Five climate change protesters charged with trespassing after crashing Vancouver Enbridge hearing R
VANCOUVER — A group of five protesters were arrested and charged with trespassing after crashing Tuesday’s public hearings on Enbridge’s Northern Gateway project at its Vancouver venue.
The group was taking aim at what they say is a flawed review process that excludes the public and any mention of the proposed pipeline’s contribution to climate change, according to Sean Devlin — one of the protesters charged.
Devlin, a 29-year-old Vancouver-based activist and co-creator of the viral Sh*t Harper Did video and website, said he was shocked by the federal omnibus budget bill passed last year “which gave (Prime Minister Stephen) Harper’s cabinet the power to override the findings of these National Energy Board (NEB) hearings.”
“The function of these hearings is supposed to be exactly that, hearing from the public, looking at the science and trying to determine what’s in the public interest,” Devlin added. “So this subtle rule change that happened last spring, basically means that this whole hearings process — as flawed as it was before – is essentially now nothing more than a public relations stunt being conducted by the government and the oil industry.
“So while we do respect the individuals who are expressing their opposition within the hearings, we wanted to remind the public that at the end of the day all of these hearings can be disregarded by the Harper government, and that is simply unacceptable.”
Last April, the Conservative government announced that it was ending the ability of the Calgary-based NEB, to kill a project with a negative ruling. At the time, the government said that federal politicians, not appointees, should make the decision on major projects. However, Harper later insisted that independent panels will decide the fate of the major project, after the declaration by his senior B.C. minister, James Moore, that Ottawa has no plans to “ram through” Enbridge’s $6-billion Northern Gateway project in order to sell more oil to China.
The man who had his testimony interrupted Tuesday was a friend of the agitators and vocalized his support for their actions as security and police surrounded the five and arrested them, Devlin said. The group, which included 23-year-old Brigette de Pape and Fiona de Balasi Brown, decided the night before to disrupt the Tuesday’s hearing after attending a noisy rally that saw hundreds of protesters demonstrate outside the Sheraton Wall Centre Hotel, the location of the hearings.
“The risks of climate change and of these pipelines going through front-line communities are so great it’s important to take risks to stop these destructive pipelines and to stop climate change,” de Pape told The Sun. “I believe that it is through these kinds of direct action that we can stop the Enbridge pipeline.”
Vancouver police spokesman Sgt. Randy Fincham said three men and two women were taken to a city jail, charged and released after they entered the building around 11 a.m. They refused to leave when a member of the joint review panel asked them to “because they were blowing whistles and causing a disturbance.”
Police believe a sixth person may have involved by opening the door for the demonstrators; however that person has not been arrested.
About 330 people registered to make oral statements in Vancouver to the review panel this week and for three days at the end of the month, according to NEB spokeswoman Kristen Higgins. (The break in hearings is because the panel works for two weeks on and one week off, she said.)
The NEB panel is canvassing communities throughout B.C. and Alberta on the proposed 1,173-kilometre pipeline, which begins north of Edmonton and terminates at Kitimat on B.C.'s northwest coast. Bella Bella is about 175 kilometres south of Kitimat.
The pipeline is meant to open up new markets in Asia for crude from the Alberta oilsands. Virtually all of Canada's oil exports are now shipped to the United States.
B.C. First Nations and some northern communities, as well as environmental groups, are opposed to the project because of the risk and effect of oil spills from the pipeline and tankers. Enbridge contends the pipeline can be built and operated safely, and will be an economic boon to Canada.
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