permanent residency in Canada for ‘public policy reasons,’ a term which is undefined.

We will see the last significant environmental law (at least among those that have an impact on land-use and conservation) being dismantled. The Species at Risk Act (SARA) was rumoured to have been planned to be in the fall omnibus bill, C-45. The Hill gossip is that the provinces were not willing to see the act being downloaded to the provinces as rapidly as was being proposed. Environment Minister Peter Kent has said to expect the overhaul of SARA as stand-alone legislation.

It won’t be too early to start seeing the impacts of the egregious changes from 2012. The new and pathetic excuse for an environmental assessment act is so badly drafted that even industry is bound to start complaining. And the destruction of the Fisheries Act in relation to protection of fish habitat could well be the subject of litigation, especially due to the impacts on First Nations rights.

Another potential area of litigation could be First Nations push back against the Canada-China Investment Treaty. I keep hoping that a case can be brought for injunctive relief to block ratification while there is still time. As I write this, the treaty is not yet ratified. The Prime Minister can legally ratify at any time he convenes a Cabinet meeting. We need to keep the pressure up, particularly on Conservative MPs, to urge them to pressure the Prime Minister to, at a minimum, reject the treaty with language that locks us in for 31 years. We should insist that, at least, the exit provisions match NAFTA, with a 6-month opt-out provision.

By December, the Joint Review Panel on the Enbridge Northern Gateway project, or as I like to call it, ‘The Great Pipeline of China’ will report. Thanks to changes in C-38, the National Energy Board is no longer the decision-maker. The NEB will make a recommendation based on the Joint Review Panel report. Then, Prime Minister Harper’s Cabinet will rule. Despite all the opposition, and the clear climb-down on rhetoric from the PM and his Cabinet members in the last year, it will be a surprise if the project is turned down. We will stop it from being built, somehow, but we cannot afford to assume the fight is already won.

Beyond the legislative agenda, we are likely to experience within Canada and globally, more extreme weather events due to human-induced climate change. I am convinced another year cannot go by without people around the world, urged on by the world’s scientists, making the links and demanding governments take action. We need to become more active, more assertive in making the case that the changes we are seeing now are dangerous, and that we are only seeing the tip of a very large (and melting) iceberg.

No doubt we will experience heartbreaks (I cannot speak of what happened to little children in Newtown, Connecticut). We can never anticipate exactly how the military industrial complex will make its greed and Machiavellian machinations felt in a troubled world. We will have moments that bring us great joy, worry about things that in the scheme of things do not matter much, and love and lose loves, as in every year. The world did not end in 2012 and perhaps human consciousness will evolve.

Perhaps, from our beautiful islands—big and small—off the west coast of British Columbia, just perhaps, our work for change will lead the way. All the best to us all in this new year.

The post What will 2013 hold for Canada? appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I am rising to pursue a question that was asked some time back, but it is still very relevant.

I asked this question in question period on May 17, and it related to a report that had just been released that the federal government was encouraging leases in the Beaufort Sea and other areas of our Arctic. At the same time, the National Energy Board had come up with a way to reduce what are fairly onerous requirements on oil companies that wished to drill in the Arctic. The National Energy Board had relaxed its requirements for proof of being able to drill a same-season relief well.

I think a lot of Canadians did not know what a relief well was until we watched the failure of one in the Gulf of Mexico with the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster. We certainly saw there why there is a need for it. For example, if there is a blowout at depths in the ocean, a way to stop the blowout is needed, and a relief well is required.

In the case of the Arctic, with much more difficult climatic conditions, if a blowout occurred during winter months when there is ice cover and no daylight, the chances of being able to get in a same-season relief well are critical. The relief well would have to be put in before the winter conditions became an impossible obstacle, in order to stop a blowout.

On May 17, I raised this question: How would we eliminate the risks of blowouts during drilling exploration and development in our most fragile ecosystem in the Arctic?

Since I first raised the issue, the French multinational giant, Total S.A., aborted its efforts to pursue oil drilling in the Arctic in September. The CEO of Total, Christophe de Margerie, told the Financial Times that there was simply too large a risk. In fact, from his point of view, the financial risk to his company of attempting to drill in the Arctic would outweigh any benefit. As he put it: “Oil in Greenland would be a disaster…. A leak would do too much damage to the image of the company”.

We have a situation where at least one large oil company decided it is not worth the risk. However a second large oil company, Royal Dutch Shell, abandoned those attempts after repeated failures, also in September, after spending almost $5 billion in efforts to get at oil in offshore Alaska, in the Arctic.

Here we have a situation where Canada is about to take the chair of the Arctic Council, which is a huge opportunity for this nation. The Minister of Health, a member of the Inuit nation, will be chairing the Arctic Council table.

This is a time for Canada to show leadership and say we will not subsidize oil and gas, we will not promote oil and gas in the Arctic and we will insist on same-season relief wells. We will not allow relaxation of standards and we will adopt a precautionary principle in concert with the other circumpolar nations who sit at the Arctic Council table. It is critical that we protect our Arctic.

Greg Rickford: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to the question of the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands.

Our government is committed to ensuring that a strong and prosperous north helps shape the future of our nation. Without a doubt, the north continues to be a top priority of our government. We are carrying on with the delivery and improvement of key programs and initiatives under the northern strategy – programs and initiatives that benefit all Canadians.

The north is home to world-class resource potential, representing tremendous economic opportunity. Our government continues to encourage investment in northern communities while ensuring that investment is supported by a world-class safety and environmental protection regime in the north.

In anticipation and preparation for future investment in the north, the National Energy Board initiated a public review of Arctic safety and environmental offshore drilling requirements. The final report of the public review released by the board on December 15, 2011, reconfirmed that Canada’s Arctic offshore regulatory regime is one of the safest and most stringent regimes in the world.

To emphasize this finding, the report included a series of new safety and environmental protection filing requirements for Arctic offshore drilling programs. These new requirements were developed based on input received during the public review. They will contribute to the already rigorous review process that the National Energy Board undertakes when considering whether to authorize oil and gas activities in the north.

The issuance of mineral rights on crown lands is important to encouraging investment in the north. Working with northern and aboriginal governments and people, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada issues rights to prospective resource developers. The rights issuance process in the north is open and transparent and, as in other jurisdictions in Canada, is market-based. An exploration licence issued by the department gives the developer an exclusive right to explore and to drill for oil and gas.

Currently, there is no drilling in the Arctic offshore. Any proposed activity associated with an exploration licence would require the authorization of the National Energy Board, and the review process would include public consultations. Also, before a drilling program would be authorized, the applicant would need to demonstrate that it meets the safety and environmental protection filing requirements for offshore drilling in the Canadian Arctic.

Our government is committed to helping the north realize its true potential as an economically healthy, prosperous and secure region within a strong and sovereign Canada.

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Former U.S. President G. W. Bush was caught on camera once referring to the “vision thing.” Some commentators have suggested Prime Minister Stephen Harper has not enunciated a clear vision. If Canadians wonder what Harper’s vision might be, look to the mania for slashing laws that might regulate the pace of fossil fuel development, to gagging and terminating scientific research that might call into question the impacts of said development, and the new obsession with attracting Chinese investment to ensure galloping growth in the oil sands. Harper has said that his goal is six million barrels of oil a day from the oil sands. This would amount to more than tripling the current levels of production. It is an odd goal for a government. It appears to me that all policy areas are subsumed to this one objective.

It did not come as a surprise that access to information requests from Postmedia’s Mike De Souza showed that, within the bureaucracy, the Enbridge Northern Gateway project was “top of mind” when drafting the 2012 budget. No wonder the repeal of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, and its anaemic replacement within the omnibus budget bill; no wonder the gutting of the Fisheries Act, the re-working of the Navigable Water Protection Act to exclude pipelines as barriers to navigation, and the radical change of the National Energy Board Act to allow Cabinet to overturn a National Energy Board (NEB) decision. Now we hear the Species at Risk Act will be subjected to similar “streamlining.”

At the same time, there has been an unprecedented slashing of scientific capacity. Since spring 2012, allegedly due to internal decisions of the Departments of Fisheries and Oceans and Environment Canada, pink slips have been issued to more than 70 scientists across Canada in the marine contaminants program, the government has announced it will no longer support the world-class Experimental Lakes Area (58 lakes in western Ontario, the only place on the planet allowing whole lake experiments in fresh water science), the closing of the Polar Environmental Atmospheric Research Laboratory (the closest research station to the North Pole on the planet, tracking key developments on climate and ozone depletion), as well as a raft of other closuressmokestack monitoring, climate adaptation research and all the work of the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences. The government’s only advisory body on sustainable development, the National Round Table on Environment and Economy, has also been killed.

The argument that these cuts are necessary as a matter of fiscal austerity would be more plausible if not for the reality that these cuts, cumulatively, come to less than the Harper Conservatives continue to spend on ads touting their wonderful record. Throw in the $28-million spent this year on celebrations of the bicentenary of the War of 1812, the $5-million for the 100th year of the Calgary Stampede, and another $5-million for the 100th year of the Grey Cup, and it is hard to see the elimination of scientific capacity as anything other than a pre-emptive strike against evidence.

The most dramatic proof that the only driving force of Harper’s policy is oil sands growth comes from his 180-turn on foreign policy in relation to China. When he first became Prime Minister, he was overtly frosty towards the Peoples’ Republic of China. Although I applauded his focus on pressing China on human rights, the snubbing of China was too extreme and undermined our diplomacy. Now, Stephen Harper visits China regularly, and craves the audience and photo ops with leaders he once avoided, like the now disgraced Bo Xilai. In fact, the last picture of Bo Xilai taken before his criminal charges was with Harper.

What could explain this about-face? It is the realization that there is simply not enough free market capital flowing into the oil sands. To meet the ambitious growth target (not of the industry, but of the Prime Minister), investment from China is needed. To secure that investment, concerns about human rights in China, indeed for Canadian sovereignty and national security are getting short shrift.

Tabled in the House on Sept. 26, with no debate planned, no committee review and no vote, is the Canada-China Investment Treaty. Under Foreign Affairs rules of procedure, the treaty could be ratified by order in council as soon as Nov. 2. It will bind Canada for a minimum of 15 years. If a future government wished to withdraw, a one year’s written notice is required, but any Chinese state-owned enterprises already invested in Canada receive a further 15 years benefits. What are the benefits?

Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) will be able to launch claims for compensation if actions at the municipal, provincial or federal levels reduce their expectation of profits. These claims will first go to six-month secret diplomatic negotiations between China and Canada. If this fails, there will be a secret arbitration with three arbitrators in a hotel room somewhere deciding whether Canada’s laws or regulations have been “arbitrary.” From these rulings, there will be no appeal. Moreover, if Canada (or any level of government) wants to conserve resources, we can only do so to the extent we limit our own use of natural resources.

In short, the Prime Minister’s goal of six million barrels of oil a day from the oil sands is driving our foreign policy, our trade policy, has undermined our global climate commitments, is eviscerating our scientific capacity and is skewing our economy to one product at the expense of others. What no one seems to know is why our Prime Minister has more ambitious growth targets for the oil sands than those in the oil patch and why he has set a pace that no one can explain or defend.

Elizabeth May is the Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands and Leader of the Green Party of Party.
Originally published in the Hill Times.

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“Peter Kent’s timing, the Friday of the August long weekend, to make public the new timelines for the panel’s work is further evidence of the disrespect shown to public concerns,”  said Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, MP Saanich-Gulf Islands.  “Clearly, Prime Minister Harper is driving forward and does not want to take the opinions of Canadians into consideration as he pushes his oil-uber-alles agenda.”
There is also a new memorandum of agreement between the Ministry of Environment and the National Energy Board stating that the Governor in Council – the avidly pro-pipeline Conservative Cabinet – will make the final decision on the NEB’s environmental assessment.

“Just as the Conservatives gutted the Fisheries Act and repealed the environmental assessment act, replacing it with a weak and watered down law, clearing the way for environmentally damaging pipelines and risky supertankers, they also used the omnibus budget bill C-38 to gut the Review Panel,” May noted.  “How can the Panel conduct an objective inquiry and gather all the facts comprehensively with the reality of deadlines and with the Cabinet ready to reverse any decision running counter to the oil industry’s wishes? The imposition of this deadline and process further makes it clear that the views of the British Columbia Government will be irrelevant to the prime minister.”

Once the Cabinet approves the Northern Gateway project, the NEB has been instructed to issue the approval certificate within seven days – proof that the Harper Conservatives intend to fast-track the Northern Gateway pipeline project.  This, of course, also means that mega-tankers would soon be navigating the treacherous waters near Kitimat, BC, as they ship Canada’s unrefined bitumen – and potential jobs – from the oil sands to China.

Revisions to a memorandum of agreement between the Ministry of Environment and the National Energy Board make other legal changes needed to bring the former agreement into compliance with C-38 new version of environmental assessment law.  These include a section that appears to blame the environment – an ‘Act of God” – for any problems the precarious Northern Gateway pipeline might face.
“Mr. Harper’s lack of respect for our democratic process, our laws, the provincial government, First Nations and our environment grows more obvious every day.  Not only is he curtailing the environmental assessment, but he plans to wash his hands of any future liabilities.  The whole scenario is almost beyond belief.”

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Canada undermined global climate negotiations in Durban in December, negotiated in bad faith, and immediately announced intent to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol when the Environment Minister touched down on Canadian soil. Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver kicked off the New Year with an assault on environmentalists and First Nations as “radicals.”  The Prime Minister attacked environmental groups for accepting foreign funding, even as he courted Communist Party controlled state operations from China as investors in the oil sands.  One Parliamentary Secretary said anyone opposed to pipelines and tankers was “against Canada.”  When asked to withdraw the remark as un-parliamentary, she refused.

The legislative juggernaut, C-38, repealed the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, replacing a coherent piece of legislation with a discretionary formula for confusion, conflict and court cases.  The gutting of the Fisheries Act raised the ire of four former federal Ministers of Fisheries.  Environment Minister Peter Kent insulted the four former ministers, suggesting they had not read the Act.  Mulroney era Minister Tom Siddon showed up to testify before the sub-committee on Finance and in short order made it clear he may be the only Minister who has read the act.  While Fisheries Minister Keith Ashfield tried to claim the new Fisheries Act will improve habitat protection, the assault to habitat is real, underscored by the subsequent lay-off notices to all DFO habitat officers in British Columbia. The National Round Table on the Environment and Economy is scrapped.  The Species at Risk Act and Navigable Waters Protection Act amended to allow the National Energy Board to assume jurisdiction of endangered species or navigable waters are in the way of any pipeline.

Basic science and monitoring is being savaged with the end of funding to the Canadian Foundation of Climate and Atmospheric Science, elimination of the Adaptation research group within Environment Canada, the cuts to ozone monitoring, the closure of the Polar Arctic and Environmental Laboratory (PEARL) in Eureka, the sale of the 58 lakes in the globally unique Experimental Lakes Area near Kenora, Ontario, the elimination of the marine contaminants programme within DFO, the loss of scientists in Natural Resources Canada to study ice cores data (and the hope to find a university with a large fridge willing to take the 80,000 year ice core record Canada’s government no longer wants), the end of monitoring smoke stack emissions, cut backs in the Canada Oil and Gas research group in Halifax, and cuts at NSERC (Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada) resulting in the closing of the Yukon Research Lab at Yukon College in Whitehorse.

The thin end of the wedge of privatization has hit National Parks – first Jasper and then the hot springs at Banff, while cuts to ecological staff in the parks compelled former Deputy Minister Jacques Gerin to call on Harper to stop gutting National Parks.

It is a blitzkrieg of bad news as cut-backs and programme cancellation hit the core areas of federal responsibility to protect nature.  The multi-faceted assault has the effect of blinding media and the public to the largest threat.  In 2012, Canada still has no plan to address the threat of climate change.

While Stephen Harper has succeeded in dramatically reducing the Canadian media coverage of climate science through the muzzling of government scientists, the atmosphere does not seem to have gotten the memo.  Around the world, the force and frequency of severe weather events has woken up even the mainstream US media.  Fires, floods, tornadoes, heat waves are wreaking havoc on agriculture and running up the bills to the insurance industry.  The culprit for much of this year’s strange weather phenomenon is the rapidly warming Arctic.  As the Arctic warms the differential in temperature between the Arctic and the Equator becomes less pronounced. That causes the jet stream to lose its straight and fast course. (Francis, Vavrus study, Rutgers/Univ of Wisconsin). Slowing down, it has allowed large low pressure systems and high pressure systems to sit for far longer periods than normal in one place —  causing flooding in the low pressure zones and heat waves and fires in the high zones.

Loss of agriculture, losses to floods and fires also cost the economy, as well as human lives. Despite the Prime Minister’s attempts to destroy the collection of data, the evidence of the climate crisis is all around us.  We are sabotaging our children’s future – but what does it matter as long as the bitumen flows?

Elizabeth May is the Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands and Leader of the Green Party of Canada.

First published in the Hill Times.

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