Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Cariboo—Prince George.
I would like to talk about our motion today. Oil and gas is something that I am especially close to in Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies. We have our own oil in my neck of the woods. One of my first jobs as a young guy was working on pipelines in the north, about 15 kilometres from the Yukon border.
I want to speak specifically about three particular issues that have been brought up by the NDP. First I would like to talk about claims by the leader that aboriginals do not support the project. Second, I would like to talk about the safety of the project, and the safety of oil and gas development in Canada generally. Third, I would like to talk a little about the hypocrisy of using oil and yet being in opposition to its development.
Let us start with the aboriginal support. I have an article here from person I have met, Calvin Helin, from B.C., president of Eagle Spirit Energy Holdings. He is aboriginal. I will read a few quotes from this particular article: “The leaders of a First Nations-backed oil pipeline and tanker export proposal off the B.C. coast are speaking out against legislation introduced last week”.
The moratorium is what this is speaking specifically about. They are against the moratorium because they want the benefits of developing resources to their people. It goes on, “To be clear; there has been insufficient consultation for the proposed tanker moratorium and it does not have our consent”.
This was from the statement by Eagle Spirit Energy, an initiative of elected and hereditary chiefs from B.C., with elected co-chairs from B.C. and Alberta. It continues with, “we do believe environmental protection and responsible economic development is possible.” “This ill-conceived legislation”—referring again to the moratorium—“puts the prosperity and the future of our people, particularly our youth, in jeopardy.”
There it is, in terms of the benefit to aboriginal peoples themselves. We have even seen with other pipeline projects the government has said no to that there was a vast majority of support by aboriginal communities along those particular pipelines.
To say in a broad statement that all aboriginal peoples are against oil pipelines is ridiculous. I have a lot of friends I grew up with in Fort St. John and Dawson Creek who work in the industry, and they absolutely, full on, support oil and gas development in our province.
The fact that this oil comes from Alberta is irrelevant to us. We see energy as energy. With regard to the capacity to provide clean energy that is produced in the safest manner in the world, by whatever method members could name, whether it is oil sands, pipeline, shipping across the ocean, we have the safest regimes in the world.
I would like to speak a bit about what I have learned as part of the B.C.–Yukon caucus and in my critic role for the Asia-Pacific gateway. We heard a presentation from Teekay shipping. These are some of the companies that build double-hulled tankers and actually operate them. At the time that we heard the presentation, there had not been one breach of a double-hulled vessel in the world, yet we see millions and millions of barrels of oil per day transported across our oceans. An incident that happened back in the 1980s caused the whole industry to change its entire perspective on safety, and it has been dramatically changed. We see the staggering amount of shipments that go on per day. It is 60 million barrels per day, pretty much without incident. That is an awful lot of oil going across the ocean without much incident.
I am going to speak about the east coast for a minute, and I will quote another article. This is a great article that I would highly recommend, “Sinking the myth of dangerous West Coast oil tanker traffic”. The author says it quite well, that it is myth, and it really is.
Let’s start on our eastern coasts. Transport Canada data shows that more than 1.6 million barrels of petroleum is safely moved from 23 Atlantic Canada ports each day. Another 500,000 barrels per day moves up the St. Lawrence to Montreal and other Quebec ports. Overall, Eastern Canada’s ports berth some 4,000 inbound petroleum tankers each year without any major incidents.
What we are talking about on the east coast and the Kinder Morgan project is an increase in tanker traffic. It is a dramatic increase in Vancouver traffic, from five per week to 35 per week. Meanwhile, on the east coast, as I just said, 4,000 inbound petroleum tankers operate each year without a major incident. I just want to highlight this.
We have seen presentations where we have looked at other ports around the world, where literally thousands of tankers move in a harmonious way. It is something to see when one watches on a graphic screen, how many tankers move in a day and do so safely around the world. We are talking about an increase from five to 35 per week.
In talking about the article and the myth of dangerous west coast oil tanker traffic, it is exactly that, a myth.
Most people know that I am a British Columbia member of Parliament. Like a lot of other MPs, I generally fly back on Thursday nights on a flight from Ottawa to Vancouver. It is not just Conservative members on that flight. I see a lot of NDP members, as well, getting on that same airplane. Guess what goes into that airplane to allow it to fly? It is a product that is produced from oil and is called jet fuel. I always find it ironic that members of both the Green Party and the New Democratic Party get on the same plane as I do and protest that very product's development and production. I would use a strong word to describe that, and it is hypocrisy.
I know of no electric airlanes that can fly from Ottawa to Vancouver. We need to develop oil and gas because we need it for our planes, for building smart phones, for almost everything in our modernized world. Would it not be practical to develop our resources but to do it responsibly? We see from the B.C. Green Party and the NDP in B.C., this ridiculous agreement that says they will do their very best to shut down projects like this, yet they still go to the gas station and fill up their vehicles with the product. That does not compute with me.
A person of principle is somebody who stands by a principle. People can have their principles, but they should live by them. If people believe in not supporting any kind of oil and gas development, then they should not use it. It is straightforward. It is fine to have a strong position, but I do not see NDP members in the chamber, or members from the provincial NDP or Green Party, walking back to British Columbia. Given the product that is made from oil from the oil sands and turned into jet fuel that powers the planes that fly those members back and forth from Ottawa to Vancouver, I do not know how they can keep a straight face while doing that.
Another person I have happened to bump into a few times in the lineup to get on those same planes is a man named David Suzuki. He comes up to our neck of the woods and into our ridings. He tries to stop pretty much any natural resource project that is being planned or thought about in my area of Fort St. John.
It has been mentioned before about some of the high flyers, the people with the big yachts. They seem to have developed a conscience. They say we can develop oil and gas on the east coast of Canada, but they want to keep the west coast of B.C. as a park for all to visit once in a lifetime.
I have spoken about this in detail. Members need to absolutely support our opposition motion. I give full credit to some of the speakers on the government side who are defending the project. We want more solid leadership in the province, so that when threats like this are made by coalition governments, the federal government will stand by a decision and make sure it happens.