Our mine reclamation security system is supposed to make sure mine owners pay to clean up their mine sites and downstream pollution, but there are so many exceptions, secrets, weak policies and backroom deals, that mine owners across the province are profiting while BC taxpayers cover the long-term cleanup risk.
There is no legal requirement for logging practices on private land to be sustainable over time. This allows landowners to remove most or all of the forest cover in a short time period despite major impacts on wildlife, water and communities
Canada needs to hold fast for at least equal co-management of all treaty dams, on both sides of the border. Anything less is a continued loss of sovereignty for Canada.
Last week, the B.C. government released its review of the professional reliance system, a system that has put industry in charge of water, fish and wildlife in British Columbia.
British Columbia has vowed to stop the building a bitumen pipeline across our province, over pollution and climate concerns. But on the other side of the province, in the Kootenays, pollution of a different kind is flowing from BC into Montana.