Pipeline dispute will reach Supreme Court: experts

British Columbia’s court case over the flow of heavy oil through the province could be damaged by the NDP government’s previous positions against the expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline, says a legal expert.

The provincial government filed a reference case Thursday in the B.C. Court of Appeal asking whether amendments it is proposing to the Environmental Management Act are valid and if they give the province the authority to control the shipment of heavy oils based on the impact spills could have on the environment, human health or communities.

The province is also asking the court whether the amendments are over-riden by federal law.

Nigel Bankes, chair of natural resources law at the University of Calgary, said he believes the province will lose on the validity question because it is targeting a federally approved project, even though the legislation covers broad environmental concerns.

“All rhetoric, all the public announcements, all the announcements from the premier and the relevant ministers make it clear that this legislation is actually directed at Trans Mountain,’’ he said.

Bankes said a precedent was set in 1984 when the courts ruled the government of Newfoundland and Labrador acted outside its authority by introducing legislation that disrupted Quebec’s right to access hydroelectric power from Churchill Falls.

But Prof. Bruce Ryder of York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School said that case differs from B.C. because the legislation addresses all heavy oil, not just one particular project.