News Release - April 24, 2013

VANCOUVER – The environmental platform introduced by the BC NDP this afternoon was seen as containing more “hits” than “misses”, according to the Wilderness Committee.

The platform, much of which has been announced previously, contained some positive environmental commitments including: opposition to the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline and Kinder Morgan pipeline, a pledge to strengthen BC’s environmental assessment process and work with the federal government to implement Justice Cohen’s recommendations to safeguard wild salmon, as well as a promise to introduce endangered species legislation, expand the carbon tax, restore BC Parks funding and review private river-diversion contracts.

“The decision to commit to a stand-alone endangered species law really hits it out of the park. I am also excited about the NDP’s commitment to adequately fund our parks and improve BC’s incredibly weak environmental assessment process, as well as their renewed commitment to tackling climate change – especially their opposition to the Enbridge and Kinder Morgan pipeline proposals,” said Gwen Barlee, policy director with the Wilderness Committee. “We have been campaigning on these issues for years.”

The Wilderness Committee has called for strong and effective endangered species legislation based on habitat protection, for the government to pump up the operational budget for BC Parks to $60 million, and for continuing increases to the carbon tax.

“While there are many environmentally promising initiatives in this platform, there are some key issues on which they strike out. It concerns us deeply that they haven’t committed to ending, once and for all, BC’s grizzly bear trophy hunt and shutting down open-net cage salmon farms,” said Joe Foy, National Campaign Director with the Wilderness Committee. “The NDP also hasn’t come to grips with the climate change impacts associated with the export of fossil fuels such as liquefied natural gas and coal.”

“We want assurance that the promised improvements to provincial regulations such as the BC environmental assessment review process will result in some of our worst industrial proposals being stopped dead in their tracks. Of particular concern to us are environmentally damaging projects and activities such as the New Prosperity Mine, the Site C dam, river diversion projects and hydraulic fracturing (fracking) for natural gas,” said Foy.