FRED RYAN
Posted 11.30.06

Private ownership of property may be a bedrock concept of our society, but it sure doesn't stand in the way of what governments and big corporations see as their best interests.

I'm not writing of "creeping socialism" but of runaway commercial forces. Think you own a piece of land? Think again, at least if that piece of land happens to have minerals underground.

Changes to Quebec's mining act has virtually tossed private ownership out the window; such changes have been made across Canada.

Sub-surface rights to property have been suspended for a long time, at least rights that might accrue to the property owners. Now, once a claim has been registered, the claim-holder no longer apparently has any obligation to negotiate a right-of-way or access to the property with the owner.

The claim-holder apparently has the right to come on the property at any time for any purpose connected to the mining claim, including taking soil samples, which might involve bulldozing or other heavy-equipment use. You and I have the right to stand there and watch the miners use our cottage lot, home property, or wood lot as they see fit.

I use the word "apparently" because there may be a conflict between the mining act and the civil code.

The civil code still gives property owners the right to limit access to their property, and until the new mining legislation is challenged in court, this difference of interpretation will remain in limbo -- and mining rights will remain supreme.

Supreme certainly in that most rural governments and town councils are unlikely to challenge a mining corporation's right to go where it wishes with whatever equipment it deems necessary.

Why? You know the answer in rural districts: "We need the jobs."

Our forests get shipped down the highway because we need the jobs cutting those trees. Our rivers are dammed and diverted because we need the six months of construction jobs the dams provide. >[? Promoters want to build a huge landfill in cottage country? OK, we need the jobs.

If prostitution was legal, we can expect most of our municipal councils to agree to allow recruiters in to talk to our daughters, wouldn't we? Those girls need jobs. This distasteful example is extreme, but it points to the extremes to which our non-proactive rural leaders will go. Is there anything we won't do "for jobs?"

A large mining corporation, with uranium claims in South Africa and Australia, has announced it has staked uranium claims across large parts of rural West Quebec -- in the Pontiac and des Collines MRCs. The announcement was made, apparently, to aid the corporation's share sales.

Being jobless, we are unlikely to buy many shares, but this news should make us pay attention to what our provincial government has done to property rights to accommodate corporate interests. More importantly, we should check the location of those claims before the bulldozers arrive at the cottage. Municipal offices should at least be able to provide this information.

Fred Ryan is publisher of Quebec's Aylmer Bulletin, West Quebec Post, and the Pontiac Journal. He is also a director of the Quebec Community Newspapers Association.

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Copyright © 2006 Fred Ryan/Log Cabin Chronicles/11.06