ESTERN Canadian oi] is be-
ingreported far and wide as

the greatest boom ever to hit
any country. The impression is
being left that “liquid gold”
Spurts out of prairie farm lands,

People of the province; oppor-
_ Whities for quick profitable in-

Yestment—a veritable “get rich

Quick paradise” for anyone with
| ough “get”? to him.

The wealth is there. It could
Make a tremendous contribu-
tion to the welfare of Canadians,

but it is now owned by our peo-
} le. It has been grabbed by
AMeri¢an monopolies, it being
€xploited to serve the U.S. war
Machine, and has straddled the.
Prairies , with foreign control
through foreign monopolies.

Although she produces two-
thirds of the world’s oil within
her borders, the U.S. faced a
Serious oil shortage. The demand
i oil by a highly geared war

dustry, the army, hundreds of
Nilitary bases around the world
*nd, from 1950 on, the Korean
War, converted the United States
fee a nation with an oil surplus
5 947 to one with an oil short-
Re by 1949. In 1950 that
ae amounted to 590,700
atrels daily.

Alberta oil discoveries made
the province a ‘beachhead’ for
a invasion by U.S, capital of
Mada’s oi] wealth. In
Years the wealth of the province
oo into fforeign hands, and,

Opus-like, those greedy hands
ee reached out to grab the po-

lal oil wealth of Saskatche-
Wan, Manitoba and British Col-
Unbia, (Now they’re moving

{
1 to Ontario and Newfound-
land),

six

a Alberta Social Credit gov-
Rs: ent, that once long ago
€ out of the revolt of Alberta
ae against monopoly, was no
ee ta the invasion of Am-
vac, capital. The government
. omed it in the name of the
ae of common defense” in
oe ai war. The “invul-
Be asiica, « Alberta oil—its
tually oot position, was con-
nted out,

i Provincial government oil pol-
fae designed to keep the
Au as a preserve of the
of big Monopolies. The system
all} ding for oil leases excludes

Ut the most powerful, Seal-
meee are made. .A cheque
With ae the bid must be sent
wee to the government. The
d nment accepts the highest
1969 none at all. In August of
, Royalite Oil, at one time
Dats wession of Imperial Oil,

$5 million for a lease on

64
Suen es in the Redwater field.
Yond bidding is obviously be-

suai the means of any of the

a or independent companies.
bi any have to be satisfied with
ares © on the less-productive
“tare or come to terms to work
Bet o ‘outs’? from the giants, or
iy. ut of the business complete-¢

iy te Month of February, 1947,
Bie ae placed as the begin-

Million the oil boom. Some $12
Vested ot capital had been in-
Whi} in the industry in 1946..
the % Only 59 wells added to
tion j 000 barrels daily produc-
eq ae that year, it was estimat-
Drovinne the oil reserves of the
; els Gee stood at 45 million bar-
Y the end‘of 1946. Then

Can;
Me the Leduc discovery. :

boone next five years saw ‘‘the
lands By the end of 1951,

S under jease extended to
Million acres through west-
Canada. Geophysical par-
ae crews that do the ex-

on work, had increased

tieg
Dlo

(reating untold wealth for the ©

rors

By WILLIAM TUOMI

44 times over in the five years.
Capital poured in to explore the,
ground and develop the industry,
reached $225 million—19 times
the amount spent in 1946. Near-
ly “2,500 new wells have been
prought into production in the
five years—last year alone there
were 11 times the number of
new wells as were completed in
the year 1946. Estimated re-
serves of oil are now at 1,700
million barrels, 34 times the
1946 estimate, while production
has risen from, 19,000 parrels
daily to 205,000 parrels daily
average reported June 23.

This is the bonanza that
brought about the American 0C-
cupation of Alberta. Leading
all other companies in the field
is Standard Oil of New Jersey,
through its subsidiary Imperial
Oil, Other multi-million inves-
tors include such U.S. oil firms
as Amerada Petroleum, the Con-

’ tinenal Oil Co. (through Hud-

son’s Bay (Oil and Gas), The
Gulf Oil Corporation (through
Canadian Gulf Oils), Socony-
Vacuum, Standard Oil of Cali-
fornia, Standard of Indiana

' (through Stanolind Oil and Gas),

The Texas Oil Company (through

Texaco and McColl-Frontenac).
Others among them include
Phillips Petroleum, Husky,

Superior Oil (through its sub-
sidiary Sun Oil), Sunray, Union
Oil (of California).

Imperial Oil (70 percent own-
ed by Standard Oil of New Jer-
sey) dominates the oil fields,
unchallenged. At the ‘end of
1950, its leases, options and re-
servations in western Canada
amounted to 21 million acres—
an area larger than the. total’
cultivated land area in Alberta.

The 1,150-mile pipeline from
Edmonton to Superior, Wiscon-
sin, was initiated by Imperial.
The Inter-provincial Pipe-line
Company which was set up to
undertake the project, is 30
percent directly controlled by
and because Imperial
plies it with the main

Imperial,
alone sup

‘yolume of crude for transmis-

sion, the control is complete.

The company’s other operation
include a tanker fleet of 23
ocean and lake vessels, @ vast
wholesale
paratus and tremendous invest-
ments in natural gas develop-

ment.
Imperial Oil’s assets were re-
ported at $164 million in 1939.

Ten years 1
million.
The history of the system of
collecting royalties for oil taken
ned lands is the

from crown owt : Aan
history of abject service :
t to the bis-

Alberta governmen

. gest companies.

At one time under public
pressure the government intro-
duced the system of bidding for
crown land development by com-
panies making offers on the

and retail sales ap-

ater they were $345

A.

‘Sg - TA.

CALGARY ;

|
*. a Ss ’
Sort rect NA [>

AREAS FAVORABLE FOR
OIL PROSPECTING

AREAS OF MOUNTAINS
AND IGNEOUS ROCKS

LEDUC-WOODBEND,
GOLDEN SPIKE,
WIZARD LAKE, ETC.

@ TURNER VALLEY
@ LLOYDMINSTER

XS

o—_

2
4

SS

NS
ORT.
\.
mS
-WINNIPEG
Se

~

i DISCOVERY AREAS

IN’ PRECAMBRIAN SHIELD

Practically all oil in Western Canada is poned in the U.S.

amount of royalty they would
pay. One New York firm offer-
ed 70 percent of production as
royalty. That was the one and
only time it was done. The
monopolies in the field apparent-
ly would not prook such “non-
sense.” The next system work-
ed out to a 12% percent royalty
—the government collecting one
barrel of oil out of eight pro-
duced.

In 1951, a new system was
introduced. Royalty is based on
the square foot of the daily aver-
oge production of “a well taken
over a month’s time. There are
minimum limits below which the
royalty collected must not fall,
but if we take two hypothetical
wells, the operation of this is
seen, A well producing 100 bar-
rels as a daily average would pay
a royalty of 10 barrels or 10
percent of production, A larger
well, producing, say, 625 barrels
daily average, would pay 25 bar-
rels or 4 percent. The greater
the production, the less the roy-
alty.

Side by side with the discovery
and exploitation of oil, a second
and parallel natural resource is
being gobbled up and despoiled
—natural gas. In Alberta alone
the reserve is set at 7 trillion
cubic feet. Mass pressure in Aj-
berta compelled the government
to hestitate — temporarily — in
allowing gas export to the Ana-
conda Copper Co. at Butte, Mon-
tana. ' Today Alberta gas is
feeding the war industry there.

As early as January, 1949, ex-
tensive plans had been laid by
U.S. capital to loot the gas re-
sources, The Northwest Natural
Gas Co.—very Canadian sound-
ing—was established, with head-
quarters in New York. * Its plan
was to build a gas pipeline-from
Southern Alberta to the US.
Pacific Coast. The aim was to
strip Alberta gas fields in order

to supply cheap gas for the U.S.
Northwest “defense” area, The
company” promised to “export”
some of the gas back from the
U.S. to Nelson, Trail and Van-
couyer in B.C,

The pipeline’s capacity.of 220
million’ cubic feet a day would
be supplied by Imperial Oil,
Shell Oil, and California Stand-
ard—all of them U.S. giants.

The size of the deal is indicat-
ed by the fact that even though
the gas company would only pay
an average price of 10 cents per
thousand cubic feet to the three
supplying companies, their in-
come was expected to reach $16,-
500 a day through the deal.”
$6,765,000 a year is not bad
loot! Public pressure in Alberta
held back deals like these for
three years. Now the govern-
ment is legalizing them. The
piracy is in full swing.

How do Alberta people fare in
this mad spree of speculation,
oil profits and lease grabbing?
Has the “boom” created wealth
for the people of the province?

The provincial government
boasts that it is the nearest of
any to being debt-free. That is
true. Oil revenues have added
to the provincial treasury, but
only a pittance compared with
the wealth pumped out of the
province. Of its estimated $106
million revenue for the current
year, one-third will come from
oil. This year’s sale of province-
owned lands to the oil compan-
jes will bring, in only as much as
the year’s liquor revenues yield.
This yaar’s royalties on oil pro-
duced is less than one-half of
the liquor profits. (In 1950 the
provincial treasury collected
$10.4 million in fuel oil tax out
of Alberta, Yet the oil monop-
olies paid only $3.4 million’ in
royalties that year.) What the
provincial’ government collects
from the oil companies issbut a
miser’s tip in all the oil wealth. |

To municipal governments
there has been no boom. Muni-
cipal debts are climbing quickly.
Edmonton’s per capita debenture
debt has climbed 25 percent in
the last year despite the con-
struction work that oil has creat-
ed. Farmers lose heavily in their
farm operations in the oil-pro-
ducing area. Fields are chopped
up by a criss-cross pattern of
roads to the wells, and the far-

- mer can only watch helplessly

while it is done. Only farmers
who took homesteads prior to
1905 or after 1932 and who
claimed mineral rights with
their land, are in a position to
bargain,

According to the latest figures
available (1950) about 5,000
workers are employed by the oil
industry. The highly-skilled
work is done by crews from the
United States.

Now the province is being con-
verted into an armed camp. Ed-
monton people are becoming
quite accustomed to the roar of -
American jet planes using the
city airport—now handling an
average of 10,000 aircraft move-
ments a month.” Edmonton is
the jumping-off place for all
traffic to the far north where
manoeuvres, winter testing of
army equipment, radar stations,
etc., are maintained.

At Suffield, northwest of Med-
icine Hat, a ghoulish industry
produces and tests chemica] and
bacteriological supplies. A’ few
miles north of Edmonton, con-
struction proceeds on the Na-
mayo airport, built by the Ameri-
cans during*World War 2, and
at one time claimed to be the
largest of its kind in the British
Empire. Across the road from
it will be a huge arsenal cover-
ing hundreds of acres, now un-
der construction. Ottawa gov-
ernment has announced that it
Wilk spend $10 million in the Ed-
monton area during 1952—not
in civilian housing but for army
housing.

The most recent of war pro-
jects is the development of a
4,000 square mile area strad-
dling the Alberta-Saskatchewan
boundary north of Cold Lake
where an airforce bombing and
rocket-firing range will be start-
ed at-a cost of $14 million.

The Alaska Highway is am
American military road. Canada
maintains it at an annual cost
of $7.500,000, while the U.S...
military takes up 95 percent of
its traffic. Similarly, the North-
west Staging Route—a string of
landing fields along. the Alaska
Highway—is maintained by the
Canadian government at an an-
nual cost of $9,200,000.

There is only one way out of
the despoilation piracy of Can-
ada’s oil and gas resources. That
way is to nationalize it totally—
the oil lands, the pipelines, the
refineries, the tanker fleets and
the distribution apparatus. Made
to serve the needs of Canada’s
peaceful development, western
oil can do wonders for our coun-
try. Planned exploration and
development, carried through to
serve our country’s present and
future needs, can give our coun-
try the perspective of oil self-
sufficiency. Natural gas can be
piped across this country to heat
homes, thousands of miles away
at amazingly low costs. The
prairie provinces have fuel
enough to develop in the west a
new industrial centre for the na-
tion. :

“The oil belongs to the people,

the Alberta LPP declares, and
the people of Alberta and all
Canadians should be the first
to benefit from it—not the bank-
ers of the United States,

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — JULY 4, 1952 — PAGE 9