Dear Editor:
Re: Pundits were wrong about Libs, column, Burnaby NOW, May 22.
I am writing in response to Keith Baldrey's opinion piece. I want to counter the general belief that not supporting the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion, as Adrian Dix has done, is opposing economic development.
The proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline will have little economic benefit for B.C. Aside from some temporary construction jobs to build it, there will be few jobs for operating it.
Alberta will be the one to benefit - where the diluted bitumen from the tar sands is extracted. Shareholders and executives will also obviously benefit.
In actual fact, B.C. will lose economically (and environmentally) when ruptures and spills happen (not a matter of "if," but "when" and "how much," as the industry admits spills are inevitable) on land, in streams and especially off our coast from the increased tanker traffic. B.C. taxpayers will be paying most of the cleanup costs, and our fisheries and other industries will suffer, not to mention the land and marine wildlife, clean air and water.
It is unfortunate that Dix and the NDP did not frame their opposition to the pipeline well, nor defend it well.
Now that Christy Clark and the B.C. Liberals have won the election, it can be perceived that they now have a new stronger mandate of supporting the pipeline (and Enbridge and any other pipeline proposals that may come forward). They can continue supporting the dirty, polluting and climate altering oil industry, with little economic benefit for B.C. The new government, instead should focus on developing cleaner, more sustainable industries, that create good green jobs and larger, longer term economic benefits for B.C., such as developing more public transit infrastructure, energy retrofitting of buildings and tourism.
My hope is that they will support a brighter, cleaner future. We will see what happens in the next few interesting years.
Geoff Senichenko, Burnaby
