LETTERS TO THE EDITOR — B.C. ministry weak, unsupportive

Having read the British Columbia government’s A Mineral Strategy for B.C. — Discussion Paper, March, 1993, I can only conclude that the first half of the paper is a realistic appraisal of the problems of the province’s exploration and mining industry. The text appears to have been written by someone in the industry conversant with the problems.

The second half, however, is almost all bureaucratic twaddle with no sense of concrete decision-making. It is truly a “fiddle-while-Rome-burns” approach, with no appreciation of the time value of inaction. Proposals for more studies or more meetings to reach “consensus” with other “stakeholders” to further the government “process” (three words which I detest) amount to no action at all.

British Columbia used to have two main things going for it: a supportive, stable government and low power costs. We now have a government that cannot make resource-use decisions and a hydroelectric power rate being used as a primary means of taxation before any profits are realized.

We cannot understand the obscene haste for Protected Area Strategies and the land-use policy espoused by the Commission on Resources and Environment to zone the whole province into “you can” and “you can’t” areas for mining. Government must stop listening to high-pressure preservation groups who do not offer substitute jobs for the high-paying resource jobs they would lock out by needless preservation. Governments and the public must recognize these cults as power groups who would control large pieces of land at taxpayers’ expense. This land control would be their source of power at no cost to themselves.

We do not need more studies; we need a strong mines ministry that defends the right to mine anywhere in the province. We also need a mines ministry that will defend industry from vexatious prosecutions by the Ministry of Environment and from threats to hold company directors liable for perceived transgressions.

Without a strong, proactive, decisive mines ministry that recognizes the contribution of a healthy mining industry, a ministry that does not want to trade off mining rights to other aggressive government ministries, mining may disappear in British Columbia. Government interministerial rivalries and bureaucracies are the greatest enemies of resource industries in the province. As Roy Romanow, premier of Saskatchewan, said: “If governments are going to redistribute wealth, first they have to create wealth.”

C.C. Rennie, P.Eng.

President and Chairman

Better Resources

Vancouver, B.C.