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Will the Prime Minister confirm that under no circumstances will the federal government become the aggressive and hostile government that approves a project as long British Columbians say no?

Right Hon. Stephen Harper: Mr. Speaker, the project in question, of course, is subject to a joint review panel process. Obviously, we believe in the rule of law and, in adjudicating these things based on scientific and policy concerns, the government will obviously withhold its decision on the matter until we see the results of the panel and its work.

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

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Related interviews:

• CTV’s Question Period
• CTV’s Power Play

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The post Press Conference on Elizabeth May’s trip to Washington DC appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Seconded by Elizabeth May on September 20, 2012

Click here for the full document.

The post Bill C-437 An Act to amend the Canada Shipping Act, 2001 (prohibition against the transportation of oil by oil tankers on Canada’s Pacific North Coast) appeared first on Elizabeth May.

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The post Alberta Oil Spill Press Conference appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I had the enormous honour earlier today to meet with Bonnie and Gord Johnston of Sundre, Alberta. They came to Ottawa to plead with members of Parliament to remember that when a pipeline leaks it is not just the environment that is devastated, it is families and it is lives.

Gord Johnston grew up on the 23 hectares where his family lives on the banks of the Red Deer River. Their beautiful river became a flood of oil that has now contaminated their entire property. Bonnie and Gord were in tears as they pleaded with members of Parliament to bear in mind what happens when environmental regulations are weakened.

In their own words, and they asked me to convey this today, they said, “Please, Mr. Prime Minister, you need to stop and think. The environment is where we live”.

The post Statements by Members – The Environment appeared first on Elizabeth May.

“Plains Midstream pipelines are located in close proximity to Alberta communities and these reoccurring spills have a devastating effect on residents and the environment. We’ve asked before, knowing the company’s record of major spills, what kind of monitoring and oversight of its activities took place in Canada? Given their record of spill after spill, there should have been more effort to ensure that another community would not have to suffer this devastation,” said May.

Plains Midstream Canada, a division of the Texan company Plains All American, was also responsible for a major 28 000 barrel oil spill near Peace River, Alberta last year.  The parent company has an atrocious record and has had spills amounting to at least 6,510 barrels of crude oil into bodies of water in Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and the Gulf of Mexico.

The latest spill took place on Thursday, June 7th, resulting in approximately 3000 barrels of oil spilling into Jackson Creek and the Red Deer River from a pipeline.

“Plains has a dismal safety record and this latest spill highlights the problematic nature of pipelines,” said Green Leader Elizabeth May, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands. “The oil is now spreading tens of kilometers downriver, affecting wildlife, plants, and possibly drinking water.  The reality is that these spills leave long-lasting damage that can not be fully mitigated.”

The post Another Alberta Oil Spill from Company with Dismal Safety Record appeared first on Elizabeth May.

Elizabeth May, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands and Leader of the Green Party of Canada, hoped to spark interest in the anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill with a picturesque press conference Friday morning.

On March 24, 23 years ago, the Exxon Valdez, an oil tanker bound for Long Beach, Calif. struck the Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound and spilled 260,000 to 750,000 barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Alaska.

“The life of that ecosystem has not yet recovered,” May said Friday at the Shaw Ocean Discovery Centre in Sidney. “There is still damage. It is being monitored by scientists that the bird life has not returned, that the life of the ocean waters have not been restored to the condition which they were 23 years ago today, on the eve of the Exxon Valdez spill.”

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The post May says Exxon Valdez spill calls for legislation against oil tankers appeared first on Elizabeth May.

A moratorium on crude-oil supertankers on B.C.’s coast should be expanded and enshrined in legislation, Green Party leader Elizabeth May said on the eve of the 23rd anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

“We know oil and water don’t mix,” said May, who was at the Shaw Ocean Discovery Centre in Sidney Friday.

After the Exxon Valdez was grounded on a reef in Prince William Sound in Alaska in 1989, it spewed 40 million litres of crude oil across approximately 2,000 kilometres of shoreline. The area has not yet recovered, May said.

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The post May calls for tanker ban on oil-spill anniversary appeared first on Elizabeth May.

“The 1989 Exxon Valdez spill taught us some tragic lessons,” said Elizabeth May, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands and Leader of the Green Party of Canada.  “We learned how difficult it is to clean up a remote shoreline, how widespread and long-lasting the damage can be, and how costly such accidents are in ecological, social, and economic terms.

“Most Canadians realize that this must not be allowed to happen again, and yet the continued push to develop the oil sands at a breakneck pace brings the very real risk that it probably will,” said May.

After the Exxon Valdez grounded on a reef, the resulting spill of 40-million litres of heavy crude oil spread across nearly 2,000 kilometres of shoreline. It was responsible for the deaths of up to 700,000 birds, marine life, billions of herring and salmon eggs, and the continuing contamination of an entire ecosystem.

The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council estimates that almost 80 000 litres of crude oil still remain in the subsurface and, at the current rate, “the remaining oil will take decades and possibly centuries to disappear entirely.” Oil is still found as surface puddles and pockets in the sand of some beaches.

For this and other reasons, the Green Party is calling for a legislated ban on crude oil tankers along BC’s coast.  This ban would include the busy south coast, as well as the more pristine and rugged north coast area.

In the south, since 2007, the federal government has allowed up to 1.2 million barrels of tar sands crude oil to be shipped from Kinder-Morgan’s Burrard Inlet terminal in Vancouver each week to California and China.

In the north, Enbridge has proposed a 1,170 km Northern Gateway pipeline to carry 525,000 barrels per day of Alberta tar sands crude oil westward to a new oil-tanker port at Kitimat.  If these projects succeed, oil tanker traffic through the region could increase by five-fold in coming years – up to 200 supertankers annually.

“The proposal to build a pipeline from a tar sands terminal near Edmonton, across the Rocky Mountains, over 1000 rivers and streams, and through First Nations territories –and then allow supertankers, which are as long as the Eiffel Tower is high, to transport this oil along an incredibly winding and rock-filled route through an ecologically-significant region sounds like another Exxon Valdez in the making,” said May.

According to one of Enbridge’s own studies, a spill of 36,000 cubic metres of bitumen — on the order of the Exxon Valdez spill — in Wright Sound near Kitimat would contaminate 240 kilometres of shoreline in 15 days.  The Environmental Commissioner in the Office of the Auditor General has warned that Canada has no ability to respond to such a devastating oil spill.

“With such clear warnings, why should we allow this pipeline-tanker extract-and-export scheme to happen? Canadians must speak out against such oil industry and Conservative recklessness.”

The post Lesson of Exxon Valdez Oil Spill More Relevant Than Ever appeared first on Elizabeth May.

The coastal waters of Newfoundland and British Columbia are decidedly different.  An oil spill off the coast of Newfoundland would be largely moved eastward to the open ocean.  In the case of a spill off the BC coast, the oil would be caught in the turbulent waters between the coast and Haida Gwaii, causing damage up and down both shores, threatening prime fishery and tourist industries.

“The BC coastline is extremely sensitive to oil spills because of its physical features.  That is why there has been a moratorium on oil tankers off the BC coast for over 30 years. It is tremendously disappointing that the Prime Minister does not understand this,” said May.

The moratorium on oil tankers off BC’s North Coast has been in place since 1972 through a provincial-federal agreement.  The Green Party of Canada has called for the ban to be legislated, especially given the threat of intensifying oil tanker traffic servicing the Alberta Tar Sands.

The waters of the Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Basin are known to be exceptionally stormy, with some of the largest waves on Earth, making the risk of an oil spill a near certainty.

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