Pain in the Asbestos Mines

Somehow, the Tories (and other political parties) keep on defending Canada's asbestos industry.

Earlier this week, CBC uncovered an email sent from a top Health Canada bureaucrat urging the government to let the UN list chrysotile asbestos as a hazardous material, which the Conservative government promptly ignored. The Ottawa Citizen's editorialists, quite rightly, declare the Tories' support for the Canadian asbestos industry “morally bankrupt.” Despite all scientific evidence to the contrary, they maintain that asbestos, when handled properly, is safer than other forms of the cancer-causing mineral. However, by stymieing attempts to get it added to the UN's Rotterdam Convention, asbestos is shipped to the developing world without anything labelling it as potentially hazardous, nor how to handle it.”The health of people in the developing world depends on Canada doing the right thing,” warn the editorialists, “as does our international credibility.”

Chris Selley of the National Post thanks the NDP for being the lone party in Canada to take a (semi-) principled stand against the asbestos industry. “Traditionally, Canadian politicians have softened their stance as soon as they find themselves credibly bidding for Quebecers’ affections,” writes Selley, but the NDP, even with its much larger Quebec caucus, has yet to resort to pandering to the riding of Richmond-Arthabaska, the only place in the country where the mineral is mined. Selley suggests the NDP “may simply have concluded the embarrassment costs of learning to live with asbestos weren’t worth it," hinting that the NDP's stance may be politicking over principle, which rings a little hollow, though. Not compromising beliefs for minor political gain – isn't that usually defined as acting principled?

The signatories of the Rotterdam Convention are meeting on Monday to determine if chrysotile asbestos should finally be added, notes the Vancouver Sun's Craig McInnes, which would be an ideal time for the Tories to have an about-face on the issue. “Listing chrysotile would only be the equivalent of adding a warning label,” says McInnes. “But even that has been too much for Harper's government.” That 100,000 people die each year from asbestos-related illnesses, most of them in the developing world, hasn't changed the stance of the Tories (and the Bloc Québécois and the Quebec Liberals), and provokes one to wonder just what it would take for them to do so.