Notley stays silent while Bill C-69 passes another hurdle
On Wednesday afternoon, federal Bill C-69 passed second reading in the Senate by a vote of 56-29.
The response from the Alberta government on this troubling news?
Crickets. Deafening silence. Inaction on an epic scale.
Officially called the Impact Assessment Act, many people in the energy industry prefer to call it Justin Trudeau’s “No More Pipelines Law.” Deron Bilous, Alberta’s economic development and trade minister, said Bill C-69 will “doom our energy sector.”
Premier Rachel Notley’s NDP government argues it has done plenty to object to Bill C-69. The facts state otherwise. In August of 2017, Alberta Environment Minister Shannon Phillips and Energy Minister Margaret McCuaig-Boyd wrote their federal counterparts a four-page letter initially raising concerns about what was then called the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. It’s not a bad letter but lacks any sense of urgency or alarm.
On Feb. 8, Bill C-69 was tabled in the House of Commons and by March 19 it passed second reading and headed to the House of Commons’ environment committee. Ten days later, United Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney sent a letter to Notley suggesting that the entire legislature unite against Bill C-69. She never responded.
Eventually, Kenney put forward a motion condemning Bill C-69 in the Edmonton legislature. Notley’s government voted against the motion.
From March 22 to May 22, the environment committee held 14 meetings in Ottawa. It was during this time that Chris Bloomer, president of the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, told the committee: “It is difficult to imagine that a new major pipeline could be built under the Impact Assessment Act, much less attract energy investment to Canada.”
The committee had 150 briefs submitted and 117 witnesses appeared. Even though Alberta has the most to lose from this bill, no one from the Alberta government bothered to testify. Not even a brief was submitted before the committee.
This missed opportunity is inexcusable and a gross dereliction of duty considering the significant effect this legislation will have on Alberta if passed.
On May 29, the bill cleared the committee and headed back to the House. Two days later, Alberta sent a letter to three federal ministers, stating: “Alberta also requests that these timelines accommodate government-to-government dialogue and we need to see a plan by June 30, 2018, on how this will occur.”
There’s no evidence of any dialogue occurring. In fact, on June 20, Bill C-69 passed third reading in the House and headed to the Senate. Surely, by now, Notley should have gone nuclear on Bill C-69.
Instead, Notley’s government sent a technical brief to the feds. Then, silence about this disastrous bill from the Alberta government ensued for many months.
On Aug. 15, at the annual Energy and Mines Ministers’ Conference in Iqaluit, the governments of Saskatchewan and Ontario refused to sign a joint statement in protest of Bill C-69. McCuaigBoyd, however, did not publicly raise any objections about Bill C-69 when she had a national audience.
In early September, Alberta business leaders associated with a group called Suits and Boots launched a public campaign to fight Bill C-69.
Finally, on Sept. 25, possibly because of Suits and Boots’ action and resulting media coverage, Notley announced that she would send Phillips and McCuaig-Boyd to Ottawa to lobby the Senate for changes.
On Oct. 9, the Alberta government sent a technical document to the feds about the bill and, on the same day, Notley sent Trudeau the most strongly worded letter to date about the bill.
On Oct. 24, Phillips met with about 100 senators to discuss Bill C-69. Waiting so late into the process is obviously highly risky.
And Notley’s government is claiming it’s done a good job on this file?
“Unlike Jason Kenney,” Mike McKinnon, a spokesman for the energy minister, wrote Thursday, “we are out there every day fighting for things that matter to Albertans like getting the Trans Mountain pipeline built and fixing Bill C-69. We still intend to formally go before the Senate committee to deliver that message.”
There is so much wrong with the above statement. But it gets worse.
“This is too important to get wrong,” continued McKinnon. “We’ve seen what happens when this process fails with the recent Federal Court of Appeal decision and we saw it happen when the Harper-Kenney Conservatives made a complete mess of pipeline approvals with Northern Gateway. As the Premier said on Nov. 28, this is one of the biggest public policy failures of the last generation. It is unforgivable.”
Talk about misplaced blame. Northern Gateway was vetoed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Notley never objected to that devastating act.
In fact, she was in favour of killing Northern Gateway. On April 24, 2015, during an editorial board meeting with the Herald, Notley said she was opposed to Northern Gateway:
“I think Gateway is not the right decision. I think there’s just too much environmental sensitivity there. And I think there’s genuine concerns by the Indigenous communities … And so, I don’t think it’s a particularly good use of our time,” said Notley.
Now, she and her spokespeople are trying to lay the blame on the Harper government that approved it? It’s galling.
As Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers president and CEO Tim McMillan said Thursday: “Bill C-69, as it’s currently written, will devastate not just Alberta’s energy industry but industry across Canada.”
Notley and her government have completely mishandled Bill C-69.
In this case, silence is deadly.