In B.C.鈥檚 construction industry, we鈥檙e cheering on the development of liquefied natural gas and the long line of private-sector proposals to get our provincial resources into the world marketplace.
We believe in these plans because they鈥檒l create a boom of construction jobs when the plants are built 鈥� and a long-term lift for our province as the economic impacts are felt for generations.
But the possible benefits seem to be hanging in the balance in the provincial election. The front-running New Democratic Party seems more and more hostile to resource development of any type in B.C. And anyone who thinks the nine investor groups proposing to spend billions on LNG plants would do so in the face of hostility need look no further than Australia.
In Australia, it took a carefully choreographed ballet of securing regulatory approvals, assessments of future market conditions and the co-ordinated development by the many joint-venture partners to make LNG a reality. In that nation, governments saw that multibillion-dollar investments are based on multi-decade planning.
What鈥檚 happened in Australia since the 2007 election of the left-leaning Labour government is an increase in costs and a lowering of productivity in the LNG sector because of pro-union policies. Australian construction unions, spurred on by the government, are engaging in work slowdowns and pursuing aggressive wage demands that lead to delays and escalated costs.
One chief executive in the business warned that investment in the LNG industry would dry up by 2017 unless the Land Down Under becomes more cost-competitive. LNG projects in the pipeline are 80 per cent more expensive to build now than existing projects because of the rapid escalation in labour costs and the plummeting productivity due to new union-friendly workplace rules.
It鈥檚 already happening. Australian LNG giant Woodside Petroleum made two significant announcements in the space of one week in March. First, it stopped chasing a $45-billion LNG plan for the Australian coast because of higher costs and lower productivity. Second, it threw its hat into the ring to develop LNG at Grassy Point near Prince Rupert 鈥� right here in B.C.
It should be a chilling warning to British Columbians 鈥� especially those who want to see robust investments and developments and the accompanying flow of tax dollars into government coffers.
That鈥檚 because the NDP are promising the same kind of approach to labour laws that鈥檚 driving up costs and driving out investments in Australia. Those policies include:
鈥� A platform promise to push construction work to project agreements, the code word for building-trade-union-only deals;
鈥� Scrapping a worker鈥檚 democratic vote on joining a union, and replacing it with a card-based system open to intimidation; and
鈥� Ending the open approach to skill training that鈥檚 been built over the past decade and returning to a labour-dominated system that lets fewer people into trades training.
The success conditions so many have worked so hard to build are unlikely to survive a radical change in labour policies.
Add in the NDP鈥檚 open hostility to resource development, and the hope of LNG development may disappear. And when the investments disappear, there won鈥檛 be anyone left to pay for all the health care, education and social services that British Columbians desire.
Philip Hochstein is president of the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association of B.C.
