This page contains annotated news stories and press releases with commentary about land reform and the democratic process in British Columbia. Our comments are shown in red.
With the forest industry facing up to 1000 layoffs last
week, it is a sad state of affairs that Rich Coleman, Minister of Forest and
Range, is more interested in fighting with the NDP than in answering any of the
hard questions.
Coleman's consistent line of defense is that his hands are tied, as he points to
the market forces at play. Then he tries to
downplay the problems, stating how many mills are still running. Well, it appears he can’t even keep track of
the layoffs his Ministry is responsible to. Rich Coleman is clearly not
the person who should be in charge of BC's forest and forest industry. It has been asked for again and again- It is time for a new Forest Minister.
Troubled forest industry not helped by minister who'd rather jeer critics
May 03, 2008VICTORIA - Another string of closures and layoffs in the forest industry, another bad week in the legislature for Forests Minister Rich Coleman.
The Opposition started it off with a challenge to one of his earlier decisions, freeing Western Forest Products to sell some of its forest lands on Vancouver Island.
Coleman had defended the removals as a way of shoring up a troubled company and protecting jobs in its remaining operations.
"Since those statements, what have we seen?" challenged New Democratic Party MLA Doug Routley, who hails from one of the Vancouver Island ridings in the heart of WFP territory.
"We've seen four Western Forest Products mills close," continued Routley, answering his own question.
"The minister failed. He failed the workers by not getting assurances for their jobs. He failed the people of B.C. when he allowed this removal without any compensation."
Coleman wasn't about to admit any of those things. As the troubles multiply in his ministerial bailiwick, he's become increasingly hostile to the critics on the other side.
"I don't know why this member hates Western Forest Products," the forests minister returned.
A typical Colemanism. As if it were tantamount to communism to even suggest that some of his policies aren't working.
"I get that you want to insult every company in B.C.," he'll say. Or "I know you don't care about their capital investment."
Soon it'll be "I know you want to liquidate the captains of industry" or "I get that you want to hang them from lampposts."
Then again, some of his actual comments in defence of Western Forest Products were beyond satire.
"Maybe you don't like the 175 employees that are presently working at Alberni Pacific sawmill or the 155 that are working at Somass sawmill in Port Alberni," Coleman challenged.
"As a matter of fact, they have seven mills operating, three re-man mills and 17 logging operations going on Vancouver Island right now."
Unfortunately at almost the same moment as he spoke those words, some of those operations were going down.
"The West Coast's largest forest company, Western Forest Products, announced Tuesday it is shutting down most of its logging operations and laying off more than 800 loggers and contractors," was the way my colleague Gordon Hamilton reported the story next day in The Vancouver Sun.
Included were six of the 17 operations cited by Coleman in his why-do-you-hate-WFP blast. The New Democrats of course underscored the irony when the house reconvened for question period Wednesday afternoon.
Routley: "Today we learned that 1,000 people lost their jobs overnight -- 800 of them from those very logging operations the minister was referring to."
Routley wasn't finished: "It's bad enough that he admits he's just a spectator, but he's not even watching the game."
Coleman can exchange rhetorical small-arms fire with the best of them. But he had nothing in his depleted arsenal to match that salvo.
"I'll just ignore the personal insults," he began, feebly. "The company yesterday afternoon -- probably because the markets close after or about the time question period starts -- had not informed anybody, because they are a public company."
The New Democrats weren't about to let up. "Were 1,000 jobs lost yesterday enough of a wake-up call?" asked New Democrat Leonard Krog.
Coleman was still in glass-half-full mode. "Well, you know, on Vancouver Island there are seven sawmills and three remain plants run by Western Forest Products."
He might want to start including a "best before" date with such comments. Given the current economic climate in the industry, all references to levels of employment and economic activity in can't be guaranteed beyond sundown.
"I actually am concerned about the forest industry and its future," Coleman conceded at one point this week. " I believe that the industry is trying to make the adjustments so that it will be there to employ your people and your communities in the future. They have to do that in order to survive."
To be sure, the industry faces a punishing combination. High dollar. The near vaporization of the U.S. housing market. Producers all over the world dumping product at ruinous prices.
"One of the worst market trends in the history of the province of B.C.," the minister calls it and he's right about that.
But there's something else historic about this situation.
Forests ministers of every political stripe have long maintained that government, as the landlord and owner of crown timber, has options to nurture its proper use for the benefit of the public.
Coleman seems content to retreat to the sidelines, alternatively cheering on the industry and disparaging anyone who dares suggest other ways of doing things.
As if he were nothing more than a spectator at a slow-moving train wreck.
