Media

Media Release- September 3^rd 2015
Serious questions must be asked about Trans Mountain Hearing Process
For Immediate Release
 
Victoria B.C. – After more than a year and a half, the National Energy Board (NEB) hearings for the Trans Mountain Expansion Project remain on hold as the previous deadline for final arguments passes. Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay Gordon Head and Deputy Leader of the BC Green Party is reiterating his call for the BC Government to establish it’s own review process.

September 3rd had been the deadline for intervenors to submit their final arguments for the NEB’s consideration under the old timeline. No new timeline has been established for when intervenors will submit their final arguments, or when the process will be resumed.

“My office prepared almost sixty pages of final arguments calling into question the evidence Kinder Morgan provided, especially around spill response.” said Andrew Weaver. “It is outrageous that once again the very impartiality of the process needs to be seriously debated. We’ve spent hundreds of hours operating under ridiculous time constraints reading thousands of pages of evidence to prepare our submissions and final arguments. The fact that in the eleventh hour the NEB is forced to put the hearing on hold points to the complete dysfunction of the current review process.”

The hearings were suspended by the NEB after Steven Kelly was appointed by Stephen Harper to the NEB in late July. Mr. Kelly is an energy consultant who was involved with preparing evidence that Kinder Morgan is in part relying on to justify the economics of their project,. This has set off a review by the NEB to identify the evidence that is connected to Mr. Kelly, striking any from the record that isn’t replaced by Kinder Morgan.

“The BC government is quick to suggest it’s five conditions are sufficient in ensuring that a project is in the best interests of British Columbians. ” said Andrew Weaver. “The fact is the five conditions can not, and do not act as a replacement for a rigorous process that allows for a diversity of intervenors to cross examine and test the evidence provided. I have lost confidence in the process. It is time for the BC Government to pull out of the equivalency agreement for this project and begin laying plans to initiate its own, rigorous review process.”

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Media Contact

Mat Wright
Press Secretary – Andrew Weaver, MLA
Cell: 250 216 3382
Email: Mat.Wright@leg.bc.ca

Media Release – August 12th 2015
Key Issues Remain Unaddressed in Draft Conditions on Trans Mountain Pipeline
For Immediate Release

Victoria B.C. – Today the National Energy Board today released 145 draft conditions for the Trans Mountain Pipeline. While highlighting a number of existing deficiencies in the application, the conditions fail to address several key concerns with the project.

“There appears to be no reference to the unique properties of diluted bitumen and its fate and behaviour in the marine environment,” said Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay Gordon head and Deputy Leader of the BC Greens. “We still have very limited scientific understanding as to what would happen if a diluted bitumen spill were to occur in our coastal waters. But published evidence suggests that a spill clean up would be much more difficult than in the case for traditional crude, if it is possible at all.”

Back in 2013, the NEB’s draft conditions for Enbridge’s Northern Gateway Pipeline included a requirement to fund a research program to study the behaviour of heavy oil (diluted bitumen) spills in freshwater and marine environments. Yet today there was no mention of any requirement for such a study.

One of the conditions released today touches on the need to expand the existing oil spill response capacity. However it fails to acknowledge the fact that there is evidence to suggest that Trans Mountain has in some cases overstated the existing response abilities.

“I am pleased that the NEB is requiring Trans Mountain to have a plan to respond to bigger spills faster. But the fact remains that under numerous weather conditions, a spill response would be impossible or severely constrained. Furthermore, there is a substantial difference between actual recovery rates and spill response capacity.” said Weaver

“It’s hard not to draw comparisons back to the Enbridge review panel, where 199 conditions were released and cross examination ensured that the risks of the project were far more rigourously examined and questioned,” noted Andrew Weaver. “The review process for the Trans Mountain project was degraded to a paperwork exchange, and many critical issues with the project remain unaddressed to this day.”

Dr. Weaver’s final argument will be available in early September when it is submitted to the National Energy Board.

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Media Contact

Mat Wright
Press Secretary – Andrew Weaver, MLA
Cell: (1) 250 216 3382 Email:
Mat.Wright@leg.bc.ca

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Media Statement July 21st 2015
As LNG bill passes, British Columbia is at odds with the global community on climate change
For Immediate Release

Victoria B.C. – British Columbia is at odds with the global community, who are calling for governments to take immediate action on addressing and mitigating climate change according to Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay-Gordon Head and Deputy Leader of the B.C. Green Party. This statement comes a week after calling for an emergency debate on whether B.C. legislators are acting with sufficient urgency or demonstrating the leadership needed to mitigate and prepare for climate change.

Yesterday, twenty four of the UK’s foremost academic and professional institutions – including the British Academy, the Royal Society, and the Learned Society of Wales – released a statement that said “responding to the challenge [of climate change] will require deploying the full breadth of human talent and invention. Creative policy interventions and novel technological solutions need to be fostered and applied… Capturing this potential quickly and effectively will drive economic progress.”
“Today the B.C. Liberals are forcing through legislation that they desperately hope will land a single LNG investment,” said Weaver. “At a time when it is imperative that we are making meaningful investments in low-carbon technologies, the B.C. Liberals are pulling out the stops to build fossil fuel infrastructure that will commit the province to an energy-intensive non-renewable industry for the foreseeable future.”
In reference to the regional droughts, forest fires, lack of snowpack, and fishery closures currently affecting B.C.,  Andrew Weaver last week urged the House suspend discussion of LNG legislation to discuss the government’s inaction on climate change. Responding to MLA Weaver’s statement, Finance Minister Michael de Jong said, “…we have certainly experienced some extreme conditions in the province these past number of weeks that have contributed to some challenging circumstances. We heard about that earlier from the minister. Nor do I doubt the member’s interest and commitment to addressing some of the underlying issues that may or may not be contributing to that. Having said that, we are also bound and obliged to conduct proceedings in this chamber pursuant to the standing orders.”
Both the BC NDP and the BC Liberals argued against having an emergency one hour debate on climate change.

“The juxtaposition of the B.C. government being called into a summer session to push LNG legislation through, unwilling to spend an hour discussing our response to climate change while salmon are dying in warm rivers before they can spawn, Gulf Islands are starting to truck in fresh water, and the Premier’s own riding is on fire is incredibly striking, and only further highlights the inaction we are seeing” said Weaver.

“British Columbia has all the tools it needs to tackle climate change head on; we have the renewable resources required, and the innovative, creative, and inspired population,” said Andrew Weaver. “The missing element is a government willing to demonstrate the leadership required to focus the efforts. Right now they seem content to continue rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.”

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Media contact

Mat Wright
Press Secretary – Andrew Weaver MLA
Cell: 250 216 3382
Mat.wright@leg.bc.ca
Twitter: @MatVic

Parliament Buildings
Room 027C
Victoria BC V8V 1X4

Media Statement – May 26, 2015

Green MLA calls for more time to consider Election Amendment Act

For Immediate Release

Victoria, B.C. – Andrew Weaver, M.L.A. for Oak Bay-Gordon Head and Deputy Leader of the B.C. Green Party, introduced an amendment today that called for an additional six months to consider the significant consequences of Bill 20 – the Election Amendment Act. If the bill is enacted, it would provide political parties with private information concerning who did or did not vote in a previous election or by-election. It also creates an election financing free-for-all in the pre-writ period.

With comprehensive individual voter turnout records, political parties can match voter records to their existing data on who their opponents’ supporters are. Any matches can be targeted with highly efficient voter suppression tactics to keep opponents’ supporters away from the polls. These tactics are already common in elections, but their effectiveness varies based, in part, on the quality of targeting data.

With the elimination of pre-writ spending limits, the government has opened the doors for more money to pour into B.C. elections. This further increases the issues of election financing in BC – a jurisdiction that already allows anyone in the world to donate to BC political parties, and allows union and corporate donations.

“This bill will have serious consequences for our democracy,” says Andrew Weaver. “There is no evidence that these changes will increase voter turnout and government knows it. British Columbian’s were never asked whether they wanted these changes – I think we need to give them time to have a say.”

Yesterday during committee stage debates, Minister of Justice, Suzanne Anton, acknowledged the lack of substantive evidence to support the government’s claim that this would improve voter turnout, stating: “This is not based on peer-reviewed literature. This is based on election organization experience.”

“As it stands, this Bill offers clear tools to suppress the vote but only offers the government’s word that it will increase it,” says Weaver. “The fact that this information is being provided after an election raises significant fears that it will be used for voter suppression. The Privacy Commissioner has been clear that the bill needs to be amended. We need more time to address her concerns and to consult the evidence.”

Andrew Weaver’s amendment was supported by Independent MLA Vicki Huntington and by the Official Opposition. It was defeated by the government on a vote.

Bill 20 requires Royal Assent before it is formally enact into law.

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Mat Wright

Press Secretary – Andrew Weaver, MLA

Cell: 250 216 3382

Mat.Wright@leg.bc.ca

Media Statement – May 20, 2015
Green MLA calls Pacific NorthWest LNG-BC Government MOU “shocking and irresponsible”
For Immediate Release

Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay-Gordon Head and Deputy Leader of the B.C. Green Party, says that the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding between the B.C. Government and Pacific NorthWest LNG is a truly shocking and irresponsible act.

“This is the act of a desperate government,” says Andrew Weaver. “For over two years I’ve been saying the same thing. Oversupply in the global natural gas markets means that the economics simply do not support the Liberal’s irresponsible LNG hyperbole. Rather than acknowledging the folly of their pre-election promises, they take the reckless and desperate approach of essentially giving away a resource while simultaneously proposing to hamstring future governments from looking out for the interests of British Columbians.”

The Memorandum of Understanding, signed between Pacific NorthWest LNG and the B.C. Government is a precursor to the controversial project development agreements that are designed to give LNG producers more certainty by making it costly for future governments to change royalty and tax rates.

The project development agreements are being used to get around the fact that by law a government cannot impose limitations on the powers and actions of future governments. They can, however, make it costly, both financially and politically, for a future government to withdraw from an existing agreement.

“By signing this agreement, the government is effectively putting the interests of one corporation ahead of British Columbians. This government has already rewritten environmental laws, rewritten the way royalties are assessed on industry, and advanced a very favourable tax regime for the industry.  Now they are hamstringing future governments. British Columbians are getting a raw deal from a government that is putting politics ahead of good economics. They should be outraged.”

Ironically, this latest event in B.C.’s ongoing LNG debacle comes at a time with the Asian LNG June spot price averaging around $7.12 per million BTU. A recent Macquarie Private Wealth analysis pinned the break even price for BC LNG at between $8.37 and $9.77 per million BTU.

Media contact

Mat Wright
Press Secretary – Andrew Weaver MLA
1 250 216 3382
mat.wright@leg.bc.ca