Last week Premier Christy Clark, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson were cheek to jowl posing for photos at the big multimillion-dollar transit funding announcement in Burnaby. They put on their best faces and paraded together for the media.
This week Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson is proud to announce that his city is the latest to launch a court challenge aimed at putting the brakes on the Trans Mountain pipeline.
The government giveth and then taketh away.
If Justin Trudeau thought that coming through with his promise of major transit infrastructure bucks would cool the anti-pipeline fervour on the West Coast, he was wrong.
Vancouver’s court challenge is somewhat like Burnaby’s. It’s a no-holds-barred attack on both the NEB process and the decision to recommend approval.
In a statement, Robertson said the board ignored key pieces of scientific evidence about what would happen if there was an oil spill. And, of course, the NEB did not even address the larger picture of greenhouse gas ommissions.
The city also asked the court to prevent the federal government from making a decision until the NEB goes back and looks at it all again under a proper process – one that allows cross-examinations and true community consultations.
But Trudeau’s cagey answers to questions about the pipeline approval are no comfort to anti-pipeline forces.
Trudeau keeps pointing to how hard it is to please everybody and how there’s a lot of give and take in projects. We’re thinking he’s not trying to let the oil barons down softly. He’s more likely signalling to the oil companies that they’re going to get their way again.
It’s one of those political dilemmas that has got us stuck in an Earth-damaging vicious circle.
Trudeau knows that continuing dependency on fossil fuel essentially harms the planet and Canada. But cutting it off now dampens a bit of the economic flow to Alberta and the federal government.
He, like the rest of us, wants it both ways. A cleaner, healthier planet and the ability to keep the money flowing at the same time.
Perhaps he will find that “sweet spot” on the fence and be able to balance his supporters and his principles. But we doubt it.
Perhaps he’s even hoping that one of the court challenges does stop the pipeline.
If he is, we’re with him on that faint hope.
