Brian Zinchuk is editor and owner of Pipeline Online
Shannon Stubbs, in the Natural Resources Committee, when the chair would not allow her to to introduce an amendment. House of Commons
The whirlwind around the federal carbon tax, which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau paused for home heating oil for three years, but no other forms of home heating, has become the focus of the nation. And in the centre of that whirlwind is Shannon Stubbs, Alberta Conservative MP for Lakeland (which includes the Alberta portion of Lloydminster). She’s the Natural Resources Critic whose been deeply involved in the House of Commons Natural Resources Committee consideration of Bills C-49 and C-50. The first is “An Act to amend the Canada—Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act and the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts. The second is “An Act respecting accountability, transparency and engagement to support the creation of sustainable jobs for workers and economic growth in a net-zero economy.” It’s also know as the Canadian Sustainable Jobs Act.
It’s also been referred to as the “Just Transition Act.”
So in the midst of consideration for an act that wants to do away with the fossil fuel industry, the renewed and amplified furor around the carbon tax has got the Lloydminster MP hopping.
Pipeline Online spoke to Stubbs by phone from Parliament on Tuesday, Nov. 7, while she waited to be recalled to the committee. Here’s the first part of the interview. The this is second part, covering the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling against most of the Impact Assessment Act. You can read Part 1 here.
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Pipeline Online:
So is the Impact Assessment Act, Bill C-69, really dead after the Supreme Court decision? Because it doesn’t seem like it. Danielle Smith seems to think that it will have a huge impact, but Steven Guilbeault thinks minor amendments are all that’s needed.
Shannon Stubbs:
Yeah, well, it’s not good, because the NDP-Liberals, of course, have done nothing about it in response to the Supreme Court ruling.
I would just invite everyone to think for one moment, just as an aside, what it would be like if a Conservative government had said that they were bringing in its cornerstone environmental and regulatory legislation that deals fundamentally with all kinds of major projects and all kinds of sectors, and especially natural resources, which underpins the Canadian economy still. I think that people in Saskatchewan and Alberta would have very robust reaction to this, as I think we’ll all be thinking the same thing. But can you imagine what the reaction would be from the media, from the establishment, from activism, from the opponent political parties, if this just happened under a Conservative government? And if a federal Conservative government brought in legislation like that, which by the way, was opposed or called for major changes by every single province and every single territory when they rammed it through the House of Commons at the end. That then the Supreme Court came out and said was largely unconstitutional, and then it got even more scathing and focused and specific thereafter in the judgment? And that that law had been on the books for half a decade, unconstitutional? Can you imagine what the reaction would be?
So, I was proud to lead the fight against C-69 behalf of the federal Conservative official opposition through that time. At that time, every Canadian will recall, and especially people in Saskatchewan and Alberta and Newfoundland and parts of British Columbia who are most directly damaged by the anti-energy and anti-development agenda of the NDP-Liberals. What the Liberals did was in the they froze all of the existing natural resources projects and application early in their second year. They announced these vague interim guidance principles which were, by the way, already hallmarks of Canadians regulatory system. They had to do with things like community consultation, indigenous consultation, science, and evidence-based decision making technical know how and skills this is. That’s always been the hallmark of Canadian of Canada’s world renowned regulatory vigorous system under any government.
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So the Liberals announced those five generic principles. Then they spent two years developing C-69. What they did in those two years was, as you’ll remember, they politically intervened and individual applications like for the Energy East Pipeline, for example. They moved the goalposts. They set new standards. They applied conditions unevenly and deliberately to various different infrastructure proposals that they didn’t apply equally to all, designed deliberately to kill the ones they didn’t like – that would be the west-east pipeline, of course. And then they went through this long, exhaustive debate on C-69, where through the course of both the committee and committee work and Parliament work, and then, through the course of the Senate, who went out with public hearings on C-69, and sent the bill back. Often the Senate just rubber stamps (bills), which is why certain prairie people have concerns with the institution, but in this case, very rare. It’s uncharacteristic. The Senate sent it back to the House of Commons to fix this thing. Conservatives, of course, and I, specifically, because I happen to be in the role, were highlighting all of these issues and potential pitfalls.
The NDP-Liberals voted, forced that bill through, and then it sat there for five years being unconstitutional.
Now here we are the NDP-Liberals have done nothing, nothing! In response to the Supreme Court decision, except that, as you said, recently, the Environment Minister announced, again, that they’re going to focus on it I think he said in coming months. (It is) obviously way too late for the damage and the job losses and the billions of dollars they’ve already driven in resource development outside of the country and the damage they’ve done to jurisdictional clarity and relationships with the provinces and national unity as a consequence of C-69. And so now they’re proposing the exact same thing; that they will do some sort of interim guidance. And then I guess, get around to in the next couple of months, focusing on fixing C-69. This is just more of the same uncertainty, lack of clarity, lack of fairness, chaos, and it is, in itself, death by delay, and will continue to be death by delay, to research, to development to businesses to jobs in Canada, which is of course is why the only solution is actually for Canadians to elect common sense Conservative government the next federal election.
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Pipeline Online:
Some of the statements you just made your mimic almost word for word what the letter from the CEO of Teck Resources said, when they cancelled the $20 billion Teck Frontier Project. In fact, Teck has left the oil sands as a result. One of Canada’s largest mining companies was going heavy into the oil sands and they said, ‘Look, we can’t see an end to this. They keep changing the goalposts. We’re out.’
Shannon Stubbs:
Yes! And remember, you’re bang on, and I’m so glad that that you’re raising this, because it really is important for Canadians to see the whole picture, as you pointed out, while both a basket and a suite of all their policies. They are moving on a number of fronts that are anti-energy, anti-resource, anti-private sector. They’re not letting up. They are proving in their policies, in their laws, in their actions that they absolutely want to shut the industry down.
I think many of us in the 2015 election, I think it was thought, that Justin Trudeau had a slip up or he had made a gaffe, when he said that he his intent was to phase out the oil sands. It was true, and his government has incrementally been doing and showing that every which way. And of course, it’s also hitting oil. It’s also hitting natural gas. And that’s what happens when radical, ideological activists are driving policy decisions in a government.
I’m glad that you’ve reminded this, about the issue with Teck Frontier mine. The cabinet had to make the final decision right? And Teck was pointing out these changes and these goalposts and these changing messages. But what I hope people will remember is that then what happened was the media started reporting on how the project was becoming a big fight in the Liberal cabinet, and that there were ministers for whom this was no option, and they were saying no, because they want to shut down the oil sands. And because they hate Alberta and Saskatchewan, frankly.
And that was deliberate leaking from the Liberal cabinet, I believe, to show that potential instability and the uncertainty to Teck about the final decision that the cabinet was going to make on their project, which they were dragging out to the very end, as long as they possibly could.
So you’ll recall that right before that Cabinet decision happened, Teck pulled out, and it was for the exact reason that you’re saying.
That’s a perfect example of these NDP-Liberals. They are either going to hammer the industry and all the workers and all the development that pays for everything else, by the way. I don’t know who they think pays for the health care and social programs services that we all rely on. But that is their tactic, hen they’re not doing it through bans and standards and policies and laws and prohibitions. They do it through messages to cause uncertainty a lack of clarity, lack of predictability, to lack of deliberately designed to kill projects. That’s death by delay, too.
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