You have to have lived in the business for about 50 years and seen a lot of mining deals go south to know this. I don't expect everyone to understand.
You have to wake up and realize we are the number one mining country and mine financing country in the world. 30,000,000 people raise more money for mining than 300 million of the richest people in the world. We were number one in silver, and nickel production, up there in copper, and mined 200 tonnes of gold per year at one time. If you have levels of government constantly gnawing at the foot of mining day in day out, it's serious. They don't have to go about shooting miners in massacres like they would in Libya if they were against them, just pull the rug out slowly as they squeeze every last dollar out of them. Why? You tell me, but they have done it. They took the number one industry in Canada, and the largest resource exchange in the world, and relegated it to marginal status. The TSE is now going to be sold to the London stock exchange. Merger my ass. We are losing it. Noranda, Falconbridge, Inco. Largest mining companies in the world. Sold to foreigners. Nary a peep. I am not letting the conservatives off the hook here. Harris was an ass as far as mining was concerned. Only reason they balked at the BHP takeover was you guessed it, Potash was government owned largely, not private. Oh, the taxes! that is what it is all about. Where the hell do these morons think the taxes come from ultimately? People have to make money. I think they are brain dead.
The Liberals and NDP have killed mining in the past 50 years that I know about. I could quote a dozen regs and acts of pure piracy. Taxes, regulations, seizures, just plain interference. All their rhetoric points to it. Sunset industry etc etc etc. Real encouraging. 90% of all environmental legislation is an arrow pointed straight at the heart of mining, while they ignore the dead zones of nitrates pouring out of cities on the coast. Did mining do that? Was mining responsible for PCB's and DDT? Nope. You don't hear the geniuses in the NDP talking about nitrates and dead zones. Because they are that dumb. They just don't know.
Are whales inedible because of nickel, copper, iron, gold, cyanide or even arsenic? No! Are jellyfish in the gulf due to mining? Nope. 100,000 farms and towns along the Mississippi maybe, but hey that is 15,000,000 votes. Can't make them clean up their crap. No way.
How long have you been in mining in a serious way? The way you talk I am guessing ten years. No serious person I know in the business would let on that the opposition parties are anything but the enemies of mining, and heavy industry in general. I see it a post office wall of bad guys. Most wanted. In some other country, please.
Most of the elected officials of the past few decades have been left of Hugo Chavez. Chretien, Martin, Tobin, Rae, Schreyer, Blakeney, Barret, Douglas etc, etc.
You might as well vote communist.
NDP is calling for a moratorium on coal mines in BC. Here is a sample of their drivel. In every plank of this sorry platform is the hidden agenda of stopping private enterprise in its tracks. These people have the idea that the government does everything and every forge and factory is the tool of the devil. No balanced thought, just rampant big government commie ludditism. No oil tankers in BC coastal waters. What?!! And how is oil going to get to BC? Sheesh! as if they could do anything about stuff coming from the North Slope. No way.
"Implement a moratorium on developing new coal mines. The one exception may be the need to open new mines for metallurgical coal for steel production if electric arc furnace production from more environmentally friendly methods of generating electricity cannot be developed in a short time frame.
• An effective stand-alone BC Species At Risk Act will be an important part of our strategy.
• An NDP government under my leadership will promote sustainable aquaculture practices by moving fin-fish aquaculture from open net to closed containment systems.
• I support the moratorium on oil tanker traffic in BC coastal waters.
• Under my leadership, a Minister of Water Stewardship will be appointed.
• A moratorium on private power development in BC is warranted. First, we need to determine the extent private power projects might be able to help us deal with our climate change commitments. Second, we need to understand BC’s real energy demands and the sustainable alternatives. Third, we need to use our tools of land use planning and environmental assessment to make sure that all power development is appropriately located. Fourth, we need to determine if the public receives a genuine benefit from private power development and ensure that private power development does not compromise our public power system, or our access to the backcountry.
If you listen to the NDP you would think they invented fair government. I did not say the SOCREDS were angels. Far from it. But at least they let people mine in the province, and yes, there was plenty of manufacturing, serving mostly logging, mining and shipping. Now there is nothing. They take the credit in BC for the 1990's boom. It was not their doing. It was immigration cash. They wax euphoric about the increases in medicare etc, but forget to tell you BC is bankrupt because of it. If you cannot afford something, what must you do? Economize or do without. No point in printing funny money and propaganda about what a great country we have where our children will live in abject poverty.
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