And, they note, a proposed tax on exports will only work if it applies equally to all logs shipped out of BC rather than only those from public lands as indicated by Forest Minister Rich Coleman.  Ninety per cent of log exports come from private lands, so a tax on public-lands logs alone won’t work.

“British Columbians want to know that BC logs are creating BC jobs in BC communities, not providing benefits to a few companies and foreign sawmills,” they said in a letter sent to Campbell on Monday.

The three warn “forest-based communities all over this province are threatened by the failure of corporate and government policy to deliver jobs and other economic benefits in exchange for the public timber that companies are allowed to harvest.”

Noting that the root of the problem is a long-term failure of companies to either invest in new plant and equipment or diversify industry output, the unions also urge the province to create a community investment fund using receipts from the additional timber that firms are harvesting under the so-called beetle uplift, as well as a portion of the border tax on lumber exports.

The Unions ask “People in the province’s resource-based communities are suffering and anxious.  How many more Mackenzies, how many more Port Albernis?”