Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Premier, good morning.
[00:00:02] Speaker B: Good morning. How are you?
[00:00:03] Speaker A: Or should I say good afternoon based on where you are?
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Well, good evening. Rather getting late here. Yes, we're almost exactly opposite time, about 13 hours away.
[00:00:13] Speaker A: Thirteen and a half hours. Yes, Premier. So you are, you are in Mumbai today. What's been on the agenda, especially in the financial capital of India?
[00:00:22] Speaker B: Well, there is a lot going on here in Mumbai. I really underestimated the scale of city and the growth that's happening here.
We've had a lot of meetings with really big conglomerate companies like Reliance and had very important conversations about what British Columbia has to offer.
The theme of the majority of the meetings has been, I would say, near certainty about the continued growth and expansion of India.
India's been growing at 7 and 8% a year and that these companies are really looking for partners to provide some of the raw materials that are needed to continue this growth and ensure the success of their ventures here in India. And that's good news for us in British Columbia because we have a lot of what they need here, metals and minerals from our mines.
We hope we have some softwood lumber meetings coming up, Softwood lumber as well, and also energy lng and there is a lot of work around renewables and for batteries, they need nickel and other key metals.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: Premier, before you left for your India trip, this trade mission, you had been talking about the possibility of building a refinery in British Columbia that rather than building a pipeline, there should be a refinery. So it's if you met the officials from Reliance Industries today, did the topic of a refinery come up?
Could you delve into some of the discussions that you've had with Reliance?
[00:01:56] Speaker B: Yes. Well, I'll keep it at a bit more of a general level because we've had discussions that are, I think, commercially sensitive for some of these companies. But certainly we've been asking about things like additional smelter capacity and mineral and metal refining capacity in the province, steel manufacturer in our province, because we don't have that primary steel production in our province and we're very dependent on other provinces.
So that's the kind of conversations we're having about investment in the province as well as taking partial ownership stakes in some of the new mines that are proposed that are in permitting right now.
All of this means significant additional potential for jobs for British Columbia as well as revenue for government to pay for public services and increased customers for businesses in British Columbia. These are for I imagine your listeners are very familiar with these companies, but for myself I'm really learning they really have arms of their Business in just about every area of the economy.
And they are massive, worth hundreds of billions of dollars and with multi billions of dollars in annual profits, they are looking to expand at an incredible rate.
The gigafactories that Reliance is talking about building with batteries and other initiatives here are just, they're going to need massive primary inputs from places like British Columbia to be successful.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: Is there a possibility for Reliance to come to British Columbia and set up a refinery that you've been talking about here on the coast of bc?
[00:03:30] Speaker B: No, I don't think that's their priority. I think their priority is refining and energy here in India. But they are certainly interested in, in offtake agreements from British Columbia around lng, which is good news for those final investment decisions of some of the projects that are proposed for our province.
You may know we have three this year that are reaching final investment decision about whether or not to go ahead, including the massive LNG Canada Phase 2 project, which is what will be the biggest private sector investment in Canadian history, which means jobs for British Columbians and opportunities for our province and all Canadians. So they're very interested in that kind of thing.
The I think, to be, to be blunt, the refinery proposal from my perspective is if the federal government is going to be putting a significant public subsidy into Alberta, that it's probably better to put it in to create jobs for Canadians rather than to ship raw resources to China and refineries there or to refineries in the United States. Let's create jobs for Canadians. And I, I think, you know, for a refinery investment in Alberta, it will require significant federal investment from the government of Canada rather than private investors.
[00:04:38] Speaker A: Isn't Reliance industrial in crude oil from Canada because they've got one of the biggest refineries in the world in Jamnagar?
[00:04:43] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Their refinery is massive and the scale of it is incredible. One of the dominant themes from Reliance from the government of India and others is, you know, they're really trying to reduce their dependence on import of energy. And what they're looking to is things like hydrogen, solar, others. And these companies are all integrated across multiple energy forms. So for us in British Columbia, the more that we are able to meet their needs across different sectors, the more successful we're going to be in hitching our wagon to the growth that we're seeing here in India and grow them as a trading partner and increase prosperity for people at home.
[00:05:24] Speaker A: Premier, you also recently met with India's Petroleum Minister, Hardeep singh Puri. And Mr. Puri has described the conversation with you as an excellent discussion and that you2 discussed. BCs LNG beyond building relationships, what's the specific dollar amount in new investment or export contracts that would make this trip a success in your eyes?
[00:05:46] Speaker B: Well, the, the real winner out of the gate is the mining industry and our conversations.
I don't think there's been a company that we've sat down with that doesn't want a list of the companies that are opening new mines in the province and in which metals and minerals they're proposing to produce and that hasn't expressed interest in buying into these projects and entering into offtake agreements. So I don't think that's an exaggeration at all to say that there is potentially hundreds of millions or maybe even in excess of a billion dollars of potential of new business for British Columbia mining companies available here in India and US connecting these huge conglomerates with those mining companies.
In terms of lng, I think the interest around the energy sector and the huge demands of this market as well around liquid propane and cooperation around hydrogen technologies is a close second.
There is great interest here. The energy use here is quite dramatic and they are trying hard to get away from coal burning power which creates smog and the pollution here is quite challenging. As someone who's visiting, it's quite a serious issue.
And so they're hoping to transition to LNG and then to renewables, including using LNG for heavy duty trucks, which was some of the conversation we had with HP today.
So, you know, there is lots of opportunities here for British Columbians and we'll be taking that back to the companies that operate in our province and playing a bit of a matchmaker, connecting them with the companies that have expressed interest so that they can continue commercial conversations. And I hope some very significant results will come from that.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: Premier, when do you head to Chandigarh and the Punjab region?
[00:07:33] Speaker B: Well, we're up at 3 o' clock in the morning. Our time to get out to the airport to be in Chandigarh in the morning. We've got meetings all day, including an agricultural roundtable where we'll be discussing B.C. agriculture technology and how we can support the food sector out there.
Really looking forward to it, obviously. First time in India, first time to the north of India.
I don't know exactly what to expect, but certainly looking forward to it.
[00:08:00] Speaker A: Premier, your opponents, the B.C. conservatives, are calling your trip alarmingly removed from reality given the RCMP report linking Bishnoi Group to the Indian government. They say you should not be chasing deals while British Columbians are facing extortion and violence at home. What's your response, Premier?
[00:08:17] Speaker B: Well, this just tells you all you need to know about the conservatives. They are committed to tanking our economy.
They don't care about jobs. They don't care about families at home or the impact on the softwood industry of Donald Trump's trade war. What they're interested in politics and chaos. And it's why they oppose our negotiations with first nations that are advancing hundreds of billions of dollars in projects. It's why they're saying that we shouldn't be here in India. They know very well that there is a criminal trial underway that will uncover and address any of these issues. The RCMP report that they've been pushing is actually a summary of news articles from October of last year. I've had briefings from the Department of Defense, secure briefings. I've had briefings from csis, secure briefings. I've had briefings from the federal government with detailed intelligence.
And we have had nothing but encouragement from the federal government to attend and to do this work.
My belief is that issues will be addressed through the criminal trial process. And we have to do two things. We have to make sure that there's justice for Mr. Najjar and justice for his family and for the community. And we have to recognize that India will be the third largest economy in the world. We have to talk to China. We have to talk to India. We have to talk to the United States and find a path forward. Otherwise, our standard of living will fall in Canada. We will be poorer, will be less successful. And if that's what the conservatives want to do, then I look forward to running an election with them. About that.
[00:09:48] Speaker A: So, Premier, that report by the RCMP is based on news articles, you said?
[00:09:53] Speaker B: Yeah, it's something called open source intelligence. And analysts from the RCMP cited sources from, for example, Al Jazeera and other news outlets summarizing it. I guess for senior executives within the rcmp, it was not an intelligence document.
And so suggestions that it was somehow new revelations are false. We've seen the doc. I've seen the document because I heard this news report. I was like, oh, my God, should we be canceling meetings? What's happening here? Please get me this document. I reviewed it. The paragraph is a summary of news articles. I had those news articles, but more than that, I had detailed briefings from national security experts.
And my belief is that any issues will be addressed through the criminal process.
[00:10:35] Speaker A: Premier, thank you so much for your time this morning and this evening on your side in the part of the world that you are.
And we wish you good luck for the rest of the trip and talk to you when you come back.
[00:10:48] Speaker B: Yes, I look forward to that very much. I just have to say this has been such an amazing experience. India is such an incredible country. I had absolutely, you know, you had to have a bit of an idea from television, from talking to people who are so connected to the country. But I'm really enjoying my time here. It has been a real eye opener. I look forward to telling you all about it.
[00:11:09] Speaker A: There are many Indias in that India, Premier. Yes, some of those Indias you only get to experience when you go there.
[00:11:15] Speaker B: I think that's correct. Yeah, I've had my eyes opened. Okay, we'll talk soon.
[00:11:19] Speaker A: Thank you, Premier. Take care. Bye bye.
[00:11:20] Speaker B: Bye. Bye.
