In a wide-ranging interview with leading Vancouver radio host Bill Good, Cross discussed the highlights of the report and the work behind it. The show also prompted readers to call in and some of those comments are also below.
Listen to highlights from the CKNW broadcast (April 11, 2014) below:
Bill Good introduces the new Resource Works Society
Myth: Benefits go mostly to rural areas, bypassing Metro Vancouver
Myth: Natural resources create few good jobs
Myth: BC’s resources follow a boom-bust cycle
Myth: Spin-off benefits go outside British Columbia
Myth: The resource sector is too small to significantly affect the economy
Myth: Canada’s future is only in moving up the value-added chain
Callers to the Bill Good Show
A listener named Wayne called to say that Alberta is in debt so has not managed to capitalize on its supposedly rich oil resources. If the wealth had been built up like in Norway, this caller says he would have no problem with the Canadian oil industry.
Chris “from the 250 area code” – shorthand for BC’s resource-creating regions – called to say that if Vancouver leaders like Mayor Gregor Robertson want to stop natural resources from going through the city, the city also has to know that this will also mean giving up the benefits of the natural resource economy. Bill Good calls this the “divide between north and south – urban and rural.”
Bill Good says that people have forgotten how huge the resource industry is – and that people in Vancouver do not recognize or support it.
