03:22 - 07.10.07
Rape and Pillage
Happy Birthday Archbishop Tutu!
There is quite a paradox playing out around the oil and gas royalty report and ensuing audit that was released a week later. As that news was breaking, so was the news that Taqa, the biggest oil company in Abu Dhabi, was buying out a Canadian oil trust company for somewhere around $5 to 6 billion dollars. Another Asian based company was also buying out a smaller player in the 'patch, but the dollar amounts were still astronomical viewed from a subsistence level existence such I have right now. Neither entity flinched even a little as the rules for paying corporate taxes were changed. One of the most profitable European companies also has expressed no difficulty with the shift, because they already pay those kinds of taxes all around the globe willingly and are still considerably more profitable than the North American companies. Wonder what would happen if they took over management of the less efficiently run companies who are complaining so vigourously right now.
Which companies do I mean? The local and international companies here who are waxing apoplectic at the same instant. The biggest bully statement came from the amalgamation of the current company that used to be the front companies for both the provincial government (AEC) and the federal government/CPR (PanCanadian) now jointly called Encana. They're going to take "their" money and invest it someplace else. Given the highly favorable terms they had in the past - CPR already being granted significant land and mineral rights from their heydays in the transportation world, those that made them such a big player to begin with - there is every argument that they should have to pay back even more, especially if they are trying to remove or liquidate capital assets that have always belonged to the citizens of this province. Oh, and they don't get to keep or sell off any crown or provincial mineral rights still on their books, if they take their teeny balls and go play somewhere else. Corporate citizenship has responsibilities as well as rights. Right?
Of course, those threats are resurrecting legitimate fears among Albertans about the revenge the oil corporations will inflict on local workers and communities if they don't get their way. The social and economic devastation caused when those oil companies shut-in thousands of existing, producing wells when the National Energy Program was brought in in the fall of 1980 hasn't left the consciousness of any one living in this province at that time. The difference was that then the provincial government pocketed the benefits both financially and politically when both they and the oil companies conspired together to blamed the federal government for that destruction. Those hurt the most weren't in a position to see the collusion and the co-ordinated action to use Albertans as the blood sacrifice to take previously held federal powers and split them among themselves. That's why we have the Picasso-like belief in this province that somehow it is the corporations that own the resources and that, as citizens, we should all worship them for allowing us to share the crumbs they toss our way as a signification of their vaunted corporate social responsibility. The big lie. The difference now is that, so far, the new provincial premier hasn't seemed willing to play that game. The specter of the layoffs has been touted in certain local media instead. Hmmm. Conrad Black's old stomping grounds; guess he has still got his cronies in place. Backing a political entity into a corner by creating an illusion or delusion so big it smothers all reasoned debate. And no, I still haven't read any of Naomi Klein's books. Don't need to, thank you very much.
Next up came the dulcet tones of one of the global villains in the oil and gas world - the Darfur czar. Threats all around there too, commensurate with someone who might need to worry a bit more about war crimes charges, if the UN ever adopts and adapts the new US legislation on corporate pillaging in the same sentence with nations and de facto governments. As it should, since the effect is the same - the children are dead no matter who paid the mercenary. Oh, and where is the "homeland security" team when it would have some real value - you know following the dirty money/money laundering trail.
To his credit, the new Premier of the province stated he wasn't going to be intimidated by those threats, but then some investors and their brokers in the bully companies chimed in, because of course they are thinking they won't get as much in their dividend packages anymore. Given that those dividends came directly out of our province's natural resource base - that means renting not owning, y'all - and should have been invested in health care, education and family support, the investors/brokers should be ashamed of themselves. No more taking food off the tables of the families producing the wealth, no more pushing those productive workers into homelessness onto our city streets. Those investors should consider what will happen to them, given that they knowingly supported their companies in causing incredible damage to the local environment in order to extract the maximum return on their investments. In Canadian law, res ajudicata in Ontario and a couple of Atlantic provinces already, those directors and investors who have knowingly directed their invested companies to carry out the damage were fined - heavily. Maybe there should even be a rule that those companies have to fix the damage they've done without the assistance of the orphan well fund, if they become ornery about it. That orphan well fund was the sneaky way the governments paid companies to clean up their messes in the past. That fund was the basis for the formation of the trust companies as well. More taxpayer dollars and community resources siphoned off behind our backs. Then there are all those write-offs and write-downs to existing shell and legacy companies deemed unprofitable, that shave millions more off from net tax declarations. Audits anyone? Um, yes, well I'm ranting, but it is the only satisfaction I'm likely to get after all. Free speech was stomped on when one of the local companies, who said the change in the royalty structure wouldn't cause them any harm, quickly backpeddled by it's peers. Free speech, but only if permission is secured from the big oil companies first or one has the protection of an international agency such as the Nobel foundation.
So what does our Prime Minister say to all the royalty angst? Silence, almost as though he wants to hide it from the press altogether. But yes, oh wait, he worked for Imperial Oil - something recently removed from his on-line biographies, it seems. You know about Imperial Oil, don't you dear diary. Like a lot of companies operating in this city, that is the Canadian name for the affiliate that belongs to the big multi-national parent company - in this case Exxon-Mobil, which of course is just the latest incarnation of Standard Oil. Huh? Check Wikipedia if that doesn't ring a bell, dear diary. Just one of the biggest corporate corruption scandals that eclipsed even the Enron gang of today. Oops I stray a bit, don't I? The local incorporation/name is required because the companies must have either a Canadian or Provincial business licence in order to operate in this country. It is the only tool that regulatory bodies have to ensure compliance with Canadian laws - environmental protection and labour laws, theoretically and for example. On the other hand, with respect to the new international companies buying out a couple of local companies despite all the whining, our esteemed Prime Minister opines that "foreigners" shouldn't have the right to buy up our natural resources or exploit citizens' right to a fair return for that rental. No hypocrisy there, nuh uh.
Um, anyway my blood pressure is a tad high right now, so I think I'll go meditate and pray for those people in Burma who have been sold out to other mining companies through a brutal military government. Guess that is clear evidence why Canadians need to speak up now or risk being silenced too. Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
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