Candidates are making election promises on behalf of ecosystems that can’t vote

The future of the natural systems we rely on to meet our basic needs—food, water, and shelter is being rolled into campaign promises made by sitting and would-be MLAs across the CRD.  In the run-up to the Oct. 19 election, it’s important to remember that these ecological systems aren’t constrained by riding or ideological boundaries. They will be constrained, however, by environmental policies that impact them, and so impact us all.

Because of their overarching effect on the way we live, work, play, and sustain ourselves, campaign promises concerning the environment and climate should trump all, but they don’t.  It’s understandable that as people struggle to pay rent, mortgage, heating, and grocery bills each month, it’s easy to forget the horrifying impacts of the 2021 heat dome in which 619 people in BC died and the disruptions the washout along the Malahat Highway caused that same year.

one of the questions asked of candidates at the Oct. 1 Downtown Victoria Business Association’s (DVBA’s) all-candidates meeting was environment-driven even though those two climate events, along with an ongoing Island drought, and recent wildfires in Sooke have impacted the lives of people and businesses in Victoria and the greater CRD. They also all happened on David Eby’s watch, which is why the Globe and Mail called the premier’s climate leadership a “muddle,” in its consideration of his on-off support for fossil fuel projects that drive climate change.

Fossil fuels and climate

If elected, the Conservatives promise to hit the gas on natural gas to hasten LNG expansion. The Greens are taking a three-pronged approach to ending the fracking industry. It begins with halting permits for new fracking wells, setting a date to phase out gas production in the province and prohibiting all new LNG projects in the province.

Fracking is the method of extracting natural gas from underground shale deposits. In the process, water, hundreds of chemicals, and sand is pumped at high pressure down a borehole. The water pressure opens up cracks in the shale and the sand keeps those spaces open, allowing the release of underground gas back up the borehole. If built, the six proposed LNG projects would account for 40% of BC’s 2030 emissions target and require the electricity of more than eight Site C dams.

Eby has publicly lamented not being able to meet BC’s climate goals yet his government has made a habit of making announcements on its efforts to curtail climate change on the heels of announcements they make in support of fossil fuel expansion. In fact, since 2021, Eby has been promising to implement an oil and gas emissions reduction plan, while he’s also been granting project approvals that will increase carbon emissions in the province without measures in place to limit them. Since he has been leader, his government has approved the Cedar LNG and has issued construction permits for Woodfibre LNG. There’s more going on in the waffling than meets the public’s eye.

Last year, The Breach Media reported extensively on the easy transition many former NDP office holders and staff were making to consulting opportunities in the extractive industry and their record of meetings with sector lobbyists while in office.

In May, Sonia Furstenau, the Green party leader and candidate in Victoria Beacon-Hill, spilled the tea on the NDP’s relationship to a TC Energy executive lobbyist. The Narwhal reported that lobbyists for LNG planted staff in NDP-called public meetings and ghost-wrote briefing notes for NDP cabinet ministers on TC energy’s Coastal Gas Links and the Prince Rupert Gas Terminal pipelines. The proposed PRGT pipeline is currently splitting  Indigenous communities across whose lands they traverse in the northern Interior.

Species at risk

There are more than 1,900 species at risk in BC.

Late last year, the NDP government released its draft biodiversity and ecosystem health framework that promised to “provide a path to protect and enhance biodiversity and ecological integrity, and support healthy communities and economies into the future.” It said the framework was to set the direction “for a more holistic approach to stewarding our land and water resources” and eventually lead to legislation to protect biodiversity. It was slated to roll out in 2024 prior to the election. That didn’t happen.

The current NDP provincial electoral platform makes no mention of legislation to protect at-risk species. Instead, the party has made a vague commitment to “working with First Nations and other partners on a ‘made-in-B.C. strategy’ to protect biodiversity and watersheds, if re-elected.”

The Conservatives have levelled sharp criticism of the NDP’s mismanagement of BC’s unique wildlife. Both the BC Greens and the Conservatives have promised to introduce legislation to protect the province’s growing number of at-risk species but that’s about the only place where these two parties converge in their environmental platforms.

A Conservative government would introduce “made-in-B.C. species at risk legislation so wildlife protections are shaped by BC-based experts—not Ottawa—and are reflective of our unique ecosystems.”

Victoria-Swan Lake, home to the Christmas Hill Nature Sanctuary (a designated Key Biodiversity Area) and Juan de Fuca Malahat districts, comprise important ecological areas that require ongoing provincial protection.

Old growth and forestry

The Juan de Fuca Malahat riding is home to a huge swath of the province’s pristine old-growth forest and was the site of the Fairy Creek 2021 anti-logging protests on Pacheedaht territory, the longest civil action in Canadian history. Old growth continues to fall in BC and second-growth tree farms cannot replicate the biodiversity found in remaining old-growth areas like the Fairy Creek watershed. Logging activities there have destroyed habitats for many species, including the endangered spotted owl and marbled murrelet.

The conservative platform “Forestry for the Future” is riddled with progressive-sounding language that is vague and non-committal. The platform takes its name from a tagline used by Forest Products Association of Canada, an association that represents some of the biggest pulp, paper, and timber companies in North America, including Canfor, Interfor, West Fraser, and Paper Excellence.

The NDP candidate for Juan de Fuca Malahat, Dana Lajeunesse, spent his childhood in Jordan River. He expected to grow up and work in the forestry industry like his relatives before him before a life-changing injury altered that pathway forever. He told Capital Daily “As a third-generation logger, I have a deep respect for trees and the land we’re on. Sustainable forestry practices have come a long way since I was young and there’s more work to be done.”

Lajeunesse said the NDP is committed to helping create more forestry innovation and to training more people for good jobs in a sustainable forest sector while conserving BC’s oldest forests.

“All of these decisions need to be and will be done in consultation with First Nations,” Lajeunesse said. “We’ve come too far to work toward reconciliation to go backwards.”

Given their respective party records and campaign promises, it should come as no surprise that renowned environmental activist David Suzuki endorsed a Green candidate in the CRD. “If the kind of world we leave to our children and grandchildren is our highest concern, we must indicate that by voting Green,” said Suzuki. Cowichan Valley’s Cammy Lockwood announced Suzuki’s support over social media yesterday and the environmentalist will be attending an election rally for the Greens tonight (Oct.17) in Victoria.

‍ This is Part ll of a three-part series, Promises, promises made by candidates in CRD ridings. Part lll, exploring public safety and child and elder care, will appear on Friday.