Despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promising to cap oil and gas sector emissions to reach net zero by 2050, his federal labour minister Seamus O’Regan is now saying that Canada has a major shortage of workers in the oil and gas industry.
According to Blacklock’s Reporter, O’Regan made the remarks during a House of Commons natural resources committee meeting in response to a report warning that the Trudeau government’s emissions plan would cost the country 170,000 jobs.
“We are not transitioning jobs out of the sector,” O’Regan said. “To be honest with you, and this certainly has been my focus since I’ve taken on this new role as labour minister, our biggest problem is we don’t have enough workers.”
O’Regan singled out the oil and gas sector for being particularly plagued by a labour shortage.
“We don’t have enough workers in just about any industry in this country but most particularly and poignantly we don’t have enough workers in the energy industry and in the oil and gas industry,” said O’Regan.
Since Trudeau was first elected in 2015, his government pledged to provide a “just transition” for oil and gas sector workers into more sustainable jobs.
O’Regan addressed the pledge, saying, “(I know of) the deep-seated anxiety amongst oil and gas workers whenever the words ‘just’ and ‘transition’ are mentioned.”
During the committee meeting, NDP MP Charlie Angus challenged O’Regan for his contradictory positions.
“Why are we wasting time with the public telling them that you’re going to have this big just transition plan?” said Angus.
O’Regan replied that having enough oil and gas workers and lowering emissions were not mutually exclusive goals.
“My biggest concern is making sure workers of this country are in place to make sure they do the work that we need them to do which is to lower emissions.”
Despite O’Regan’s position, the Trudeau government has been mulling legislation aimed at transitioning workers out of the oil and gas industry. In November of last year, Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson said that the legislation would be ready “in the next couple of months.”
Liberal environment minister Steven Guilbeault also stated in an interview earlier this year that he wanted to phase out fossil fuels in Canada entirely within two years.
“My timeline is two years,” Guilbeault said. “So in the next two years, more stringent methane regulations, zero-emission vehicle standards, net-zero grid by 2035, cap on oil and gas and obviously phasing out fossil fuels – all of these things must be in place in the coming eighteen months.”
