Coal Bed part of Conservative shell game in motion.

Sherritt partnered with Fording Coal of Alberta. In the deal, Fording coal kept the metallurgical (hard) coal and Sherritt, owned by the Ontario Teachers Association Pension Fund took control of all of the heating coal.

Fording goes on to build power plants and buys the coal from an outside source (Sherritt). There is no price control on this coal, all the market well bare. No matter what they pay for coal they will be able to rip it out of our pockets in electricity charges.

In a more recent scenario Sherritt will mine and sell coal to the Oil Companies. The Oil companies will agree on what ever price is asked because it goes onto their production costs hence is not considered a loss. There is no jurisdiction, laws or government agencies in place in this province to stop the exploitation of this commodity and petroleum expenditures are not closely audited. We end up with nothing; a hole in the ground.

Hence, the people of Alberta do not receive any royalty payments until the cost of this coal. Other things like construction and travel are considered when figuring in start up and production costs.

As it stands at this moment, the Ontario Teachers Pension fund stands to make more money per barrel on Alberta’s tar sands than do the people of Alberta! And even worse, it comes off the top, long before we see our pennies.

We need a Government that will take proper stewardship of our resources seriously and undertake to see we get a fair market value for our resource which are not renewable.

John Clark
cyberclark@shaw.ca.