Doerkson questions a tanker ban that applies to Canadians and nobody else

KRAKÓW — Recently elected Conservative Party of BC premier-designate Lorne Doerkson has not yet joined the federal Conservative push to scrap the North Coast oil tanker ban, even as Coastal First Nations declared the matter "closed" after Liberals voted down a repeal bill on Wednesday.He has, however, questioned a ban he says applies to Canadians and nobody else.The vote in the House of Commons on Wednesday was along party lines at second reading of Bill C-264, a private member’s bill from Calgary Conservative MP David McKenzie seeking to repeal the moratorium. The Oil Tanker Moratorium Act, introduced as Bill C-48 by then-Transport Minister Marc Garneau and given royal assent on June 21, 2019, formalized a long-standing policy. It prohibits oil tankers carrying more than 12,500 metric tonnes of crude oil or persistent oil from stopping, loading, or unloading at ports or marine installations along BC’s north coast. The area runs from the Canada-US border in the north to the mainland point opposite the northern tip of Vancouver Island, covering Dixon Entrance, Hecate Strait, Queen Charlotte Sound, and Haida Gwaii. Smaller shipments remain allowed so northern communities can receive heating oil and other products. A voluntary tanker exclusion zone has existed since 1985. Fines for violations can reach $5 million. The law effectively blocks large-scale crude exports from northern ports such as Prince Rupert.Only Conservatives supported sending the repeal bill to committee for further review on Wednesday..Prime Minister Mark Carney made a rare appearance in the House to vote against it. In July, Carney and then-British Columbia premier David Eby had agreed to maintain the ban “without alteration, suspension, or narrowing of scope.” The proposed Pacific Link pipeline was then routed south to Roberts Bank to respect the ban.As previously reported by Western Standard in April, internal briefing memos obtained from the Eby government through a freedom-of-information request instructed staffers under his government to begin "building a counter-case" for any northern BC pipeline route long before any plans had been finalized, demonstrating the level of the BC NDP's unwillingness to support any such project..Carney and the federal Liberals have similarly shown an unwillingness to revisit the northern tanker ban.The federal Conservatives, by contrast, had pointed to a private-sector proposal from Calgary-based Strathcona Resources to ship up to 250,000 barrels a day by rail on existing tracks to Prince Rupert. Parkland Conservative MP Dane Lloyd posted a video calling Carney’s bluff: a Canadian energy company would pay to upgrade the Port of Prince Rupert for that volume. “All you have to do is extend the same exemption to the tanker ban that you’ve given to the Port of Vancouver,” he said..Doerkson’s own record on the ban has been more measured, if not unclear. On October 1, during the campaign, he took questions on the topic and did not commit to removing it. .He told reporters then, and has maintained, that other countries use the waters and that the ban seemingly only applies to Canadians. On October 27 he gave a further statement on the issue, noting the law “applies to Canadians and nobody else.” “American tankers move oil down this same coast from Alaska every day, and the law says nothing to them. Those are real concerns and British Columbians should know I share them," Doerkson said. Some have taken those comments, which did not explicitly endorse or promise to revisit the ban, as a tacit commitment to keeping the moratorium in place.CTV News Vancouver, for example, reported Wednesday that BC’s incoming premier “doesn’t support tanker ban reversal pitched by Poilievre.” .The post drew a Community Note and widespread pushback pointing out that Doerkson had not issued a direct statement opposing the reversal. His emailed response to CTV focused on the project in front of them and said he does not accept having to "choose between protecting the coast and building the economy."North Island–Powell River Conservative MP Aaron Gunn called the headline false. He posted that the ban is “ideological, unscientific” and “arbitrarily applied to one region of the country and not others,” and has “always been opposed by conservatives.”.Legislature reporter Ben O’Hara-Byrne, drawing his own conclusions, summarized the provincial Conservative position as “not a fight for now.” .Meanwhile, Samuel Schooner, president of Coastal First Nations – Great Bear Initiative and elected chief of the Nuxalk Nation, issued a statement after the House of Commons vote suggesting the fight war already over. Communities on the North Coast “have consistently said ‘no’ to oil tankers for over 50 years,” he said in a statement on behalf of the organization.Coastal First Nations is the operating name of the Great Bear Initiative Society, a non-profit registered under the BC Societies Act. It is an alliance of specific member First Nations on the North and Central Coast and Haida Gwaii—Gitga’at, Gitxaała, Heiltsuk, Kitasoo Xai’xais, Metlakatla, Nuxalk, Wuikinuxv, and Haida-related entities including the Council of the Haida Nation, Old Massett, and Skidegate. It is not itself a First Nation, a government, or a representative of all coastal First Nations, although its board technically has one representative from each member Nation.The group has long received funding from US philanthropic foundations, including a reported $1 million capital grant and $100,000 startup from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund in 2004, plus substantial grants from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Tides Foundation network, and others active in Great Bear Rainforest and anti-pipeline campaigns. Many have described it as an American-funded advocacy vehicle.

Doerkson questions a tanker ban that applies to Canadians and nobody else

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