BC Green Party leader Andrew Weaver had his own words on Site C dam thrown back at him June 8 at a protest held by an association representing contractors working on the $8.8 billion BC Hydro project.
The Independent Contractors and Businesses Association (ICBA) strung hundreds of pink slips up at BC Hydro’s head office in Vancouver – one for each of the 2,245 workers currently employed at the dam site.
Those construction jobs are now at risk, should a review by the BC Utilities Commission recommend bringing the project to a halt, according to the ICBA. As part of a four-year governance agreement struck between the BC NDP and Greens, a minority NDP government would fast-track a review of the project, said Chris Gardner, ICBA president.
“That’s 2,200 families that don’t know in the next two to three months whether they’re going to have a paycheque,” said Gardner. “What [BC NDP leader] John Horgan and Andrew Weaver are doing is irresponsible and it’s reckless.
“It’s sending a signal to investors that, if you get a project approved in this province, you may not be able to build it. The government may change its mind.”
The Site C project is now about 20 per cent along in construction. Estimates of the money already spent by BC Hydro on the project vary from $2 billion to $4 billion.
One of the visuals for the protest was a poster featuring quotes from Weaver.
“It meets the definition of clean energy,” was one of the quotes, which came from a Globe and Mail interview with Weaver in 2010, before he had entered politics.
“I can’t see what is stopping Site C,” Weaver is also quoted as saying in 2009.
The pink slips displayed at the protest featured Weaver and Horgan, with a bubble quote: “You’re fired!”
