Self-regulation benefits industry and lets govt’ avoid responsibility
By Lethbridge Herald on October 14, 2023.
Editor:
I read with interest how the Grassy Mountain coal mine project has been re-submitted to the Alberta Energy Regulator after being repeatedly rejected by the government.
I feel it worth pointing out an intentional failure point (or an area of weakness)which allows such acts, and it is the allowed practice of “self-regulation” and “self-regulators.”
Sel-regulation occurs when an industry seeks to obtain more favorable decisions, so it creates its own “regulatory” body to police…wait for it…itself. Governments often go along with such acts, since it buys governments some distance, or insulation, from more controversial issues.
Government can avoid controversy (and responsibility) by saying “I did not do it, the industry regulator did” and some politicians use this to insulate themselves from responsibility on important matters. Self- regulators usually protect the industry, even while failing to protect the public.
From the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) website: “The AER is 100 per cent funded by industry and is authorized to collect funds through an administrative fee levied on energy development projects and activities. This model is used by other regulatory agencies in North America, such as the Alberta Utilities Commission and the British Columbia Oil and Gas Commission.”
Details about the AER (Alberta Energy Self Regulator) are found at the link below:
https://www.aer.ca/providing-information/about-the-aer/who-we-are
With industry-money, plus an industry-first mindset, self-regulatory bodies hand-select persons to staff their offices. This allows advantages, such as “distancing” the government of the day, from accountability. Governments like to be able to distance themselves, when it is to their advantage, even if it is a pure political ploy.
I have researched thousands of “self-regulatory” acts, finding that they form a single-minded, cost effective manner of allowing “public entrusted power” be used for private gain. Sadly that is the literal definition of “corruption” from Transparency International, as found at this site https://www.transparency.org.
Allowing public-entrusted resources to be privately and quietly manipulated, using hand-picked teams of industry-compensated “guardians” often meets the definition of corruption. It allows industry foxes to guard the public’s own henhouses. Your henhouses. Their gain.
Larry Elford
Lethbridge
14-13
We can underscore the concerns expressed in this letter regarding industry self-regulation by referencing several of the key findings of the Walkerton Inquiry.
That inquiry was held in the aftermath of an incident in May 2000 when the town water system of Walkerton, Ontario, was contaminated by a E coli 0157:H7. Seven people died and some 2300 became ill. A generation on, many town folk continue to experience psychological and physical health problems stemming from the outbreak.
As noted in an article by Salvadori et al (2009), published in the journal Kidney International, the inquiry concluded that reduced oversight by the Province’s Ministry of Environment in favour of among other things self-regulation and relaxed reporting requirements, contributed significantly to what the authors call “the worst public health disaster involving municipal water in Canadian history.”
The Inquiry also found that several years before the outbreak Ministry of Environment(MOE) staff had expressed concerns over possible consequences of the decisions by the Ontario Government, which was led at the time by Mike Harris. The Inquiry also learned that prior to the staff cuts at the MOE, which necessitated the more relaxed system of oversight, no assessment of the potential risk to public health was undertaken. So much for Harris’s “Common Sense Revolution.”
Wonderful example Ben . I believe it got Mike Harris kicked out of office. In Alberta cutting red tape, proper control, resulted in the $260 billion and growing orphan well cleanup mess that I was involved with for 8 years when Lougheed and Getty forced the oil industry to pay for the clean up and Klein eliminated it. Then there was the coal protection on the eastern slope that Lougheed put on and Sonya Savage tried to destroy it and condo buildings that weren’t inspected properly when being built and now they have been condemned. Once again proper inspections and control weren’t being done to protect the public. It’s something these phoney conservatives, Reformers, are famous for.
Larry while Jason Kenney was spreading the lie that B.C. was mining coal safely the federal government was fining Coal Tech $60 million for the pollution being created in B. C. as these articles point out. You want to Google them?
“Coal Tech fined $60 billion for polluting B.C. Waters”. They have now changed their name and think that’s going to let them do it. How dumb do they think Canadians are?