Praying for Pictou

Albertans have been doing a lot of grumbling about the decline of the fossil fuel industry in that province, and while other Canadians may ask why they didn't see this coming its a bleak prospect to be unemployed at Christmas -- ask GM workers in Oshawa.

We have lived in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia and realize that Atlantic Canada has struggled with a "boom and bust" economy forever, it would seem, and check out the employment rates in those provinces. They too depend on natural resources, from the sea, and the forest, and yest, oil and gas extraction. In so many of these places across the country the companies are significant employers until they conclude they are no longer profitable. Too often they close shop and slink out of town, leaving human destitution and environmental damage which they won't pay to clean up. 

I was caught off guard today when the Nova Scotia government stuck to an earlier decision to set a deadline of the end of January 2020 for the Northern Pulp mill near Pictou to stop dumping toxic effluent near a First Nation. The mill has been given five years to come up with an alternate plan but the proposed solution was to have it flow into the Northumberland Strait -- 85 million litres a day -- a day!

This will almost certainly mean the closure of the plant and the loss of thousands of jobs. It is a grim prospect for these employees and is so often the case, they will pay the price for the decision the company has made not to comply. The premier of Nova Scotia announced a $50 million transition fund, but that won't replace employment for so many. 

On the other side  fisheries in P.E.I. and Nova Scotia as well as Indigenous rights organizations are relieved the government has shown the fortitude to follow through on what has been a difficult decision. 



This is never easy for governments which are caught between a rock and a hard place. Yet there are consequences to irresponsible industry. We hear now that many ranchers in Alberta are angry because resource companies have walked about from rigs on their land because they are no longer productive. Indigenous communities downstream from the tarsands have experienced significant problems  And think back to the huge outcry in Newfoundland when the cod ran out because of federal mismanagement and rapacious over-fishing. The moratorium resulted in the end of a way of life. 

We can pray for Pictou and this region, realizing that there has already been division and anger. God be with the churches attempting to celebrate Christmas in the midst of what is terrible news for some and a hopeful outcome for others.