Both human trafficking and human smuggling are offences under existing federal legislation. In the name of going after smugglers who engage in profiteering at the expense of would-be refugees, Bill C-4 actually introduces draconian new measures against refugees themselves. Talk about human smuggling is to cover up that human trafficking is a government enterprise made legal through the government's own Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP). Under this program, many migrant workers report that they have been misled into paying "agents" both in their home countries and in Canada. They report that they are essentially working in Canada to pay off debts they have incurred to "agents" in order to work in Canada.
Extension of Libyan Mission Underscores
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When workers complain about
these arrangements or
organize to speak out about employers who use agents, they are often
deported back to their home countries, while
no substantive penalties are issued against those who abuse the
workers'
rights. The conditions these workers face is due to their vulnerable
position without any rights under the
TFWP. Now, through the government's omnibus crime
bill, the Harper government
has introduced measures that allow immigration officials to block a
work permit from being issued to a migrant worker if "they are at risk
of humiliating or degrading
treatment, including sexual exploitation or human trafficking." In
other words, it is creating more measures to eliminate migrant workers
who organize to oppose unjust
working conditions and violations of their rights. Meanwhile the
violators of rights -- the agents and the businesses that use migrant
labour -- are not seriously dealt with in order
to deter others from doing the same. In this way, the government is
organizing a state-run system of human trafficking and putting in place
measures to criminalize those
who take a stand for their rights. Talk about opposing "human smuggling
and human trafficking" is smoke and mirrors to cover up what is really
taking place. Canadians
should not accept such deceit on the part of their government.
The "debate" in the Parliament on
September 26 to extend Canada's
illegal involvement in
Libya and the ensuing vote are an affront
to the vast majority of Canadians who
aspire for peace and justice at home and abroad. The vote of 189 to 98
in favour of extending Canada's mission in Libya shows that
increasingly the war government of
Stephen Harper, with the help of the Liberals and others is seeking for
Canada to play a leading role -- "punching above our weight" -- in
Anglo-American imperialism's quest
to dominate the Middle-East and Africa and the whole world, and to seek
out opportunities for Canadian monopolies and financiers to implant
themselves in Libya and
elsewhere to exploit and oppress other nations and peoples, under the
imperialist and colonial doctrine of "Responsibility To Protect."
support for
humanitarian law, human rights, law enforcement, economic development,
constitutional processes, election
monitoring and other essential elements for state building."
This same fascist logic was
presented by Mussolini
before the League of Nations in 1935 to justify the invasion of
Ethiopia -- that the
Ethiopian government was "enslaving" its own people. Mussolini carried
out this invasion with the tacit support of League of Nations because
of its predomination by the big powers especially Britain and France
and their policy of appeasement toward the fascists. This crime against
the
Ethiopian people was one of a chain of events, including the overthrow
of
the Spanish Republic by General Francisco Franco with the full support
of Hitler and Mussolini
in 1939 -- that led directly to World War Two which led to the deaths
of
over 50 million people. It is in these troubled waters that Harper, Rae
and other war-mongers
are fishing and embroiling the Canadian people. This will only lead to
further destabilization and increase the danger of a catastrophic Third
World War, which threatens to
engulf the whole of humanity in a nuclear holocaust.
A firm stand against all forms of
foreign interference
and the use of violence to settle disputes between and within countries
is called for irrespective of political or
ideological orientation. All attempts which undermine a rule of law
nationally and internationally, whereby the big powers and the
interests
they represent use their might
to decide the fate of countries and indeed the world, must be opposed.
Today, the necessity to oppose the apologists for imperialist war by
affirming the right of all nations to sovereignty and to live free
of foreign interference is increasingly urgent given the dangers which
lie ahead of more wars of aggression and occupation. Canadians must
organize for an anti-war government that upholds principles of
international law, not self-serving interpretations of these principles
the way the government of Canada and other apologists are doing. It
must not pass! As we approach the anniversary of the invasion and
occupation of Afghanistan, it is vital that Canadians discuss these
matters in depth and take stock of what is at stake for the peoples of
the world as a result of the dangerous course upon which U.S.
imperialists and the big European powers, with Canada in tow, have
embarked. 
In a speech infused with phrases reminiscent
of diehard Cold
Warriors such as U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower's Nazi-loving
Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles,[
Harper has liberally used
the word "freedom" to "justify" both
his campaign to wreck the farmers'
Canadian Wheat Board and participation in the bombing of the Libyan
people. The reality is that the Harper government will always "go
along" whenever what is being proposed is reaction and anti-people
activity down the line.
Baird's conclusion is an open call
for the United Nations to be even
more subservient to the U.S. imperialists and their allies than it is
now and for the suppression of any "dissent" within UN organizations.
He refers to those who refuse to "go along" with the imperialists as
those who "quietly undermine its (the
UN's) principles and who sit idly watching its slow decline." As a
shining example of upholding his version of the UN principles, Baird
once again refers to John Diefenbaker, stating, "This year marks the
50th anniversary of Canada's principled refusal to support membership
in the Commonwealth of Nations by
South Africa's apartheid regime." Again distorting history to serve his
own purposes, Baird fails to mention the large number of Canadian
monopolies that were allowed to trade with the apartheid regime, the
wholesale arrests of anti-apartheid demonstrators by the Canadian
state, and the fact that, although Diefenbaker
opposed South Africa's membership in the Commonwealth, he regretted to
the end that some compromise, even a few token seats for non-whites in
parliament, could not save the day. Ten years later, he strongly
supported the resumption of British arms sales to South Africa on Cold
War grounds. Diefenbaker also
somehow missed noticing that the same system of apartheid was in place
in the United States, Canada's neighbour to the immediate south.
 CEP President Dave Coles (centre) with energy workers from Ft. McMurry and Montreal. |
In a joint press conference prior to the rally on Parliament Hill, leaders of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union (CEP) and the Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL) explained their opposition to the Keystone XL for its negative impact on the environment, the loss of potential jobs and the harmful effect on the Canadian economy.
"It really is raw logs on steroids," said Dave Coles, CEP President. "You rob the bitumen and pump it to the United States. They get the jobs and we end up with the environmental mess that's left over," he said. "This government has had a wrong-headed approach to the economy, does not have a national energy strategy, and there is no debate going on xin this Parliament about the environment and all of the renewable resources. We build our pipelines north-south. There is an issue of national energy security, there are no pipelines east-west."
Coles pointed out that CEP is convinced that the permit to build the XL pipeline is now null and void because construction did not start on schedule, and now has to go back for consideration again to the National Energy Board.
He stressed that the economy and the environment cannot be separated. "Jobs are important to Canadians, jobs are important to Albertans; they are linked with the environment and you can't separate the two. You cannot have an economy that is based just on exporting raw resources, whether it is water, oil or trees."
Gaeten Menard, CEP Secretary-Treasurer, said: "In shipping 900,000 barrels per day of bitumen down those pipes, we are also shipping over 40,000 jobs to the U.S. Also, like all fossil fuels, we will see the end of them one day. Why rush to reach the bottom of the barrel? In rushing in this way, we are not utilizing the proper technologies that would allow us to respect the environment. In rushing we are causing enormous environmental damage, and we are exporting jobs."
He pointed out that Canada
is the world's second largest
exporter of
petroleum and yet the entire eastern half of the country is dependent
on foreign oil. "We are saying
to the MPs as well as to Prime Minister Harper: stop lobbying Obama so
he will approve this project in the U.S. Just yesterday, Harper called
approval of the Keystone a 'no-brainer.' I say it is a 'no-brainer'
that says we ought to approve
this project, it makes no sense at all. We have a question: can Mr.
Obama approve a project whose approval
right here is no longer valid? ... So we say to Harper: bring the issue
back to the natural resources committee, we need to take a closer look
at the issue. We need to stop
shipping our natural resources to the U.S. without refining them."
Gil McGowan, AFL President, stated that it is clear that Albertans support the idea of adding value to our resources instead of exporting them to the United States. "But despite this emerging consensus in support of more value-added production in Alberta and in opposition to the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, our politicians in Alberta, members of our provincial government have instead transformed themselves from public officials into little more than salespeople for a pipeline company. So over the last year and a half we have watched in frustration as [Alberta] energy minister Ron Liepert, [Alberta] Washington envoy Gary Mar who is on deck to become the next premier, and our current premier Ed Stelmach have all made trips down to the U.S. and they have been going down there to lobby in support of approving the Keystone pipeline."
McGowan stated that it is time that the National Energy Board started considering issues of public interest before those of corporate interest when approving these pipelines, and that the federal government work with the provinces to develop a real national energy strategy. "Canada and the federal government must put the interests of ordinary working Canadians before the narrow interests of corporations," he said.
"There is an opportunity to rewrite the traditional script," McGowan said. "For too long Canadians have been hewers of wood and drawers of water. We want to change that script and move up the value ladder. The first thing is stop this pipeline from proceeding."
Indigenous peoples from
across Canada came to express
their
opposition to the Keystone XL and the destruction of their traditional
homelands.
George Poitras, former Chief of the Mikisew Cree First Nation pointed out, "The tarsands have been mined, primarily open-pit, for the past 40 years in what is known as the traditional lands of many Treaty 6 and Treaty 8 First Nations." In a statement, Poitras noted, "Only 3 percent of the total deposit has been mined in the past 40 years. Dr. David Schindler, a world-renowned water expert, proved last year that there has been virtually no monitoring of what has also been characterized the largest industrial project in the world. It is a claim that the local Indigenous peoples have made for decades with proof of deformed fish, observation of poor water quality, receding water levels, impacts to animal health, and more recently in Fort Chipewyan, an increase in rare and aggressive cancers."
Poitras pointed out that the governments of Alberta and Canada have for the past 15 years relied on the Regional Aquatics Monitoring Program (RAMP) to monitor the Athabasca River and fish health. The RAMP is completely funded by the oil companies. Poitras pointed out that the data collected by RAMP is considered proprietary, and governments have claimed for years that they found no problems with water quality in the Athabasca River.
 Bill Erasmus, Regional Chief, Dene Nation |
However, an exhaustive study of air and water pollution along the Athabasca River and its tributaries from Fort McMurray to Lake Athabasca, led by Dr. Schindler, a biological sciences professor at the University of Alberta, confirmed the findings of the indigenous peoples. His team found high levels of Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds (PACs), a group of organic contaminants containing several known carcinogens, mutagens and teratogens. The highest levels of PACs were found within 50 kilometres of two major oil sands upgraders. His research proved that the government's contention that pollution was due to naturally occurring erosion was false. Pollution increased as one got closer to the oil sands developments and reached a point where the airborne particulates left oil slicks on top of melted snow.
Clearly the health of the First Nations communities, oil
sands
workers and people living in communities around the oil sands is being
seriously affected by the refusal
of the governments to safeguard the health of the peoples in these
communities.
(Photos: CEP, Council of Canadians, OttawaAction.ca)
No to Monopoly "Right"! No to the Keystone XL Pipeline! Yes to Nation-Building!
In an interview on CBC's Power and Politics on September 27, federal Energy Minister Joe Oliver was questioned about the consequences of shipping raw bitumen down the Keystone XL pipeline. Oliver dismissed the question: "It's uneconomic [to build upgraders or refineries in Canada] and it's up to the private sector. It's obviously less expensive to use existing refineries than to spend $16 billion creating new ones. There hasn't been a refinery built since the 1980s."
How is this an answer? This statement is simply a declaration of monopoly right. The owners of the oil companies have the right to decide. The end. Canadians are told what they already know -- the oil monopolies aren't interested in building refineries in Canada and are even shutting down existing refineries. People are not stupid, they know it is the monopolies who are making these decisions based on what is going to be most profitable for them. The problem which the workers are putting forward for solution is that in taking these decisions, the monopolies are engaged in nation-wrecking, and causing the massive loss of jobs in manufacturing and processing. Workers are calling on the government to uphold their social responsibility to defend the public good. But Harper and his ministers speak as though the role of the government is to explain and defend decisions made by the monopolies, not to defend the public good.
If approved, the Keystone
XL and other proposed
pipelines will
ship raw bitumen, meaning that all new production from the tar sands
for many years to come
will be shipped as raw product. There will be no new Canadian
upgrading, refining and petrochemical industry. This is where most
of the permanent jobs are, so most
of the potential permanent jobs will go down the pipeline. Canadians
will be left with the environmental consequences.
Oliver stated that over the next 25 years, it is estimated that Keystone will create 60,000 direct, indirect and induced jobs in Canada. The Harper government has said nothing about whether these are temporary or permanent jobs, or whether they are "direct," "indirect," "induced" or even imagined. In contrast when they travel to Washington and Houston to sell the Keystone XL, they offer precise breakdowns regarding temporary and permanent jobs, stating that there will be a minimum of 250,000 permanent jobs in the U.S.
The oil monopolies have chosen to ship raw bitumen because they think they can make a bigger score building their refineries on the Gulf Coast and grab the lion's share of the wealth produced. One factor is that Obama "stimulus" dollars have been used to retool old refineries on the Gulf Coast. Then there is the claim that it is too "costly" to build in Alberta. Both the monopolies and the governments that serve them consider the workers who actually create the wealth as nothing but a "cost." During the last boom, which ended in 2008, conditions were favourable for the workers to make their own claims on the wealth they created to compensate them for their hard work and skills. The companies complained about "high labour costs" and the Alberta government came to the rescue. They criminalized the construction workers when they fought for their rights, enacted labour laws favourable to the monopolies and introduced modern day slavery in the form of the temporary foreign workers program, all in an effort to drive down wages and working conditions.
The boom also created more favourable conditions for the local small- and medium-sized companies that supply equipment, machinery, fabricating and services to the dominant monopolies to claim a larger share of added-value. The monopolies responded by taking fabricating and manufacturing off-shore. Governments took no action even though Alberta lost 30,000 manufacturing jobs with the onset of the economic crisis in 2008.
Now the monopolies have taken the final step, essentially declaring that Alberta will become a shipper of raw bitumen, left with little but the environmental damage.
Another factor for the monopolies is that they want to continue a frantic pace of bitumen extraction, which in the past created a situation where suppliers couldn't keep up with demand, leading to shortages of materials and equipment and delays. This points to the need for a planned economy. It doesn't have anything to do with justifying why it is "not economic" for Canada to build a refinery or an upgrader or become self-sufficient in oil and refined products. It is just repeating the tired, capital-centred mantra of the oil monopolies who want to be given the oil resources for next to nothing, in whatever quantities they decide, and provided with government subsidies and tax breaks. Even then they shout that the claims of the workers who actually produce the wealth are nothing but a cost!
Imperial Oil's Kearl Lake project became the first major project built without any upgrading capacity. The approval of the Alberta Clipper, Keystone and Keystone XL pipelines will make Kearl Lake the norm and not the exception. Even while the Harper government's Special Panel on the tar sands is just beginning its work to consider yet another bitumen pipeline, the Northern Gateway, the government has already expressed its support and approval.
Decisions such as building a pipeline to ship raw bitumen are public issues that necessitate public and government control over our resources. Workers and their allies refuse to accept monopoly "right" in these matters and are putting forward concrete, practical alternatives, which are in the interest of Canadians. There are alternatives to the Keystone XL pipeline. They involve upgrading and refining in Canada, which permits the development of a petrochemical industry, as well as building pipeline capacity in Canada so that Canada is self-sufficient and does not need to import oil.
The National Energy Board must renew its mandate to ensure that projects are in the public interest through concrete measures. Banning shipment of raw resources which could be upgraded in Canada is one such measure. Another would be regulations requiring that orders for the industrial products needed for the means of production for the projects are filled within Canada, which will boost the Canadian manufacturing and steel industry.
The rights of construction workers to modern cultured living and social conditions and guarantees for livelihoods when construction is completed must be upheld. As well, the public and governments have the right to decide the claim of the owners of capital on their invested capital to ensure that the investment is of mutual benefit to both Canada and the investors and not one-sidedly to the narrow benefit of owners of capital and ripped out of the economy.
The public and governments have a right to discuss and decide questions of necessary infrastructure, including social programs and how they will be funded and the amount. Finally, the public and governments have the right to oversee and direct the impact of the project on the environment, including appropriating the necessary funds from the monopolies to harmonize the project with the natural environment.
October 1, 2011 Bulletin • Return to Index • Write to: editor@cpcml.ca