Trudeau regime should learn from War in the Woods

Pipeline purchase was based on ego,

The federal government’s decision to risk $4.5 billion of taxpayers’ money to buy the Trans Mountain pipeline plus more than $6 billion to build a new pipeline is hard to justify. The government states that the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion is essential to meet Canada’s “national interest” to get its oil to world markets.

But as a number of independent studies show, there are alternatives to the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, such as Keystone XL, that can get the same world-market prices and economic benefits without putting B.C.’s coast at risk and without requiring taxpayer subsidies.

A second rationale is that the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion must be built to maintain Canada’s business-friendly reputation. But taking over a private-sector pipeline while facing ongoing public protests is hardly a recipe for improving Canada’s international reputation.

A third rationale is that Canada has a long history of supporting private-sector projects such as the auto industry, and now it is Alberta’s turn. But government support is normally restricted to instances where this is a significant net benefit to Canada that would not be achieved without the support. The Trans Mountain pipeline does not meet this test. It adversely impacts Canada’s business climate by using taxpayer funds to give one pipeline proposal an advantage over its Canadian competitors, and the alleged benefit would occur without government support by the building of alternative pipelines without taxpayer subsidies.

Another defence is that buying Trans Mountain does not risk taxpayer funds. This assertion ignores the fact that Kinder Morgan wanted out because of the legal and the economic risks of rising costs (35 per cent over budget with forecasts of further overruns), declining demand for new pipelines and increased competition from other pipelines.

A final rationale is that building the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion is necessary to garner support in the oil sector to achieve Canada’s climate-change commitments. But the federal government still has not published a plan that shows how we will meet our Paris commitments to reduce emissions by 30 per cent by 2030, and using taxpayer funds to subsidize the expansion of the fossil-fuel industry is hardly the way to get there.

The decision also does not appear to meet the public-opinion test. Recent polls show a majority oppose taxpayer support for the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.

The only possible explanations left are poor decision making and ego. The poor decision making started when the Trudeau government ignored the recommendations of its own report to get more information before approving the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion in 2016 and they have consistently ignored evidence questioning the wisdom of the project ever since.

Another sign of poor decision making is their inconsistency. They banned oil tankers on B.C.’s north coast because they were too risky, but are promoting a seven-fold increase in tankers on the south coast. They are restructuring the pipeline-review process to address major deficiencies but justify their support of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion based on the ‘rigorous’ review process that they rejected.

And they committed to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People to free, prior and informed consent, but then approved the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion without First Nations agreement.

Ironically, their purchase of the pipeline may provide them with one last chance for changing course. If they insist on building TMX, they could appoint a multi-stakeholder task force including First Nations to consider redesigning the project to reduce its worst impacts by scaling down the size of the expansion and directing increased shipments to refineries in Washington State. This would avoid tanker exports from Vancouver, reduce the number of Alaskan tankers through Georgia Straight, and allow for the phasing out of the higher risk aging pipeline.

Combine this with stronger climate-change policies, investment in green energy and increased refining of oil in Canada and we would have an option that comes closer to meeting the national interest than the course we are on. Balancing conflicting interests is never easy. As we learned in the ‘War in the Woods,’ it requires enormous creativity, compromise and patience. Hopefully the federal government can learn from our experience and develop a more acceptable option. Otherwise, we will all pay the price for their ‘my way or the highway’ mentality.