Bambi would like to react to a Letter to the Editor published in the New Wark Times (of Sackville) entitled “Opinion: No future in fossil fuels, Trudeau should act now to protect workers”
To begin with, it is always informative to read opinions. Thanks to Ms. Stearns-Anderson for sharing her thoughts and thank you Mr. Wark for publishing this as Letter to the Editor.
Here is the full text for you (taken from: https://warktimes.com/2021/01/29/opinion-no-future-in-fossil-fuels-trudeau-should-act-now-to-protect-workers/). Bambi will bold the text she will comment on.
“By Vallie Stearns-Anderson
Dear editor,
In response to US President Biden’s decision to cancel the Keystone XL pipeline, economist Jim Stanford made an interesting statement. Stanford said: “it is now undeniable: fossil fuels will disappear from most uses in the foreseeable future. And fossil-fuel industries will never again be an engine of economic growth and job creation in Canada.”
This is something that the climate movement and Indigenous land defenders in Canada have been saying for a very long time but, now, we’re hearing it from economists too.
For some reason, however, the message still hasn’t reached Prime Minister Trudeau and politicians like Jason Kenney who remain convinced that there is a pathway toward building this project.
Instead of trying to save this doomed pipeline, maybe Canadian politicians should get to work in service of the workers they claim to support. In the 2019 election, Trudeau promised to deliver a Just Transition Act that would support workers through the transition to a green energy economy with new jobs and retraining programs. It feels like this would be a good time to follow through on that promise.
Sincerely,
Vallie Stearns-Anderson
Sackville NB
Note: This is the first letter to the editor Warktimes has published. Readers usually express their views in the comments section. Occasionally however, readers may wish to comment on topics not covered in a previous article and in such cases, a letter to the editor would be appropriate.”
End of the text here.
You may be curious to see the picture in question, please bear with Bambi. She will first reply to the three bold sections of the letter for her own fun (she knows no one cares for such “retrograde” opinions in our “Sweet Little (and holy) Sackville”).
First, the writer seems to be putting all the Indigenous citizens in the same basket, assuming that all members of every group think the same. How is that possible? When in Bambi’s same family, all three siblings do not think the same ??
Seriously, Bambi means that some workers in this sector are Indigenous and they do not want to lose their jobs or they want pipeline projects to earn a living from whilst ensuring a better safety to their fellow citizens (in comparison to train transportation of fossil fuel) and awaiting a transition to a renewable energy.
So, the association between “the climate movement and “Indigenous land defenders in Canada” may not be existent (or fully existent) for all, as this statement wants us to believe. For some, it is. For others, it is not. Yet for others, it is somewhere in-between: Preferring to get to renewable energy, but until scientific discoveries and commercialization, we still have at least 100 years ahead (and Canada is far from being a leader in this area…). Plus, we may lack fossil fuel until then, who knows?
Second, when Ms. Stearns-Anderson tells us that politicians need to work for the workers, this seems very noble. With this regard, let’s see what workers want to say to our leaders… Yes here is the promised picture, thanks to the friend who took it ?:
If everyone recalls, when the pro-pipeline protest convoy of workers braved the cold all the way from the West to Ottawa to express themselves to our leaders, Mr. Trudeau snubbed his nose at them. If Bambi recalls (and she may be wrong), Mr. Maxime Bernier (from the PPC party) was the only leader who went out in the cold to greet them. Worse than that, our media tried to portray them as a being “racist” (maybe some were, who knows? However, this applies to any group).
Third and last, Bambi agrees with Ms. Stearns-Anderson, our PM seems to be talking the talk, but not walking the walk. We definitely need a “Just Transition Act that would support workers through the transition to a green energy economy with new jobs and retraining programs”.
To conclude this post, Bambi has a question for both Ms. Stearns-Anderson and Mr. Trudeau: Why don’t they spend more time on the technological aspects of renewable energy to actually make it happen?
