Bob Simpson, MLA Cariboo North, January 31, 2013 – The BC Liberals will introduce legislation in this short pre-election session to give Cabinet and/or the Minister of Forests the ability to convert replaceable volume-based timber licences to area-based tenures. The bill will consist of a few short paragraphs that will enable a designated politician to set the rules by which a private corporation can be given exclusive rights over areas of our public forests.
At best, some of the rules governing the rollover of volume-based licences to area-based tenures may be publicly announced as regulations set by Cabinet sometime after the legislation is passed. However, sources involved in discussions with government about this proposed legislation are hearing that most of the rules will be guided by policy, which can be established and revised by a Minister and his or her staff without reference to Cabinet, the Legislature, or the public.
The Minister of Forests has publicly claimed that the recommendation to enable the rollover of forest licences was made by the Timber Supply Committee after their public meetings last summer. This is patently false: the Committee suggested a variety of considerations “if conversion to more area-based tenures is desirable.” What the Committee discovered in its hearings is that while there is some support for more area-based tenures, there is still confusion and concern about any major shift to this form of tenure because of the exclusivity of rights they give private corporations over our public forests.
When Social Credit attempted a similar rollover in 1988, widespread public backlash squashed the policy change. We need to mount a similar response to stop this unseemly, ill-timed, and politically motivated attempt to fundamentally alter our public forest tenure system.
ALTERNATE COURSE OF ACTION
Instead of passing legislation that would enable the wholesale conversion of the replaceable forest licences held by a few large forest companies, the government should take the conversation about area-based tenures that was started by the Timber Supply Committee to the next level by conducting a specific, time limited consultation on tenure reform throughout the province (not simply in the mountain pine beetle zone).
If there is a case to be made for more area-based tenures, then British Columbians should be informed about the pros and cons of expanding this form of tenure, and the general public should be able to influence the process by which the public forest tenure system is changed.
If the Liberals do introduce the proposed legislation this spring, then the NDP should commit to the following: 1) to repealing the legislation immediately should they form government; and 2) to a province-wide consultation on tenure reform. 2
BACKGROUND
- BC has a long history of debating how to provide private companies with access to our timber resources. The 1988 attempt by the Social Credit government to “rollover” volume-based licences to area-based tenures was dubbed “privatization on a massive scale” by the NDP Forest Critic. The rollover was stopped by widespread opposition from environmental organizations, small independent operators, and the public.
- The claim that this legislation is coming forward because of a recommendation from the Special Committee on Timber Supply is patently false. The current attempt to convert volume-based licences to area-based tenures was raised with Cabinet in April 2012 as a possible solution to ensure that Hampton Affiliates would rebuild the Burns Lake mill. See pages 5 and 10 of the leaked Cabinet document. We’ve posted a timeline of the current decision on our website. Minister Thomson has suggested an alternative history, and you can read my response here.
MISSING INFORMATION
- There has been no definitive provincial assessment of the claim that area-based tenures result in better forest management or that they attract more investment in BC’s public forests. Some anecdotal information was given to the Special Committee to suggest that area-based tenures are superior, but no studies were presented to prove that this is, in fact, the case.
- When asked about area-based tenures during the Timber Supply Committee hearings, it was obvious (often as the result of follow up questions by NDP Forest Critic Norm Macdonald) that respondents did not automatically or intentionally mean the rollover of volume-based tenures to privately held area-based tenures. Proponents of area-based tenures were often referring to more woodlots, community forests, and First Nations tenures, not more area-based tenures for forest companies.
- The sorry state of BC’s forest inventory (as per the Auditor General’s report) means the government will be issuing these new area-based tenures blind! In his letter of intent to Hampton Affiliates, Minister Thomson states that upon passing enabling legislation this spring, Hampton will receive area-based tenures equivalent to the company’s current proportion of the cut in the Lakes TSA. Given the lack of current inventory data for that TSA and the poor health of its forests, it is conceivable that Hampton will be given exclusive rights over a much larger area of BC’s public forests than it would receive if those forests were healthy and the inventory were complete.
POSSIBLE CONSEQUENCES OF LEGISLATION
- Using “enabling legislation” to convert volume-based tenures to area-based tenures means there will likely be no legal guarantees of a defined public process or legal terms under which this rollover will take place. For example, there may be no fixed public compensation for giving companies exclusive rights to our forests: no set clawback of allowable cut, no set requirements to invest in communities, and no set criteria to create new jobs or diversify the sector.
- “Rolling over” replaceable forest licences to area-based tenures at this time could lead to almost 70 percent of BC’s forests coming under the exclusive control of five or six forest companies due to the industry consolidation that followed the Liberals’ 2003 Forest Revitalization Strategy.
- As a result of changes to forest legislation made by the BC Liberals in 2003, once a private company is awarded an area-based tenure there is virtually no oversight by government on the sale of that asset by the private company. Timber West, which has a number of Tree Farm Licences and no manufacturing facilities on the coast, was just purchased by pension funds with no input from the BC Government. There will be nothing to prevent state-owned enterprises from purchasing these area-based tenures in the future.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
The following materials provide additional background on this issue:
- Timeline of current rollover proposals
- Leaked Cabinet document (p. 5, 10)
- Special Committee on Timber Supply Report (p. 12-13, 28)
- Minister Thomson’s letter of intent to Hampton Affiliates
- Beyond the Beetle: A Mid-Term Timber Supply Action Plan (p. 12-13)
- Timber Supply Committee transcripts
- Ben Parfitt’s Province article
- Minister Thomson’s response to Ben Parfitt
- My response to Minister Thomson
- Forest Tenure and Management in British Columbia, a history of tenure reform in BC
- Rollover Debates, 1988: Introduction of Bill; Second Reading; Committee Stage Debate I; Committee Stage Debate II.