by Delores Broten
In the mid-nineties, in the midst of the NDP’s “over-regulating” grip on British Columbia, an inside source in the pollution prevention arm of the environment ministry once muttered to the Watershed Sentinel that the favouritism shown to large industrial polluters and the lack of concern for toxic pollution in the ministry was shocking, “Much much worse than Ontario under Mike Harris.”
Now the BC Liberal party has set out on what, cumulatively, is a systematic program of destruction of environmental regulation. Communities and BC’s once-powerful environmental movement have been mainly frozen out of the process while the media, largely owned by one company*, focuses on the human interest stories – homeless pensioners, a drunken premier – the government serves up on a regular basis.
* CanWest Global Communications Corp., the rightist Winnipeg-based media monopoly controls both Vancouver daily newspapers, the Victoria Times-Colonist, and top-rated BCTV.
The only good news in this grim sequence is that, eventually, a new government will have to start reinstating environmental and sustainability programs. When they do, they will be able to start from a clean slate, instead of cobbling together bits and pieces from the old programs, because there will be little left to build upon.
Step One: Break It Up! Divide and Conquer
Immediately on taking office, BC Liberals divided the formerly proud Ministry of Environment into two. The new Ministry of Water, Land and Air Protection lost staff and authority to the Ministry of Sustainable Resource Management, which, along with land use planning, has the mandate of aiding and abetting resource extraction, and leasing of Crown land and foreshore. The environment ministry lost its legal role under the Forest Practices Code to protect biodiversity and community watersheds. The power to deal with contaminated mine sites and regulate mining pollution was also taken from the environment shop and transferred to the Ministry of Energy Mines and Resources, which is tasked with promoting mining activities in the province.
Step Two: Starve ’em Out
From the mid-nineties to 2001, the Environment Ministry lost 30% of its funding. Budgets from 2002 to 2005 will see all five resource ministries, including Forests, Energy Mines and Resources, and Agriculture and Fisheries, lose another two fifths of their budgets and one third of their staff. The environment ministry winds up with 42% of the resources it had in 1995. Enforcement and compliance in all ministries will undergo planned reductions.
Step Three: Neutralize the Citizens
Upon taking office, the government immediately threw out the Protection of Public Participation Act, instituted during the dying days of the NDP government. The Act gave the courts power to protect citizens from lawsuits designed to intimidate individuals and stifle public debate (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation).
The statutory requirement for sustainability assessments for all major government projects and agencies was immediately eliminated, as was the Commissioner for Environment and Sustainability.
There has been little or no public consultation except with business and industry lobby groups on re-writes of major legislation such as the Environmental Assessment Act or the Agricultural Land Reserve Act. In some cases, public consultation has been strictly limited in both time and content, while in others, the public’s advice has simply been disregarded. New and upcoming changes to major legislation all brutally limit or eliminate the public right to consultation or involvement while increasing Cabinet’s right to act unilaterally. (See below)
Step Four: Deregulate and De-legislate
Fish Farm Moratorium: Lifted, while environmental rules such as inspections, disease monitoring, and pollutant regulation are reduced in favour of self-monitoring for Atlantic salmon net farms. Recommendations of 1997 scientific Salmon Aquaculture Review not implemented.
Off shore Oil and Gas: 1972 moratorium lifted, funding to University of Northern BC to develop knowledge to allow offshore drilling. Oil and gas slated for doubling of production. Cabinet and bureaucrats can exempt companies from requirements for spacing of wells .
Mining: Repealed the ability of land owners to restrict mining companies’ access, even if that access will interfere with land owners’ buildings or operations. Most oversight of mining pollution removed from environment ministry. Cabinet and bureaucrats can exempt mines from (provincial) pollution permits, and from assessment and clean up provisions, including requirement to secure funds for clean up. Changes liability at historic contaminated sites.
Forests: Removed environment ministry oversight of logging in community watersheds; eliminated stand management for second growth forests. Forest Practices Code was made non-prescriptive and “results based.”
Protected Areas: Enshrined right to compensation for creation of protected areas.
Pulp Mill Effluent (AOX): Lowered standards for a set of organochlorine water contaminants and ignored recommendations for controls on black liquor and air pollution.
Environmental Assessment Act: Minimum triggers for assessment eliminated in favour of government discretion; guarantees of public involvement and access to information eliminated, cabinet and bureaucrats can exempt projects from review; assessments MUST reflect government policy.
Agricultural Land Commission Act: Created regional structure for the commission, increased ability to delegate to local government; removed local government and public input from decisions about private forest land proposed for development under the Forest Land Reserve Act.
Further Improvements Pending, Proposed, And Under Discussion (but not with environmentalists, biologists, conservationists, community organizations, the ecotourism industry, or small business)
Streamside Protection Proposed: Let the developers protect the fish creeks, as they have done so well in the past. The Streamside Protection Regulation required municipalities to protect riparian edges with a 5-to-30 metre building set back, by 2005. In the fall of 2001, a provincial advisory group told the BC Liberals that the regulation was workable and was not going to drive down property values. But the government will likely reduce the setbacks or give developers the “flexibility” to design their own streamside protection e.g.) eliminate the legal standing of provincial protection altogether. Eighty percent of the streams in Greater Vancouver area no longer have fish, while 140 streams in the Georgia Basin are threatened by urban development.
Contaminated Sites Regulation Proposed: Shift risk assessment to private consultants, hired by the owner, from government. Reduce range of responsible people. Limit liability. Require proof that a substance is causing a “significant and verifiable” adverse effect. And, for clean ups, remove cost recovery options for government.
Waste Management Act Proposed: Eliminate permits except for high risk polluters; for medium risk, regulate with Codes of Practice which protect polluters from liability if the code is followed; for low risk, de-regulate and require only registration and that they do no harm (Note that although the government suggests this is an Alberta model, in BC most such polluters are already de facto deregulated.) Reduced use of permits with no other mechanisms means less public right to know, less attention to local situations and less opportunities for public to challenge decisions. Create covenants between government and industry whereby industry agrees to certain practices in exchange for governmentpromises (e.g. promises to waive regulatory requirements; not regulate in the future; speed up approvals or consolidate permits). Environmental Appeal Board to have power for alternative dispute resolution.
Drinking Water Standards Act: Water protection and testing proceeds by Cabinet-mandated “Action Plan” rather than legislation promised in spring of 2002.
Mineral Tenure Act Proposed: Increase the strength of property rights of mining claims so that government will have to pay compensation for land use changes
Pesticide Control Act and Regulation (also known As Integrated Pest Management Act) Proposed: No definition of Integrated Pest Management. Eliminate government approval of Pest Management Plans and limit circumstances that require government-approved permits. Eliminate site specific assessments. Limit or eliminate ability of public to appeal to the Environmental Appeal Board. Increase notification to residents. Increase access to pesticides for domestic use. Gives “the Administrator” wide powers to exempt pesticides from government regulation, without any requirement for safety evaluations of the exempted substances.
“Only the following pesticide uses of high concern would require an approval (permit) [on public land or private land used for forestry]:
- use of high risk pesticides (classified as ‘Permit-Restricted’)
- use of pesticides for predator control,
- uses of pesticides for which no ministry standards have been set, and
- aerial application of pesticides over residential areas.”
Community Charter Proposed: Municipalities will required provincial approval to pass bylaws for environmental protection, green building or energy efficiency standards, all powers they currently have.
Step Five (on-going): Demoralize with Egregious Disregard
South Chilcotin Mountain Park: Created after deadlocked negotiations at the Lillooet Land Use Plan by order-in-council the day before the NDP called an election. Government is under intense pressure from the Mining Association of BC to renege on the protected area. Since there is no evidence of real mineral potential, it appears to be a point of pride with the industry. The conservation movement says that turning over a park, ironically located near Whistler, to mining would precipitate a Markets and anti-Olympics campaign.
Tulsequah Chief Mine: Despite the following:
- a BC Court of Appeals ruling which threw out a 1998 certificate due to lack of consideration of effects the proposed mining project would have on Aboriginal people,
- 12 pages of unresolved objections from the federal fisheries, and
- land claims in progress with the Tlingit First Nation,
the province issued a project approval certificate to Redfern Resources to re-develop the old polluting mine and build a road through unroaded wilderness.
Coal Burning: A major new coal-fired power regulation sets pollution levels substantively less protective than federal guidelines, ignores greenhouse gases, and is designed to encourage more coal burning. A small coal plant produces as much greenhouse gas as 300,000 cars, along with smog forming sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and particulate matter.
Workers Compensation Board: Workers in BC have the right to refuse to work with carcinogens, but the levels and definitions are to be weakened.
* Sources and Disclaimer: The author relied heavily on analysis by West Coast Environmental Law, especially The BC Government: a One Year Environmental Review, and legislative submissions at www.wcel.org, as well as critiques from the BC Environmental Network and member groups, the T. Buck Suzuki Foundation, David Suzuki Foundation, SPEC and individuals, but any misinterpretations in this summary should be attributed to the author alone.
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[From WS February/March 2003]
