Alberta inquiry finds no wrongdoing in anti-oilsands campaign despite foreign funds
BNN Bloomberg
Canadian environmental groups were simply exercising their democratic rights of free speech when they accepted foreign funding for campaigns opposing oilsands development, a public inquiry has reported.
EDMONTON -- Canadian environmental groups were simply exercising their democratic rights of free speech when they accepted foreign funding for campaigns opposing oilsands development, a public inquiry has reported.
But Alberta Energy Minister Sonya Savage said that even though environmentalists may have been within their rights, they were still in the wrong in opposing energy development that cost Alberta jobs and money.
"The report didn't suggest anything illegal was going on," she said. "But if you ask people in Alberta who lost their job if anything wrong happened, I'm pretty sure they would say yes."
On Thursday, the Alberta government released the final report of the Allan commission, struck in July 2019 to look into allegations that Canadian environmentalists were accepting foreign money to fund campaigns aimed at impeding expansion of Alberta's oilsands, a source of greenhouse gases.
The environmental groups have never denied that. On Tuesday, commissioner Steve Allan seemed to shrug at the charge in his report, which cost $3.5 million.
"I have not found any suggestions of wrongdoing on the part of any individual or organization," wrote Allan, who did not appear at the press conference releasing the report.
