Columbia River-Revelstoke MLA Scott McInnis is calling the recent forced vote by the B.C. NDP on Bills 14 and 15 on May 28 "an authoritarian move, for authoritarian legislation."
"This is by no means my opinion alone," McInnis said, adding both the Union of BC Indian Chiefs and the Union of BC Municipalities have voiced their opposition to these bills.
Bill 14, the Renewable Energy Projects Act, allows for the fast-tracking of energy projects by giving the BC Energy Regulator the responsibility of permitting all renewable energy projects. Bill 15, the Infrastructure Projects Act, expedites the permitting processes for infrastructure projects from hospitals and schools to "provincially significant" resource and housing projects.
"We realize that these, whether we’re looking at green energy projects or conventional energy projects, which is primarily Bill 14, or massive infrastructure projects, which is essentially Bill 15, we support and we have supported for a long time, getting some of those projects moving quickly," McInnis said.
"Part of our frustration is this government feels painted into a corner because they’ve literally done nothing over the last eight years, and now they’re in a really tough spot financially and publicly. People are realizing that there’s nothing getting built across the province."
Both bills were left until the end of the evening at the legislature, and both were passed with votes of 47 to 46, with Speaker Raj Chouhan casting the tiebreaking vote on each.
The B.C. Conservatives were joined by the BC Greens and three Independent MLAs in voting against the bills.
"That essentially puts us at a tie with the sitting NDP MLA," McInnis explained. "Now, the speaker holds the balance of power. The speaker is an NDP MLA, Mr. Chouhan, and in a confidence vote, he has to vote with the government. If it wasn’t a confidence vote, the ruling is that the speaker would have to rule that debate continue on the bills, but not on a confidence vote. So it snuck by with the narrowest margin."
Because both bills were confidence votes, had the NDP lost, it would have meant going to an election.
Some of the biggest concerns for these bills, raised by the official opposition and the third party (the BC Greens) are as follows.
For Bill 14, they include the potential for agricultural land within the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR) to be severed to build clean energy projects; a lack of guardrails on grazing land, guide outfitting territory and private property to stop encroachment, and cutting swaths of land for power generation on First Nations' land.
Regarding Bill 15, McInnis mentioned a lack of mechanisms to ensure a balance between urban and rural projects and the failure of the minister to consult with First Nations.
"When talking about Bill 15 with infrastructure projects, the big concern I have and have had since day one is that the projects that are going to get priority are in the Lower Mainland, and that’s not good enough for me," he said.
"We’ve got several major infrastructure projects here that are already behind schedule and way over budget, I’ll use Revelstoke and Kimberley’s wastewater treatment plants just as an example, so I’m going to be making sure that the Infrastructure Minister understands very very clearly that there is a balance between rural versus urban priorities that has to be followed when looking at these projects."
McInnis said his job now that these bills are passed is to ensure all necessary guardrails are in place for any potential green energy projects within his riding.
