Month: November 2017

Chris and Jordan welcome Lori Ackerman, mayor of Fort St. John – and one of Canada’s most formidable supporters of responsible resource development. Lori is in Vancouver to pick up an award for FSJ, and we talked LNG, Kinder Morgan, fracking, oil and gas innovation, Site C, BC Liberal leadership, the rural-urban divide and more.

Last week, Tom Sigurdson of the Building Trades Unions ripped B.C.’s construction record in an op-ed in The Province. He was bent out of shape because ICBA had pointed out how successful the evolution of the industry has been since the NDP were last in power in the 1990s. Today, The Province published this short letter to the editor from ICBA President Chris Gardner:

No shame in construction industry

It is amazing that Tom Sigurdson and the B.C. Building Trades have such a negative view of the B.C. construction sector. Nearly 250,000 men and women go to job sites every day building B.C. They are highly skilled and hard-working.

Sigurdson’s view that for the past 20 years, B.C. “has one of the most shameful records on construction” is simply not true. B.C.’s construction sector built Olympic venues, the Canada Line, the Sea-to-Sky Highway, the Port Mann Bridge, the William R. Bennett bridge and many other major projects.

Sigurdson wants to return to a bygone era that denied opportunities for workers and where conflict was the order of the day. B.C.’s construction sector is safer than it has ever been and is training a new generation of workers. No one working in construction in B.C. has anything to be ashamed of.

Chris Gardner, president, Independent Contractors and Businesses Association

Did you know that ICBA offers training on your job site? Our training department would be pleased to set it up for you!

Interested in one of our courses for your staff but you’re not able to send them all to one of our public courses? Contact us at training@icba.ca with the course that you’re looking for and some potential dates, and the team will handle all of the logistics for you.

Our full list of courses can be found at www.icba.ca/training; check it out today! We can bring the trainer to you, anywhere in BC. We can also facilitate mobile equipment operator training, online courses, and customized training for your employees.

Our training team is already booking courses into 2018; make sure you don’t miss out by subscribing to our training newsletter at www.icba.ca/trainingnewsletter. And don’t forget, most of our courses qualify for Gold Seal and BC Housing CPD Points!

ICBA’s Jordan Bateman joined the Goddard Report this week and talked some Peyton Manning, Site C, Kinder Morgan and the end of Gregor Robertson’s foolish natural gas ban.

ICBA has sent a letter to the federal government’s Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities opposing Bill C-48, a moratorium on oil tankers near B.C.’s north coast.

“The federal government’s proposed tanker moratorium on British Columbia’s north coast will significantly constrain the export of British Columbia and Alberta-produced energy products,” the ICBA submission says. “Our review of the proposal offers no discernable public policy rationale for the tanker moratorium.”

In addition:

• The federal government has committed on many occasions to get Canada’s natural resources to tidewater. The oil tanker moratorium contradicts this commitment.
• The federal government has a comprehensive $1.5 billion Oceans Protection Plan. If this plan is going to be effective, then why is the moratorium on tankers on B.C.’s north coast necessary?
• About 1,400 tankers of Alaskan produced oil destined for refineries in Washington state is shipped through B.C. coastal waters every year. What, then, does the tanker moratorium effectively accomplish other than to preclude B.C.’s strategically located ports at Kitimat and Prince Rupert, from working with B.C. and Alberta energy producers and building new markets and supply chain routes for energy exports?
• The federal government has failed to provide industry with any evidence of environmental or safety gaps – rooted in scientific fact – that the moratorium is aimed at mitigating.
• Oil has been shipped in tankers off the British Columbia coast since the 1930’s and there has not been a major oil spill involving one of those tankers.
• There is no corresponding tanker moratorium proposed for any other coastal area of Canada, including the artic and east coasts. This unnecessarily pits “east” against “west” and is an inherently unfair application of federal law.
• Though the Northern Gateway pipeline is no longer proceeding, the federal government should not erect arbitrary barriers in the marketplace preventing other proponents from pursuing alternative proposals in northern B.C. which appropriately balance economic, environmental, community, and indigenous considerations. This is profoundly regrettable, given the economic benefits which could accrue throughout the energy value chain, including for our members who are small and medium-sized providers of construction services to many facets of the energy industry.

The full submission can be found HERE.