Union to protest pipeline on Parliament Hill
Posted Sep 21, 2011 9:33 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
One of Alberta’s largest unions and the body that represents workers on the oil patch says it will protest the Keystone XL Pipeline in the coming days.
Members from the Communications, Energy and Paperworker Union hope to meet with politicians Thursday to discuss why the group believes it’s a job killer.
President Dave Cole says if the pipeline is allowed to proceed, it will cost Canada tens of thousands of jobs.
Cole says what’s been missing through this entire ordeal has been the discussion.
“When the Prime Minister stands up and the U.S. says we’ll be your gas tank, okay but what about us?” he asks. “Shouldn’t we be talking about what happens to our grandchildren’s grandchildren?”
He says they’re is no reason why that amount of jobs and natural crude should be shipped to the United States without considering if it can be done here first.
“It’s wrong-headed,” he says, “Even the ex-premier of the province, Peter Lougheed and many small companies are quietly cheering us on in our battle with this wrong-headed view.”
Members from the union will also be protesting on the hill in hopes of putting an end to the project.
Most of the companies they represent, say they don’t want to see the pipeline either.
“Simple things like not being able to get enough workers, or tires or pipe,” he says. “All those realistic things when you get an uncontrolled boom in the economy, it’s not good.”
He says the project has also been the subject of protests in the United States where regulators continue to take a long look at the particulars.
