Please join WC and West Coast Environment Law Society  Monday, April 8th for a noontime rally outside Environment Canada in Vancouver to show the senate environment committee that reforming our environmental laws has broad public support.

We will march north on Burrard to Canada Place where the senate hearing will be held in the Pan Pacific Hotel shortly afterwards.

They are in town to hear input from the public about Bill C-69, which would restore environmental reviews!

In 2012, the oil industry wrote its own environmental laws via the Harper government and Canadians and our ecosystems have been paying the price ever since. Anybody who followed the National Energy Board’s botched review of the Trans Mountain pipeline and tanker project knows we need to restore public confidence in our environmental assessments.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was elected on a promise to fix this broken regulatory regime, and after two years of consultation with industry, environmental and Indigenous groups, his government proposed Bill C-69, which passed the House of Commons last June and is now in the Senate. The bill creates a more holistic process and restores meaningful public engagement and increased transparency to these reviews. It’s far from perfect, but it’s a decent compromise that is miles ahead of the current laws.

Sadly, the fossil fuel industry has run a smear campaign against the legislation and is using its immense lobbying power to try and kill the bill in unelected senate. It’s been referred to the senate environment committee for continued study and runs a risk of being severely weakened or even abandoned when the next federal election is called. We can’t let that happen.

You can also request to speak to the committee by emailing enev@sen.parl.gc.ca. Together, we can reverse the damage done to Canada’s regulatory process and restore credible project reviews. 

This action will be held on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples.