Natural Resources Ministry responds to BCGEU information request

As we reported to you last week, the BCGEU has been seeking details around the allocation of new funding announced for the resource sector by Premier Clark. In particular, we have been seeking information about the number of authorizations "which constitute the backlog in preventing projects from proceeding," as mentioned in Premier Clark’s introduction of Canada Starts Here: The BC Jobs Plan, on September 22, 2011 to the Vancouver Board of Trade.

The BCGEU is seeking this information to determine whether the allocation of $24 million in new funding for the sector is adequate to address the backlog. As mentioned in the BCGEU presentation to the Legislative Finance Committee recently, we believe this backlog of permit applications has arisen as a result of the cuts to ministry staff during the past decade.

Surprisingly, the ministry was unable to provide this information, even though this kind of statistical information is often contained in these announcements. The BCGEU filed a formal freedom of information request to obtain the information.

In response to our request, the ministry has responded with the following information:
The backlog numbers associated with the recent jobs plan announcement are: 1) Mining or notice of work permits of which there are approximately 230; 2) Water Permits of which there are approximately 3900; and 3) Land Act Permits of which there are approximately 2785. This totals approximately 6915 backlogged applications.

The BCGEU asked the Finance Committee to recommend the government provide enough funding to clear backlogs in service requests in B.C.’s resource ministries. These ministries play a key role in driving economic growth.The recent government announcement of temporary funding to deal with permit backlogs is welcome, but we believe it will be inadequate to address the backlogs created by cuts to staff. The resource ministries face budget reductions totaling $86 million during the coming three fiscal years, according to our analysis contained in our budget submission. The size of the permit backlog demonstrates the impacts of these cuts. The additional $24 million in temporary funding promised by government, though welcome, does not come close to repairing the damage resulting from these cuts. In particular, we understand that only approximately $12 million of this new temporary funding is allocated to this ministry, with the remainder allocated to other ministries with their own backlogs.

The BCGEU will continue to pursue details about the new funding from the ministry, specifically how many staff the ministry proposes to hire to address this significant and unnecessary backlog, which hampers economic growth. As well, we note the underfunding is hampering compliance and enforcement functions in government. We believe government needs to address this.

These issues will be canvassed with the ministry at an upcoming Article 29 labour management meeting. We will report to you after this meeting.
Members with suggestions and issues about these topics can contact Byron Goerz, Component 20 Chairperson, byron.goerz@bcgeu.ca or Mike Eso, BCGEU Staff Representative, mike.eso@bcgeu.ca.