07) YOUNG PEOPLE VS. TAR SANDS DESTRUCTION

(The following article is from the June 1-15, 2008, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Buried below the Boreal Forest of northern Alberta is a source of oil known as the tar sands. Companies are now producing over a million barrels of oil per day from the tar sands, and this number is constantly increasing. Oil from the sands has to be heated with steam in order to be fluid, requiring the use of immense amounts of power and water.

     Environmental, labour and Aboriginal activists have all raised serious concerns over current government policy towards the tar sands and the impact on the ecology, society, and energy sovereignty. The Federal government gets royalties amounting to onlyone percent of the price of each barrel, and Harper's Tories have recently extended an federal Accelerated Capital Cost Allowance tax break to tar sands projects until 2010.

     Mike Hudema is a former student leader, activist, long-time Edmontonian, and author of a short book entitled An Action a Day Keeps Global Capitalism Away. He currently works for Greenpeace in Edmonton and is helping coordinate the Stop the Tar sands campaign. PV correspondent Johan Boyden spoke to him about this work.

People's Voice: What should people know about the Tar sands?

Mike Hudema: People should be aware of the tremendous social and environmental impact of the Alberta tar sands. In 2020, the Tar sands will have produced more greenhouse gasses than all of Canada's cars and trucks combined. This is single-handedly changing Canada's Kyoto goals, and changing Canada's stance in international negotiations and agreements on the environment. Tar sands production causes 40 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent to be emitted every year - ensuring that Canada cannot meet its Kyoto targets.

     There is also the issue of ground water depletion and pollution. The tar sands are the largest user of ground water in Alberta, and this is having a huge impact with pollution on health, especially in down-stream communities, such as Fort Chippewan, where we've been seeing rare forms of cancer. In addition to carbon dioxide, tar sands also emit nitrogen oxide, sulphur oxide, and volatile organic compounds.

     The Tar sands are an area the size of Vancouver Island. The actual area available for leasing - the first step before development - is about the size of Florida. We are seeing the complete destruction of habitat in these areas.

What is Greenpeace calling for?

     The main demand is that since this process is so destructive, and given global warming, now is not the time to expand the development of unconventional sources of oil.

     What is happening in Alberta is a fundamental change in the act of oil extraction. We're talking about huge strip-mines - over a hundred meters deep. This is fundamentally different than the pumps and jack wells that Albertan's have traditionally seen.

     So we are calling for Alberta to make an ecological U-turn in its environmental and energy policy. Alberta is one of the best places in Canada to build a renewable energy economy. It has the most wind in the country, more sunlight, and excellent sources of geothermal energy. There are also the capital and financial resources.

Tell us about the campaign.

     It's definitely been a very active campaign to get the images out of the tar sands destruction to the Alberta public, and also across Canada and internationally. We've organized a wide-range of community meetings and thirty-nine groups in Alberta have signed onto the campaign.

     We were active during the provincial election, following Premier Ed Stelmac as well, and have organized two larger scale actions. In November, on the opening day of the Alberta legislature, four Alberta activists dropped a forty-foot banner off the High Level Bridge, downtown close to the legislature. And about two weeks ago during the Premier's fundraiser dinner, where he was launching essentially a twenty-five million dollar campaign to convince the world that the tar sands problem didn't really exist, we dropped a large banner behind him saying "The Best Premier that tar sands money can buy."

How are youth contributing to the campaign?

     Young people are making a huge contribution to our campaign - many of our volunteers are youth and justifiably so, because it really is the young peoples future that is at stake. There are an important part of our volunteer base, researching, making reports, and outreaching as well.

     To get involved, or to just sign the petition, go to http://www.nonewapprovals.ca or http://www.greenpeace.ca/tarsands.

08) HOW BILL C-50 ENCOURAGES DISCRIMINATION

(The following article is from the June 1-15, 2008, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

This commentary by Harsha Walia is reprinted from the Vancouver Sun, May 21, 2008

Recently the Conservative government introduced amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, buried in the Budget Implementation Bill C-50. By making it a matter of confidence, the government forced opposition parties to accept them or call an election.

     Despite being opposed to the Bill, the Liberals chose to safeguard their own electoral interests over the principles of justice and fairness. Immigration Minister Diane Finley has attempted to downplay Bill C-50's significance by characterizing it as "small changes to modernize the system"; while launching an unprecedented multimillion dollar advertisement campaign, largely running in 'ethnic' media only and containing very few substantive details. The ads are the first time that Citizenship and Immigration Canada has launched an ad campaign to promote legislation that Parliament has not yet passed.

     Under the proposed changes, even if someone meets the necessary - already stringent criteria for a visa (such as a permanent resident visa), the ministry can arbitrarily reject the application. Humanitarian and Compassionate applications no longer have to be examined if the applicant is outside Canada. The ministry will have the power to decide the order in which applications are processed, regardless of when they are filed.

     The minister will also have the power to issue quotas and restrictions on the country of origin and category of person. This modification would sanction racism similar to the 1923 Chinese Exclusion Act or the 1911 Order in Council prohibiting the landing of "any immigrant belonging to the Negro race."

     The government says there will be no discrimination as the Charter of Rights and Freedoms will be respected; however the Charter does not apply to potential immigrants. Furthermore, the government says the instructions will be transparent; however this publication will occur after the Bill comes into effect and will not be subject to any consultation or approval process.

     The government says these amendments will not give them power to intervene in individual cases. However, the very nature of these changes is to allow for discretion in rejecting or discarding applications that meet the existing criteria.

     The government has said that the changes will not affect family reunification. However, the bill includes the power to issue restrictions in the Family Class category and overseas Humanitarian and Compassionate claims.

     The government says these changes will not impact refugees. However, refugees will be affected by the withdrawal of the legal right to permanent residence if they meet the requirements of the law and the elimination of the right to have an overseas Humanitarian and Compassionate application examined.

     The main justification the government is providing for Bill C-50 is that it will fix the backlog. However, instead of getting rid of the inexcusably long waiting list by easing immigration bureaucratic controls, their solution is to give themselves the power to simply kick people off the list.

     An array of organizations have expressed their opposition, including the Canadian Bar Association, Canadian Council for Refugees, Canadian Arab Federation, Canadian Labour Congress, African Canadian Legal Clinic, Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and the Chinese Canadian National Council.

     The major lobby for Bill C-50 comes from business organizations who want immigration policy to meet labour market needs, meaning immigrants are disposable other than their value as labour. The Conservative government says they are "welcoming record numbers of newcomers" but the reality is that migrants are not welcome unless they are wealthy, super-professional, or are willing to work as temporary workers without basic legal protection. In Canada today, the number of people admitted each year on temporary worker visas is greater than the number admitted as permanent residents.

     What motivates the Canadian government and businesses to recruit temporary workers is that they are essentially indentured servants. A 2006 North-South Institute study documented systemic abuse amongst migrant workers, including low wages, long hours with no overtime pay, unsafe working conditions, discrimination, and being tied to the "importing" employer.

     Bill C-50 and the Safe Third Country Agreement creates a "Fortress Canada" by disallowing up to 40 per cent of asylum seekers, and the North American Security and Prosperity Partnership sanction the favouring of migrant workers as labour market commodities while creating an increasingly hostile climate to family class immigrants, refugees, and displaced migrants.

     At the same time, the Conservative government has hypocritically and opportunistically made announcements to acknowledge the Komagata Maru tragedy and allocated money to commemorate the Ukrainian-Canadian internment and the Chinese Head Tax. Yet these historical injustices are being perpetuated through racist, exploitative, and restrictive policies such as Bill C-50.

     (Harsha Walia is a member of No One Is Illegal.)