Months of work ahead for Liberals to get Trans Mountain on track
In wake of court ruling, PM vows more Indigenous consultation, eco studies
CALGARY Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his government is preparing to undertake more consultations with First Nations and more environmental studies in order to proceed with the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion between Alberta and British Columbia.
Trudeau’s comments Tuesday mark the first time he has indicated how Ottawa will respond to a surprising Federal Court of Appeal ruling last week, which overturned approvals for the project to expand oil shipments to the West Coast.
“The court ruling laid out we need to do even more work than we have already done,” Trudeau said in Surrey, B.C.
“We’re going to look at that court decision and look at the paths forward that we can take,” Trudeau said, adding the government considers the Trans Mountain project to be in the national interest.
He did not say whether his government intends to challenge the decision in the Supreme Court.
The Federal Court of Appeal ruling was a shock to the domestic energy sector, which believes the Trans Mountain project withstood the most thorough review and consultation process of any pipeline to date. But three judges ruled unanimously that Ottawa did not sufficiently consult affected First Nations and the National Energy Board should have reviewed the impact on oil tanker traffic on the West Coast.
Liberal MPs also shot down a Conservative motion Tuesday that called for six special meetings of the Commons natural resources committee to probe the pipeline’s prospects and drill into why the government bought the existing pipeline for $4.5 billion, knowing a court decision questioning the approval process was pending.
Four opposition members of the committee — three Conservatives and one NDP MP — called for the emergency meeting Tuesday.
As part of the proposal, Finance Minister Bill Morneau and Natural Resources Minister Amarjeet Sohi would have been summoned to explain what’s next.
“It’s clear they failed to meet their own standards on consultations,” Conservative MP Shannon Stubbs said at the meeting, adding that the project was “in peril.”
In an interview, Stubbs said the Liberals made taxpayers the owners of the pipeline through the government’s $4.5-billion acquisition of the project from Kinder Morgan Inc., which closed last week, and should answer to the public on how they intend to proceed.
After the NEB issued its report on the pipeline, Ottawa dispatched a ministerial panel to conduct another round of consultations with affected communities and provided the cabinet with a report of their findings.
However, NDP MP Richard Canning said the consultation process failed to meet the court’s standard because the panel toured through the affected areas on short notice and “nothing was even recorded at those meetings.”
Liberal MP Marc Serré, who attended the meeting, repeated the government’s previous statement that it “inherited a flawed environmental review process” and is working to fix it.
Last week, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley called for an immediate appeal to the Supreme Court and an emergency session of Parliament to “assert its authority and fix the NEB process as it relates to this project.”
Industry and political experts believe the federal government will require months to deal with the new challenges.
“They’re not going to legislate away the Federal Court of Appeal ruling, so we can all forget about that,” said Dennis McConaghy, a former executive at pipeline giant TransCanada Corp.
He said he hopes the government launches an appeal and also announces a plan to remedy and respond to the court’s reasons for nullifying the pipeline’s approvals, including more consultations with First Nations and additional study of oil tankers.
“I’m very confident that they’re going to go out and try to remedy this,” he said, but added that attempts to deal with the court’s recommendations could present “a Vietnam-like quagmire.”
For one thing, he said, the court rejected the ministerial panel’s additional consultation with First Nations but it’s still not clear what would satisfy it.
“Is the court expecting a bilateral negotiation? Does Trudeau himself need to go out and do it?” McConaghy asked.
They’re not going to legislate away the Federal Court of Appeal ruling, so we can all forget about that.