With the exception of a pledge to “fix” the Impact Assessment Act, end the Justin Trudeau government’s moratorium on oil tankers on B.C.’s north coast, and some specific supports for Canada’s oil and gas sector, the Conservative Party of Canada’s planks on the country’s resource industries do not appear to be radically different from the Liberal Party of Canada government’s.
Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole has even included a climate change action plan in his party’s platform, with some policies bearing a remarkable similarity to those already implemented or promised by the Liberal government, including a federal carbon tax, albeit a somewhat modified two-tiered version.
Consumers would pay a carbon tax that starts at $20 per tonne and top out at $50 per tonne. Carbon tax rates for industry would be tied to the rates of Canada’s biggest trading partners: the U.S. and European Union.
Industrial carbon tax rates could hit $170 per tonne by 2030, “but only if the combination of adopting a price based on that of our major trading partners and working with the U.S. on North American standards has not assured us that we are on a path to our Paris commitment.”
The one novelty is a proposed “personal low-carbon savings account.” Carbon taxes paid by consumers would not go to the government, but into personal savings accounts, with the money to be used for “green” purchases like bicycles and public transit passes.
The Conservative climate strategy also includes a low-carbon fuel standard and zero-emission vehicle and renewable natural gas mandates – all modelled on B.C.’s – a carbon border tariff, a clean-buildings plan, a multibillion-dollar hydrogen strategy, a $5 billion investment in carbon capture and storage and $1 billion to accelerate small modular reactor nuclear power.
“It’s good to see them make some serious statements about climate change,” said Marc Lee, senior economist for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
But for the most part, he said, the Conservative climate change plan is a watered-down version of Liberal policies.
Overall he doesn’t see much in the Conservative platform that distinguishes it from the Liberals, apart from a few sops thrown to the party’s supporters in Alberta, such a pledge to “fix” the Impact Assessment Act, scrap a moratorium on oil tanker traffic on B.C.’s northern coast and criminalize blockades that shut down critical infrastructure, like last year’s railway protests .
“That type of stuff, it’s a little bit of red meat to the base in Alberta, but none of that stuff seems super significant,” Lee said. “I don’t see a whole lot of daylight across all these things between the Conservatives and the Liberals, to be honest.
“When you read through – not just the energy, but the forestry and mining and other stuff – it’s the same old 21st century world of resource extraction, which is just Canada is a quarry for foreign interests and our job is just to dig stuff up and ship it to foreign markets.”
Mark Jaccard, a sustainable energy economist at Simon Fraser University, who has helped craft a number of Canadian climate policies, agrees that the Conservative climate policies are “inferior” to the Liberals’ strategy. But he said he is “thrilled” to see the Conservatives committing to sincere climate action policies, which he added may be better than the NDP plan, insofar as it would not “hammer industry” and threaten jobs the way the NDP plan might.
The Conservative platform pledges support and policy changes for Canada’s resources and energy sectors. It contains boilerplate pledges to resolve the softwood lumber dispute with the U.S., finish the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion and protect wild salmon.
Of interest to B.C. is a pledge to establish a hatchery marked fish program for sport fishers, and enforced timelines for wild salmon stock assessments.
For mining, the Conservatives are promising a critical minerals strategy, and for the natural gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG) sector, they promise a federal export strategy.
The latter is important, said Stewart Muir, executive director for Resource Works. He points to the cancellation of the $14 billion Énergie Saguenay LNG project by the Quebec government as a reason why a federal LNG policy is needed. That project would have sourced its natural gas from B.C. and Alberta.
As for aquaculture, North Vancouver Island communities that rely on salmon farming for jobs and taxes may be disappointed to find no pledge to reverse the Liberal government’s plan to phase out open-net salmon farming in B.C., Muir said.
“I see nothing saying they’re going to reconsider it, so if they’re trying to pick up seats on the north Island, I don’t think this platform will help them,” Muir said.
For resource industries, the most important pledge may be the one to amend aspects of Bill C-69, which created new agencies and acts, including the Impact Assessment Agency and Canadian Energy Regulator, which replaced the National Energy Board for regulating energy projects. The new regulatory regime was supposed to improve the process.
“It has not delivered as promised,” Muir said.
One pledge that is likely to be welcomed by the resource sector, especially the energy industry, is a commitment to help First Nations become more involved in resource industries through the creation of a Canadian Indigenous Opportunities Corp., which would assist Indigenous people in acquiring equity stakes in major projects.
“I’m very pleased that they’re focused on access to capital for First Nations,” Muir said. “They put a number on it – $5 billion on the table in bank loans.”
The Conservative platform commits to upholding Indigenous rights as per the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Specifically, it commits to implementing Article 18 of UNDRIP, which deals with the right of Indigenous people to participate in decision-making “in accordance with their own procedures.”
This is aimed at addressing conflict that has arisen between elected and hereditary leaders. It is a question that has beleaguered the Coastal GasLink pipeline project in B.C., with elected and hereditary chiefs taking opposing views.
The Conservatives pledge to “develop a transparent process that communities can use to identify who represents them in consultations if it is to be someone other than elected chiefs.” •
