It comes as no surprise, which is why I will be brief, but today it is worth mentioning that the deadline has officially been set for the conclusion of the Northern Gateway Joint Review Panel. By December, 2013, the federal government will have an official recommendation. At which point they will be free to rubber-stamp the whole thing, as per the changes the government has made over the past few months.
For anyone who is new to the subject, or who wants to bask in the glow of redundancy of the government’s measures to leave nothing to chance regarding Northern Gateway’s approval, a review of these measures can be found here. Most egregious among them, of course, is the fact that Cabinet has given itself the power to approve Northern Gateway regardless of the findings of the already highly compromised review panel. Nothing much has changed in terms of the review process since that post, except this latest deadline, so it might make a good refresher.
Harper is getting anxious to flex his muscles – and as the Globe noted, it will be just in time to show his friends in Calgary, before the next election, that they have a friend in the Executive. In case they didn’t already know that.
Jimmy Thomson 