REGINA – It was a show of solidarity at the Legislature by members from two labour unions alongside the Sask Party government on the issue of extending coal generation in the province.
A delegation from Estevan and Coronach including members from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and The United Mine Workers of America stood alongside Minister of Crown Investments Corporation Jeremy Harrison in a scrum with reporters prior to Question Period.They were there to push back on the NDP’s contention that the Sask Party government’s plan to extend coal to 2050 would cost $26 billion dollars.
Both the government and unions have accused the Opposition of misrepresenting the true costs, with Harrison having said the capital cost of the coal refurbishment is $2.6 billion. In a letter released Friday, the IBEW accused the NDP of a “deliberate misrepresentation of costs” while the UMWA have accused Opposition politicians of speaking of coal workers as “numbers on a balance sheet.”
On Monday Harrison slammed the "really dishonest representations from the Opposition" about their Energy Security strategy, and also slammed them for “direct attacks on these communities and these workers, who have dedicated literally their heart and soul into keeping power on here in this province for, in many cases, generations.”
The minister also took aim at comments from the NDP from last Thursday, when critic for Sask Power Aleana Young said that with the $26 billion number, “you could write a check to every impacted worker in Estevan and Coronach for $10 million and still have billions and billions and billions of dollars left over to build out our grid. It’s a staggering amount of money.”
"The last person who said that was Justin Trudeau," said Harrison, who said "it is extraordinarily disappointing hearing this from the members opposite.”
The minister also pointed to the human side of the issue.
“These are real people, with real families, with real mortgages, in real communities. These are not numbers. This is not some theoretical discussion. This is real stuff, real world stuff for these folks here.”
IBEW 2067 Assistant Business Manager Ken Hoste slammed the NDP's numbers and spoke of the impact on jobs if coal went away.
“How do you say it? Beyond the numbers not making sense, these are real people, lives that are going to be destroyed from this. It's not just some jobs down in Estevan and Coronach, it's a culture. I understand they've been town-halling this plan all over the province, and one place they haven't come is Estevan or Coronach. Nobody's come down there to say how phasing out coal is going to be better for us than it is to keep coal for another generation.”
Ashley Johnson, Financial Secretary for United Mine Workers Local 7606 said it goes beyond those at the mine or at SaskPower who are affected if the refurbishment does not happen.
“It's the teachers, it's everybody — the Canada Post right down to your people working at a 7-Eleven. Simple as that. It affects everybody.”
Johnson also said the NDP plan to rely on natural gas instead of coal did not make sense.
“Gas is good, but we don't have it in the province here. We rely on, I think it's something like 98 per cent of it comes from Alberta. We've got the coal here in the ground and the price doesn't fluctuate. It's not on the open market. To me, that makes sense for energy security and for the province. And there's ways to make coal work even better yet than what it is. I think that's what we need to focus on going forward.”
Local municipal leaders were also at the Legislature. Cal Martin, Mayor of Coronach, called it an emotional issue for his community.
“It's been very emotional in both directions. It was pretty sad up until the announcement the Minister made here a while back. In our community, in our area, two out of three people are related to a job that or associated with The mine or the power plant. If this hadn't have been done, we'd be rolling up sidewalks. I can't allow that to happen.”
Tony Sernick, Mayor of Estevan, echoed those sentiments.
“2020 Estevan, we were looking to be a ghost town. We were going to lose half of our budget of our city, probably rolling up sidewalks, as he said. But coal mining is just so important to Estevan, but it's important to Saskatchewan.”
Sernick pointed to the reliability of coal, especially in winter, and the fact that the coal was available in their own province.
“I guess we didn't grow it, but it's our coal. It's in the ground. It's Saskatchewan. The investment stays in Saskatchewan. The prosperity stays in Saskatchewan. And we're not sending it away to Alberta or the United States relying on natural gas. So again, roll on with the coal. Keep it going.”
In response to reporters questions both Hoste and Johnson took issue with the notion of writing a $10 million cheque to workers. Johnson pointed a study done years earlier that stated that for every job lost for coal workers, seven others would be impacted as well.
“So what do you do with the other seven people times every one of us workers for them? How much money do you give them? Because they're all a part of this as well. And to me, they're not looking at that, the bigger part of the community. And that disappoints me.”
“Every single person in the town is connected to coal, whether they work in it or not,” said Heise. “The spinoffs, restaurants, people buying vehicles, everything. The whole town needs coal.
And again, for each of you here, if we're going to burn something, if we're not burning coal, we're going to be burning natural gas, which means upstream, instead of jobs being in Estevan and Coronach, they're going to be in Alberta for the drilling rigs and oil companies there.”
NDP keep focusing on $26 billion figure
During Question Period the NDP continued to double down repeatedly on the “$26 billion” price tag.
The most memorable exchange involved NDP critic Joan Pratchler said this number mounted to “15 Regina bypasses, for heaven’s sakes. What a waste that would be.” She also asked "how many child care spaces he could fund with $26 billion from now till 2050?"
That drew major pushback from Harrison.
“Because of the fact that they’re conflating capital and operating, what they are saying is that the salaries that we are paying these hard-working folks — whether they be at Boundary Dam, whether they be at Coronach, whether they be at Shand, Mr. Speaker — what they are saying is that is a waste of money,” Harrison said.
“This is the sort of complete disrespect and entirely dismissive attitude that the NDP have towards 1,400 people who literally are dedicating their lives to keeping the power on in this province and doing the work that none of us would necessarily want to do when it’s minus 40 outside to keep the power on. They owe them an apology, Mr. Speaker.”
“I don’t need my words twisted. Mr. Speaker,” shot back Pratchler, who said “choosing the most expensive option leaves less money for things that our families and children need.”
Harrison replied that according to a straight “apples-to-apples” comparison, the “low end of their estimate is $50 billion, Mr. Speaker."
"They need to be forthright with the people of this province. And, Mr. Speaker, they need to be forthright and apologize to these folks sitting up in the gallery who have literally dedicated their lives to serving this province, Mr. Speaker.”
At a news conference Monday morning, Opposition SaskPower critic Young responded to some of the concerns in the letters from the unions.
“I appreciate what these folks are going through. These are workers who've been jerked around by this government for 15 years. Again, up until this year, the Sask Party government was going to be closing down their plants. These are people who've spent 15 years dealing with uncertainty, 15 years worried about their jobs, worried about what this meant for their kids, for their house. I get it.”
She also noted the numbers provided by the NDP are “not the NDP's numbers. They are SaskPower's figures. No one, including Minister Harrison, has disputed that.”
“He keeps maintaining that the cost is zero, while also saying the $13 billion fuel cost is accurate. He says the capital costs are being inflated, while saying, actually, those are the capital costs… Even if we want to talk about the $11.4 billion in capital, that is $8.8 billion higher than this government told people, than they told their own Rate Review Panel as recently as last week. These are Sask Power's figures. They're not NDP numbers, and the Sask Party government continues to stand behind them.”
