Dear Sir:
The Dec. 29, 2010 guest comment by Colin Kinsley in The Terrace Standard, “Tanker ban would deny Canada’s trading roots” (and perhaps in other newspapers of similar journalistic quality) is a distortion of reality to the point of being absurd.
It never ceases to amaze at the depths to which one might plunge their character for the love of the almighty dollar. In this case the almighty Enbridge dollar. In a misguided history lesson Mr. Kinsley rightly points out that we are, of course, a trading nation and have been for generations. He lists “mail, lumber, coal, minerals and wheat (I thought coal was a mineral...I could be wrong) as those items that we have shipped. He goes on to say “safely and reliably” and this is simply not true.
Anyone not on the Enbridge payroll, even somebody with limited investigative talents, upon examining the facts, will quickly come to the conclusion that accidents have happened with frightening regularity.
There have been losses of ships, loss of cargo, even loss of life. Not to belittle loss of life here but the only reason all these accidents have not been catastrophic and memorable is that they have not involved oil tankers and devastating damage to our environment and the lives of countless Canadians.
As an oil spill would doubtless be detrimental to all aspects of trade on the northwest coast, instead of the headline reading “Tanker ban would deny Canada’s trade routes” it should read “Tanker ban would ensure the continuing safety of Canada’s trade routes.”
We are not “slamming the door on the most important trade routes and relationships in the world” as Mr. Kinsley would state, but ensuring that they continue safely by slamming the door on Enbridge oil shipped from our northern coast. Mr. Kinsley would have us believe that only “environmental activists and their political allies” seek to stop their planned project.
In fact, a tanker ban was accepted by a majority in Parliament and a full 80 per cent of the population in BC oppose Enbridge’s planned pipeline and tanker activity on our coast.
Let us not forget the symbolic “Declaration of War” against Enbridge by some First Nations and a vow to not let their pipeline proceed across First Nations land to where those tankers would dock.
Next we are assailed by the illogic that by saying ‘no’ to Enbridge we are saying no to “tens of thousands of jobs” when just the opposite is true.
Only a handful of the jobs that would be created will be permanent.
In view of the fact that we could build in Canada a means to process oil near or at the source then ship the finished product (with greatly diminished risk of devastating consequence) and create so many more sustainable jobs we can see that Enbridge is trying to export our jobs.
Perhaps Enbridge money has made Mr. Kinsley lose a little touch with reality.
He goes on to try to validate his logic by invoking the name of a Prime Minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, who was forced to resign amid scandals of accepting bribes.
Ironic huh?
Mike Ross,
Terrace, B.C.