The NDP leadership’s proximity to fossil-fuel interests in British Columbia shows that the forces behind Starmer in the UK are not unique, argues John Clarke

As Keir Starmer wages war on the left and persecutes Jeremy Corbyn with particular malice, it is hardly surprising that it is he, and not his principal target, who is a Knight Commander of the Order of Bath.

Those in the UK who are seething with indignation at what is going on within the Labour Party might want to take note that social-democratic parties in other countries also produce leaders who loyally serve capitalist interests and have prestigious titles and other rewards bestowed upon them. An astounding example has emerged here in Canada.

Services rendered

The former premier of British Columbia and leader of the BC New Democratic Party (NDP), John Horgan, hasn’t let the grass grow under his feet since he resigned from these positions last year. It has just been announced that he will take a seat on the board of Elk Valley Resources, a newly established subsidiary operation that will focus its efforts on the production of coal.

Horgan seems quite reconciled to the fact that his conduct will evoke criticism and he rather dismissively told the media that: “I don’t have a lot of time any more, none in fact, for public comment on my world view, or what I am doing with my time.” Despite this expression of indifference, he couldn’t resist offering an assurance that ‘he will be making sure that the company is meeting its obligations to workers, to First Nations, to the environment and to shareholders.’ We may suspect that his efforts will be particularly successful in the case of the shareholders.

BC is a province in which resource extraction plays a considerable role. Writing in the Prince George Citizen newspaper, James Steidle responded to Horgan’s appointment with a very healthy and fully justified expression of outrage. He pointed out that: ‘When our leaders and bureaucrats leave the public service to immediately take plum jobs with large multinational corporations they had influence over, it makes me wonder who they were working for while they were in office.’

Steidle also suggested, with regard to such appointments, that: ‘It’s a clear conflict of interest, it’s unethical, and it should be illegal.’ For good measure, he argued that: ‘If you actually worked for the people, I can guarantee you the corporate sector wouldn’t want to touch you with a ten foot pole.’

That comment brings the matter into sharp relief in the case of John Horgan. A seat on the board of a coal company might seem an unlikely appointment for someone who recently headed a party that is supposed to represent working-class people and the cause of social justice. However, a look at the role that Horgan has played in his political life leaves no doubt that he is being gratefully rewarded for services rendered.

Though the NDP has never formed a government at the federal level in Canada, there are several provinces where it has a history of holding power and BC is one of them. As premier of the province, Horgan took the political agenda of serving the needs of fossil-fuel capitalism and resource extraction to extreme levels. He championed the ‘development of a liquified natural gas (LNG) empire in B.C’, and, in 2019, his government fashioned ‘an incentive package worth an estimated $5.35 billion to LNG Canada, a consortium of some of the most profitable multinationals in the world.’

The severe environmental impact of this course was clear and it was understood that ‘phase one of the LNG Canada project is expected to emit about four megatons of greenhouse gas emissions annually, the equivalent of adding 856,531 cars to the road.’ This project, moreover, created the need for ‘a 675-kilometre pipeline running from Dawson Creek to Kitimat’ that led to ‘one of Canada’s most distressing clashes between the energy industry and Indigenous rights.’

The following year, an obdurate John Horgan remained utterly determined to serve the interests of the oil and gas industries. Despite determined opposition from environmentalists and powerful Indigenous-led protests, the premier left no doubt that these would be disregarded and that state-security agencies would do whatever was necessary to push aside any defiance. He was emphatic that ‘the rule of law will apply to ensure work continues on the Coastal GasLink pipeline.’

Horgan also greased the wheels for the logging industry in BC, prompting major confrontations with those who opposed this destructive course. A petition issued by Greenpeace warned that ‘British Columbia’s old-growth forests are currently being chopped down at an alarming rate’ and made clear that ‘Premier John Horgan has failed to keep a number of promises, which is fuelling environmental destruction. He is still allowing logging in nine “protected” areas in BC.’

Under Horgan, the use of the most brutal police tactics to contain resistance to environmental degradation and encroachment on Indigenous land became standard practice. The RCMP are Canada’s federal police force, but provinces like BC enter into service agreements with it, so the NDP government in that province carries direct responsibility for the appalling and often unlawful conduct of the Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG).

According to the RCMP’s own website the C-IRG, as a special grouping within the force, ‘was created in 2017 to provide strategic oversight addressing energy industry incidents and related public order, national security and crime issues.’ The protesters and Indigenous land defenders who have had to deal with this unit refer to them as ‘oil and gas mercenaries’ and ‘pipeline’ police. Their track record of violent attacks on protests, their unlawful conduct and their close working relationship with the resource extraction companies, is well documented.

Climate impacts

Horgan’s political agenda of furthering the interests of fossil-fuel capitalism has been brought into sharp relief as BC has faced exceptionally severe climate impacts, including major floods and devastating heat waves. In 2021, Horgan was forced to backtrack after he responded to news of heat-related deaths in the province, at least 134 in Vancouver alone, with the observation that ‘fatalities are a part of life.’

As Horgan prepared to move on from his years of ‘public service’, the establishment within his party was determined to ensure that new leadership wouldn’t mean any significant change of course. Last year, a highly respected environmentalist, Anjali Appadurai, ran for the leadership of the BC NDP and it was soon apparent that her campaign was gathering huge momentum.

Based on a highly questionable report from a chief electoral officer with past connections to natural-gas interests, the party’s provincial executive voted to disqualify Appadurai, so that David Eby became leader without opposition. Eby is an impeccable loyalist within the NDP establishment and ‘as attorney-general, he had been a key figure in both police operations and criminal prosecutions directed against Indigenous land defenders and environmental activists who challenged climate vandalism and other destructive activities by major companies.’

Horgan’s place at the boardroom table of a coal company is thoroughly deserved and it is symptomatic of the political trajectory of social democracy on both sides of the Atlantic. The Starmer restoration has been an exercise in ensuring that Labour’s role as a loyal and effective political steward of British capitalism is never again called into question. The BC NDP has just as surely positioned itself as the servant of some of the most destructive capitalist interests in North America. It is little wonder that the work of John Horgan is so greatly appreciated by those who have profited from it.