YESTERDAY WAS EARTH DAY

Last evening I spoke as a Delegate to Woolwich Council, in the Council Chambers in Elmira, Ontario. I was the only Delegate speaking even remotely on environmental matters or regarding Earth Day. My message, with but a couple of exceptions praising the current Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC) and Woolwich Council for two positive Decisions; was essentially a discouraging one. The last sentence in my Delegation was as follows: "When the one side in any dispute has lawyers, consultants and millions of dollars and the other side only the truth; guess which one gets consistently hammered?"

Last Monday's Waterloo Region Record carried this article/opinion "Four years after oil spill, BP's stalling tactics are shameful". This article was written by David Yarnold the CEO of the National Audubon Society. BP pled guilty to criminal negligence which immediately caused eleven human deaths and currently immeasurable loss of wildlife. Their lawyers are playing the stalling game to avoid beginning massive payments of $18 Billion to attempt to repair and restore the environment. To date BP has paid for the immediate cleanup of their 170 million gallons of oil spewed into the Gulf of Mexico. The massive judgement against them is in addition to "...14 criminal counts ranging from lying to felony manslaughter." I would like to know how many BP executives who made the decisions prior to the spill will ever see the inside of a jail cell. Logically one would think that felony manslaughter would put a person in jail. In the case of a drunk driver injuring another party it probably would. But these are corporations who buy and sell politicians like chewing gum. Laws are made to protect both society and unfortunately to protect guilty corporate executives.

This is the reality of environmental protection and cleanups in North America. Money and politics rule and both are dirty and corrupt. In that sense nothing has changed since the first Earth Day in 1972.