Dogwood News This Week: intimidate, displace and punish

Details: Published on Sunday, 29 November -0001 16:00; Written by editor

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news and action Saturday April 8, 2023 This week people from communities harmed by Royal Bank’s oil & gas investments travelled to Saskatoon to speak at the bank’s annual general meeting.

But RBC security guards moved Indigenous and Black delegates into an empty room with a conference line. Bank executives refused to face them.

Undeterred, Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan speakers criticized RBC for funding the Coastal GasLink pipeline. They asked when the bank would stand up for Indigenous rights and the climate.

Eventually staff cut the mic and CEO Dave McKay refused to answer any more questions.

Outside the bank office in Saskatoon, police spotters... watched from rooftops as people drummed and sang in support of the chiefs, elders and land defenders inside.

The same day Vancouver police (some wearing banned thin blue line patches) set up an “exclusion zone” for reporters while they cleared unhoused people off East Hastings street.

It’s the same tactic used to clear land defence camps at Fairy Creek or on Wet’suwet’en territory. And once again the people removed by police were largely Indigenous.

They were scattered, not for their own safety as politicians and police officials claim, but because tent cities are bad for business.

There’s no safe, dignified housing waiting for most of the people who had their tents crushed in garbage trucks. The humiliation and cruelty is the point.

Whether it’s pipeline companies, real estate developers or the banks who back them, they all use police to intimidate, displace and punish anyone who stands in the way of profit.

Why are we paying these departments more and more every year to serve private corporations – and not the public?
NEWS Stories we’re following

John, unleashed What does it say about the ties between the B.C. government and industry (and government accountability) when one day after leaving politics, our former premier joined the board of one of the worst environmental polluters in the province? -The Narwhal

B.C.'s taking climate action... backwards The provincial government continues to support new fossil fuel infrastructure while vainly proclaiming it can meet its emissions targets. - Times Colonist

Meet Jane Jane Devonshire is one of the most passionate and steadfast climate activists in B.C., and Dogwood is stronger because of her. - National Observer

Indigenous buyers face big losses Investors in the Trans Mountain pipeline can expect to lose money on the deal and face “the likely prospect of being saddled with a stranded asset”. - The Energy Mix

Acting now to protect generations still to come The Gitxaała Nation is challenging B.C.’s long outdated and unfair process for granting mineral claims.

Masterful greenwashing How FortisBC is tricking well-meaning customers into buying their “renewable” gas. - National Observer If you like what you're reading but aren't subscribed, sign up for Dogwood News! Subscribe Dogwood Recommends

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