Canada's Building Trades Support Reversal of Enbridge Line 9; Continued Concern Over Bill C-377

JOURNAL: ISSUE 3 - 2012

On August 2, 2012, Robert Blakely, Director of Canadian Affairs of the Building and Construction Trades Department announced the support of Canada's building trades unions for the Canadian Government's decision to allow Enbridge, Inc. to reverse the flow of oil in its pipeline between Hamilton and Sarnia. Granting Enbridge consent to ship oil from western Canada through its Ontario pipeline will result in strengthening the country's national energy security framework while protecting good-paying jobs.

The nation's building trades unions, however, remain very concerned about the unintended, negative consequences of Bill C-377, which endangers the ability of Canadian workers to participate in large-scale nation building energy and resource projects. (See "Help Fight Bill 377", Issue 1 – 2012 Journal.)  "Part of the problem," says IU Acting Regional Director Craig Strudwick, is that "C-377 is intended to fix a problem that does not exist. Instead, it actually duplicates processes that if enforced, will create an expanded, expensive and redundant bureaucracy." Costs of complying with the measure would be well beyond those currently required of any other tax entity and would add considerable costs to the bottom line of large-scale energy projects.

Statistics show that every three days, at least one person on an organ donation waiting list dies.

Retired Local officer and 56-year BAC member Joe Mollica of Welland, Ontario got involved in promoting organ and tissue donation awareness when his sister, Jean Ann Cousineau, died while awaiting a kidney transplant. That tragic turn motivated Mollica, a tireless community activist, to advance this cause through his service on behalf of the Step-by-Step Organ Transplant Association.

Step-by-Step accomplishes much of its community education and outreach through The Torch of Life, a torch relay program that draws on student participation.

To learn more about organ and tissue donation, go to www.stepbystep.ca/web/content/view/20/26/.