Activist among seven jailed for pipeline protest
Supporters cheer Order of Canada recipient
VANCOUVER • An antipoverty activist and Order of Canada recipient who said she was “dressed for shackles” went to jail on Wednesday, sentenced to seven days for defying a court injunction by protesting the proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline.
Jean Swanson, who is also a candidate for Vancouver city council, and Susan Lambert, a former president of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation, were among seven people who appeared before B.C. Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Affleck.
All pleaded guilty to contempt of court, were sentenced to seven days behind bars and were taken straight to jail.
Swanson, speaking outside court before the proceeding, said she was “dressed for shackles” and doesn’t fear jail time.
“We’re just going to have to keep doing this to stop the pipeline, it’s insane.”
As occupants of the longtime protest encampment Camp Cloud on Burnaby Mountain stay put despite a court-ordered eviction, Swanson said there is a possibility more people could face sentencing.
“It’s pretty bad that the City of Burnaby is doing this. They’re supposed to be against the pipeline. They shouldn’t be bringing forward an injunction,” Swanson said.
Swanson was selected by the Coalition of Progressive Electors as one of its candidates in this fall’s municipal election in Vancouver. She is a longtime anti-poverty activist and coordinator with the Carnegie Community Action Project, which supports the Downtown Eastside.
Burnaby-South MP Kennedy Stewart, who is running for mayor of Vancouver, showed up at court to say he fully supports Swanson and the other protesters who have been arrested protesting the planned expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline from Alberta.
“The people here deserve better and the people of our city deserve better. Jean and the others here today were standing up for our coast and I’m proud to stand in support of them,” Stewart said.
About 100 supporters packed the courtroom.
Crown prosecutor Monte Ruttan said deterrence should be the reason for the sentencing, adding that there have been continued arrests in front of the facility even after it was announced jail sentences would be pursued for those who violated the injunction.
Swanson and her co-accused took turns expressing their opposition to the federal government’s purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline; their submissions drew cheers and prompted the judge to give the crowd a stern warning.
“This pipeline is the last gasp of a dying fossil fuel industry. Kinder Morgan decided it couldn’t go on, and if we keep protesting, the Trudeau government is going to have to give up too,” Swanson said in her statement before the court.
Lambert told the court she was ready to face the consequences for her actions, but said she “feels a bit more like a political prisoner.”
“It is my conviction, and I suspect everyone’s in this courtroom, that scientists and our First Nations people are right. Emissions from the use of fossil fuels are harming our planet to the point of no return,” she said.
The others sentenced Wednesday were Sachiko Gyoba, Heather Martin-Mcnab, Kathleen Flaherty, Hisao Ichikawa and Adrien Long.
Gyoba, a 74-year-old retired elementary school teacher, stated the reason for her participation in the protest before being led away.
“Many voted for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau solely because he promised to cancel the Kinder Morgan pipeline,” she said. “He didn’t cancel it, he chose to buy it, with billions of dollars of our money. And I am strongly protesting that.”
Martin-Mcnab, a resident of Salt Spring Island who had come to the mainland by bus to protest, said she will be celebrating her 58th birthday in jail.
“I’m proud and saddened, your honour, to be on this side of the struggle to wake our government up to what is really at stake here,” she said in tears. “It was not a lack of respect for the court but a greater fear for the future that brought me to my decision.”
Another accused, Ichikawa, chose to sing a song when he reached the podium.
“Stop the pipeline, stop the oil tankers, we don’t want them here,” he sang, to a tune many in the courthouse’s public gallery began to hum along to.