The Alberta government wants to incentivize oilsands companies to hire more locals. Here's why
CBC
The Fort McMurray oilsands have long hosted a large number of transient workers. Now, there's a fresh push for companies operating at the epicentre of Canada's oil and gas extraction to make their workforce more local.
"Work camps are just not good for people and not good for communities," said Alberta's Minister of Energy and Minerals Brian Jean. "They don't help our community and they don't help the communities that people are from."
Jean says the fly-in-fly-out model is "hollowing out" resource towns.
"We are making it an advantage for people to fly from other provinces and other countries to come here and take our resources, to take our jobs, and actually take that money back to their hometown, he said.
"That's not reasonable. That's not right. And quite frankly, I find it disgusting."
Jean, who is also the MLA for Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche, has found an ally with the municipality, he said.
According to the municipal census, in 2021 the total population of the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo was just over 106,000. Over a quarter — about 27,000 — lived in work camps.
Sandy Bowman, the mayor of Wood Buffalo, said in a statement that increasing the region's population is his priority, including those who are there temporarily.
"As someone that loves this region and knows it's a great place to live, work and raise a family, we want as many people living here as possible, including workers that are living in oilsands project accommodations," he said.
"I have always believed that if the requirement is for people that work here to live here, that workers will choose us over the alternative if given the opportunity and a real chance to get to know the community."
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said her government would prefer to encourage rather than penalize industries to hire locally.
"There's two ways to approach it: give incentives or give penalties," she said in an interview with CBC News. "And I like to be on the incentive side."
Smith said incentives could include creating more short-haul flights, so workers are able to travel more easily between the remote sites in the Fort McMurray region, and rebates for companies that hire locally.
"Those are the things that are under active discussion because I think it's important," Smith said.
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