00:00:27.060 --> 00:00:28.995
(narrator): Canada,
in the beginning,

00:00:29.062 --> 00:00:30.663
was private property.

00:00:30.730 --> 00:00:33.867
It belonged to the Hudson's Bay
Company in England.

00:00:35.535 --> 00:00:37.837
In 1870,
the land was transferred

00:00:37.904 --> 00:00:40.140
to the new nation of Canada,

00:00:40.206 --> 00:00:43.343
which granted the rights
to its natural resources

00:00:43.410 --> 00:00:45.545
to privately owned companies.

00:00:47.547 --> 00:00:51.518
The Indians were expropriated
and stuck on reservations.

00:00:53.520 --> 00:00:58.324
The White workforce laboured
long and hard for a pittance.

00:01:04.297 --> 00:01:06.499
We are inside
the Canadian Shield,

00:01:06.566 --> 00:01:09.569
somewhere in the mines
south of Hudson's Bay,

00:01:09.636 --> 00:01:13.273
the source of three-quarters
of Canada's mineral production.

00:01:15.108 --> 00:01:16.943
Copper for electricity,

00:01:17.077 --> 00:01:18.845
silver for photography,

00:01:18.912 --> 00:01:20.747
nickel for war,

00:01:20.814 --> 00:01:23.483
and gold
for dictators on the run.

00:01:26.619 --> 00:01:29.856
I was born in the mining town
of Rouyn-Noranda,

00:01:29.923 --> 00:01:33.226
but the world of mining
is a mystery to me.

00:01:33.293 --> 00:01:35.395
Maybe for some of you, too.

00:01:35.462 --> 00:01:37.063
No surprise.

00:01:37.097 --> 00:01:40.066
The mines are up north,
far from cities -

00:01:40.100 --> 00:01:41.868
even north of cottage country.

00:01:41.935 --> 00:01:45.939
And underground,
where no one wants to go.

00:01:46.072 --> 00:01:49.075
The refuge
of long-forgotten dead.

00:01:49.142 --> 00:01:52.812
No one talks about mining
unless there's an accident

00:01:52.879 --> 00:01:56.683
or the price of gold
goes through the roof.

00:01:56.716 --> 00:01:58.351
In the old days,

00:01:58.418 --> 00:02:02.055
men worked underground
because they had no choice.

00:02:02.122 --> 00:02:04.758
Today,
it's for the fat paycheques.

00:02:06.593 --> 00:02:09.295
You don't know anything
about mines?

00:02:09.362 --> 00:02:11.531
Well, mines don't talk much,

00:02:11.598 --> 00:02:13.400
especially about their history.

00:02:13.466 --> 00:02:15.101
(music)

00:02:27.447 --> 00:02:29.215
In the late 1800s,

00:02:29.282 --> 00:02:31.518
Métis leader Louis Riel
was hanged

00:02:31.584 --> 00:02:33.553
and eight Indian Grand Chiefs

00:02:33.620 --> 00:02:36.756
were buried
in a common grave in Alberta,

00:02:36.823 --> 00:02:38.391
leaving the land unoccupied.

00:02:38.458 --> 00:02:42.062
At the same time the railroad
arrived at Sainte-Anne-des-Pins,

00:02:42.128 --> 00:02:43.763
now called Sudbury.

00:02:45.131 --> 00:02:48.401
A dynamite blast uncovered
what looked

00:02:48.468 --> 00:02:50.770
like a major copper deposit.

00:02:50.837 --> 00:02:54.341
There was almost no mining
expertise in the country.

00:02:54.407 --> 00:02:56.343
The money came from Ohio,

00:02:56.409 --> 00:02:59.813
and the metal went
to New Jersey to be refined.

00:03:01.381 --> 00:03:04.751
A new company was founded:

00:03:04.818 --> 00:03:06.419
the Canadian Copper Company.

00:03:08.321 --> 00:03:12.192
Copper ore always contains
a lot of sulphur,

00:03:12.258 --> 00:03:14.060
which was no use to anyone.

00:03:14.127 --> 00:03:18.264
So they piled the ore on logs
from the local forest

00:03:18.331 --> 00:03:19.866
and set it on fire.

00:03:19.933 --> 00:03:23.069
The sulphur burned for months,
in the open air.

00:03:23.136 --> 00:03:27.240
These sites became known
as sintering fields.

00:03:28.775 --> 00:03:31.311
The labourers
were new immigrants from Europe.

00:03:31.378 --> 00:03:33.980
No one else would take the job.

00:03:37.450 --> 00:03:39.052
Something else:

00:03:39.119 --> 00:03:42.055
In this region,
copper occurs together

00:03:42.055 --> 00:03:45.058
with a strange white metal:
Kupfernickel,

00:03:45.058 --> 00:03:48.495
a German word that means
Devil's copper.

00:03:48.561 --> 00:03:50.697
Lots of Kupfernickel.

00:03:50.764 --> 00:03:53.533
They didn't know
what to do with it.

00:03:53.600 --> 00:03:56.903
Until, in 1889,
Scotsman James Riley discovered

00:03:56.970 --> 00:04:01.374
that nickel added to steel
makes it rust-proof.

00:04:01.441 --> 00:04:03.243
Stainless steel.

00:04:03.309 --> 00:04:05.245
And Sudbury, Ontario,

00:04:05.311 --> 00:04:07.580
was the only place
in the Western world

00:04:07.647 --> 00:04:09.082
with nickel.

00:04:11.251 --> 00:04:14.120
The US Navy's
steel-plated battleships

00:04:14.187 --> 00:04:18.058
pursued the Spaniards
to their last American colony,

00:04:18.091 --> 00:04:20.827
Cuba, with all its sugar.

00:04:24.631 --> 00:04:26.733
One by one,
the Spanish ships were sunk,

00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:28.468
as in the game of Battleship.

00:04:29.936 --> 00:04:31.538
War Minister Theodore Roosevelt
declared,

00:04:31.604 --> 00:04:35.075
"The taste of Empire
is in the mouth of the people

00:04:35.141 --> 00:04:38.378
even as the taste of blood
in the jungle."

00:04:38.445 --> 00:04:40.146
(bombastic music)

00:04:42.582 --> 00:04:44.150
The Americans
chased the Spaniards

00:04:44.217 --> 00:04:46.219
all the way to the Philippines,

00:04:46.286 --> 00:04:50.090
where they killed between
200,000 and 600,000 people.

00:04:52.625 --> 00:04:56.329
The navy didn't lose
a single ship.

00:04:56.396 --> 00:04:59.099
Nickel had done the trick.

00:05:02.335 --> 00:05:05.905
Now the armies of the world
knew that future wars

00:05:05.972 --> 00:05:09.242
would be won with nickel
from the Sudbury mines.

00:05:09.309 --> 00:05:13.613
In fact, Germany offered
to buy its entire production.

00:05:15.448 --> 00:05:18.218
American banker and magnate
J.P. Morgan,

00:05:18.284 --> 00:05:22.188
who inspired the Mr. Monopoly
character in the popular game,

00:05:22.255 --> 00:05:23.690
controlled the railroad

00:05:23.757 --> 00:05:26.059
and steel industries.

00:05:26.092 --> 00:05:28.895
In 1902, he absorbed
the Canadian Copper Company

00:05:28.962 --> 00:05:31.364
to form Inco.

00:05:31.431 --> 00:05:34.634
His empire handled
12 times more cash

00:05:34.701 --> 00:05:38.371
than the annual budget
of the United States.

00:05:38.438 --> 00:05:42.375
The Americans didn't need
an army to invade Canada;

00:05:42.442 --> 00:05:44.611
they did it with cash.

00:05:44.678 --> 00:05:46.746
All they needed
was to grease the palms

00:05:46.813 --> 00:05:48.415
of Canadian politicians,

00:05:48.481 --> 00:05:50.417
including Prime Minister
Sir Wilfrid Laurier,

00:05:50.483 --> 00:05:53.186
who cashed a $5,000 cheque
from Inco

00:05:53.253 --> 00:05:55.755
as a personal dividend.

00:05:59.259 --> 00:06:03.063
Two-hundred kilometres north
of Sudbury, in Cobalt,

00:06:03.096 --> 00:06:06.266
a railroad crew
struck a vein of pure silver.

00:06:08.702 --> 00:06:10.337
On May 27, 1906,

00:06:10.403 --> 00:06:12.505
The New York Times screamed,

00:06:12.572 --> 00:06:15.542
"Cobalt, new El Dorado."

00:06:20.080 --> 00:06:22.582
It was a classic unbridled rush.

00:06:22.649 --> 00:06:24.718
Thousands of adventurers
and prospectors

00:06:24.784 --> 00:06:27.687
came from everywhere,

00:06:27.754 --> 00:06:29.689
even from the famous Klondike,

00:06:29.756 --> 00:06:32.926
whose glory days
were coming to an end.

00:06:35.095 --> 00:06:38.698
Since silver metal
is mostly found on the surface,

00:06:38.765 --> 00:06:42.402
exploiting a mine doesn't
require a large investment.

00:06:45.605 --> 00:06:47.073
The poor Canadian capitalists

00:06:47.140 --> 00:06:49.843
would now make their entry
into the mining world,

00:06:49.909 --> 00:06:51.811
and run it in English.

00:06:54.080 --> 00:06:58.184
Labour was carried out
by European immigrants,

00:06:58.251 --> 00:07:00.086
mostly from Finland,

00:07:00.153 --> 00:07:01.921
where they fled the revolution,

00:07:02.055 --> 00:07:04.958
and from Italy,
where they fled abject poverty.

00:07:06.526 --> 00:07:08.895
No one spoke English.

00:07:08.962 --> 00:07:12.198
The various ethnic groups
were kept apart

00:07:12.265 --> 00:07:15.101
to discourage any attempt
at unionizing.

00:07:17.437 --> 00:07:19.739
Nevertheless, this work
paid three times more

00:07:19.806 --> 00:07:21.574
than in rural Europe.

00:07:21.641 --> 00:07:24.210
They dreamed
of making a bundle of cash

00:07:24.277 --> 00:07:25.745
and returning home.

00:07:25.812 --> 00:07:27.947
But it was just a pipe dream.

00:07:32.085 --> 00:07:34.054
Six-and-half days a week,

00:07:34.120 --> 00:07:35.855
10 hours a day,

00:07:35.922 --> 00:07:37.357
dynamiting by candlelight,

00:07:37.424 --> 00:07:39.759
they moved tons of rock.

00:07:39.826 --> 00:07:41.928
There was no ventilation.

00:07:43.163 --> 00:07:45.465
Their lungs
were clogged with dust

00:07:45.532 --> 00:07:48.301
from the pneumatic drills,
nicknamed widow-makers.

00:07:49.936 --> 00:07:53.073
40% of the miners suffered
from incurable silicosis.

00:07:55.108 --> 00:07:57.911
Fatal accidents
occurred repeatedly.

00:07:57.977 --> 00:08:02.248
The maximum fine
for fatal negligence was $100.

00:08:08.455 --> 00:08:10.256
Prime Minister
Sir Wilfrid Laurier

00:08:10.323 --> 00:08:12.225
gratified them with a visit.

00:08:12.292 --> 00:08:13.893
He told them,

00:08:13.960 --> 00:08:18.098
"All we ask of you is to give
the best of your humanity."

00:08:18.164 --> 00:08:20.600
(mournful music)

00:08:20.667 --> 00:08:23.770
The miners of Cobalt
eagerly complied.

00:08:23.837 --> 00:08:27.140
Their average life expectancy
was 46 years.

00:08:28.441 --> 00:08:30.744
Those men
never did anything else

00:08:30.810 --> 00:08:32.645
but dig their own graves.

00:08:37.050 --> 00:08:41.755
Cobalt. Forty silver mines were
started in a very small area.

00:08:41.821 --> 00:08:44.090
The locality wasn't zoned.

00:08:44.157 --> 00:08:46.192
The town was built around a lake

00:08:46.259 --> 00:08:48.895
that would eventually
be emptied to dig a mine.

00:08:48.962 --> 00:08:51.631
It was the town's main source
of drinking water.

00:08:51.698 --> 00:08:53.166
Garbage wasn't collected.

00:08:53.233 --> 00:08:56.803
There was one toilet
for 25 people.

00:08:56.870 --> 00:09:01.207
In 1906, while Cobalt exported

00:09:01.274 --> 00:09:03.643
Two million dollars-worth
of silver bars,

00:09:03.710 --> 00:09:05.111
the tiny city council

00:09:05.178 --> 00:09:07.547
only had $5,000
to get the place

00:09:07.614 --> 00:09:09.516
more or less organized.

00:09:09.582 --> 00:09:11.051
Three years later,

00:09:11.051 --> 00:09:12.952
the town burned down,

00:09:13.053 --> 00:09:17.223
a typhoid epidemic infected
1,000 people, killing 200.

00:09:26.132 --> 00:09:28.802
All those efforts
for the glory of England,

00:09:28.868 --> 00:09:32.072
who purchased Cobalt's
entire silver production

00:09:32.105 --> 00:09:34.341
to fund its army's occupation
in India.

00:09:37.310 --> 00:09:40.080
Nothing remains
of this pretty ghost town,

00:09:40.146 --> 00:09:43.616
which saw His Royal Highness
the Prince of Wales

00:09:43.683 --> 00:09:46.152
honour it with his presence,

00:09:46.219 --> 00:09:48.888
and witnessed its hockey team,
the Silver Kings,

00:09:48.955 --> 00:09:51.224
beat the Montreal Canadians
on their own ice

00:09:51.291 --> 00:09:53.460
in February 1909.

00:09:55.395 --> 00:09:58.598
♪ For we'll sing a little song
of Cobalt ♪

00:09:58.665 --> 00:10:00.633
♪ If you don't live there ♪

00:10:00.700 --> 00:10:03.370
♪ It's your fault
Oh you Cobalt ♪

00:10:03.436 --> 00:10:05.705
♪ Where the wintry breezes
blow ♪

00:10:05.772 --> 00:10:07.674
♪ Where all the silver
comes from ♪

00:10:07.741 --> 00:10:10.310
♪ And you live a life
and then some ♪

00:10:10.377 --> 00:10:13.513
♪ Oh you Cobalt ♪

00:10:13.580 --> 00:10:16.216
♪ You're the best old town ♪

00:10:16.282 --> 00:10:21.488
♪ Yes the greatest town ♪

00:10:21.554 --> 00:10:25.458
♪ You're the best old town ♪

00:10:25.525 --> 00:10:28.194
♪ That I know ♪

00:10:35.769 --> 00:10:38.471
Nothing remains
except the silver arsenic

00:10:38.538 --> 00:10:41.675
that continues to flow
into Lake Temiskaming.

00:10:41.741 --> 00:10:45.111
Two million kilos to date.

00:10:49.716 --> 00:10:51.084
1909.

00:10:51.151 --> 00:10:55.388
The Ontario government let it
be known that its geologists

00:10:55.455 --> 00:10:59.426
might have identified a mineral
anomaly even further north,

00:10:59.492 --> 00:11:03.063
50 km away from the tracks,
in the heart of the bush,

00:11:03.129 --> 00:11:05.465
in the midst of swamps
and black flies.

00:11:09.336 --> 00:11:11.338
The prospectors rushed in.

00:11:14.874 --> 00:11:18.578
A prospector would drive
his mineral claim stake

00:11:18.645 --> 00:11:20.914
where no else
had yet planted theirs,

00:11:20.980 --> 00:11:23.483
and rushed over to the nearest
government office

00:11:23.516 --> 00:11:25.385
to register
his small personal hectare.

00:11:25.452 --> 00:11:27.387
His claim.

00:11:27.454 --> 00:11:30.056
This claim,
obtained for a few pennies,

00:11:30.090 --> 00:11:33.460
certified that he owned
the rights to the subsoil.

00:11:33.526 --> 00:11:35.695
He would have to carry out

00:11:35.762 --> 00:11:38.064
a minimum of exploration
each year,

00:11:38.064 --> 00:11:41.401
but mostly he would concentrate
on praying to God

00:11:41.468 --> 00:11:43.636
that some millionaire
would come along

00:11:43.703 --> 00:11:47.073
and turn his small hectare
into a real mine.

00:11:47.140 --> 00:11:49.776
The prospector would gladly
sell him the claim.

00:11:52.245 --> 00:11:54.114
This method remains
identical to this day.

00:11:56.483 --> 00:11:58.918
These are the prospectors
sitting on their claims,

00:11:59.052 --> 00:12:00.487
waiting for mine developers.

00:12:00.553 --> 00:12:02.088
They won't wait long.

00:12:02.155 --> 00:12:05.058
They're sitting on veins
of pure gold.

00:12:06.326 --> 00:12:07.661
Gold.

00:12:09.262 --> 00:12:12.165
Canadian mine owners
from Cobalt

00:12:12.232 --> 00:12:15.969
also rushed in to buy claims
for a few thousand dollars.

00:12:16.069 --> 00:12:19.439
One of them gave his name
to the new town

00:12:19.506 --> 00:12:21.508
that had just been born:
Timmins.

00:12:23.810 --> 00:12:27.313
Here are three legendary mines,
side by side:

00:12:27.380 --> 00:12:28.848
the Hollinger,

00:12:28.915 --> 00:12:31.117
the MacIntyre and the Dome,

00:12:31.184 --> 00:12:33.453
still operating after 100 years,

00:12:33.520 --> 00:12:35.789
and for 100 years to come.

00:12:37.257 --> 00:12:42.429
Gold, an exciting metal
with few practical uses

00:12:42.495 --> 00:12:47.067
turned into jewelry,
liturgical vessels, gold ingots.

00:12:47.067 --> 00:12:50.870
Seven times more gold
was extracted in Timmins

00:12:50.937 --> 00:12:53.907
than in the entire history
of the Klondike.

00:12:53.973 --> 00:12:56.076
That gold still exists.

00:12:56.076 --> 00:12:59.179
Today, it's worth
100 billion dollars.

00:13:01.681 --> 00:13:04.317
In November 1912,

00:13:04.384 --> 00:13:07.420
the British Empire's
wealthiest mine, the Hollinger,

00:13:07.487 --> 00:13:10.056
imposed a salary cut
on its miners.

00:13:10.056 --> 00:13:11.858
This directive was also followed

00:13:11.925 --> 00:13:14.160
by the 12 surrounding mines.

00:13:15.628 --> 00:13:17.597
Rebellion.

00:13:17.664 --> 00:13:20.100
Five-thousand men
stopped working.

00:13:20.166 --> 00:13:22.335
The strike was led
by the Wobblies,

00:13:22.402 --> 00:13:23.970
an American revolutionary
trade union

00:13:24.070 --> 00:13:26.773
determined to set up a union

00:13:26.840 --> 00:13:29.576
somewhere
in the northern mining region.

00:13:29.642 --> 00:13:32.979
You can see them here in prison.

00:13:34.481 --> 00:13:36.616
The mines
hired Pinkerton guards,

00:13:36.683 --> 00:13:38.485
a private American police force.

00:13:39.686 --> 00:13:41.855
They shot into the crowd.

00:13:41.921 --> 00:13:46.292
The miners blocked the railway
to prevent scabs from entering,

00:13:46.359 --> 00:13:48.561
but by the same token,

00:13:48.628 --> 00:13:50.096
blocked their own supply route.

00:13:50.163 --> 00:13:54.334
Starving, they returned to work
at the end of winter.

00:13:54.401 --> 00:13:56.503
Deportation awaited
many of them.

00:14:03.810 --> 00:14:07.781
The mining industry could thus
continue to prosper in peace

00:14:07.847 --> 00:14:09.249
and in war.

00:14:09.316 --> 00:14:10.817
When World War I broke out,

00:14:10.884 --> 00:14:13.920
Inco's mines controlled 80%
of the world's nickel.

00:14:14.054 --> 00:14:16.222
As part of the British Empire,

00:14:16.289 --> 00:14:19.225
Canada sent troops.

00:14:19.292 --> 00:14:23.663
But the United States did not,
remaining neutral for a time.

00:14:23.730 --> 00:14:27.067
Inco's New Jersey refinery
continued to sell nickel

00:14:27.100 --> 00:14:29.969
to the British army
while also selling

00:14:30.070 --> 00:14:32.972
40% of its production
to Britain's enemy,

00:14:33.073 --> 00:14:35.075
Germany.

00:14:35.108 --> 00:14:36.810
And that's how,

00:14:36.876 --> 00:14:38.345
during the Battle of Vimy,

00:14:38.411 --> 00:14:41.448
soldiers from Sudbury
were shot at with bullets

00:14:41.514 --> 00:14:44.617
plated with nickel
from their own mines.

00:14:44.684 --> 00:14:47.454
Public opinion in Canada
was outraged.

00:14:47.520 --> 00:14:52.125
In August 1916,
the public also learned

00:14:52.192 --> 00:14:54.127
that the German submarine
Deutschland

00:14:54.194 --> 00:14:56.196
left the port of Baltimore

00:14:56.262 --> 00:14:59.699
loaded with 340 tons of nickel
from Sudbury.

00:14:59.766 --> 00:15:03.503
For the first and last time,
public opinion called

00:15:03.570 --> 00:15:06.139
for the nationalisation
of the industry.

00:15:08.074 --> 00:15:10.543
And then the boys came home.

00:15:10.610 --> 00:15:12.278
By the end of the war,

00:15:12.345 --> 00:15:16.416
Sudbury's landscape had been
stripped of all its topsoil.

00:15:16.483 --> 00:15:17.884
A soldier noted,

00:15:17.951 --> 00:15:20.820
"It looks just like
the battlefields overseas."

00:15:23.823 --> 00:15:26.493
The term environment
didn't yet exist

00:15:26.559 --> 00:15:29.729
at the beginning
of the 20th century.

00:15:29.796 --> 00:15:33.466
Pure profit was the only value
that counted.

00:15:33.533 --> 00:15:38.104
The returns from the mines
in the first half of the century

00:15:38.171 --> 00:15:39.973
were exceptional.

00:15:41.808 --> 00:15:43.610
There was cash to invest,

00:15:43.677 --> 00:15:46.513
and exploration in the north
had only begun.

00:15:50.283 --> 00:15:52.919
Prospectors now followed
an immense seam of metal

00:15:53.053 --> 00:15:54.754
called the Cadillac Fault,

00:15:54.821 --> 00:15:57.424
which led to the opening
of about 100 mines

00:15:57.490 --> 00:16:00.694
on either side
of the Quebec-Ontario border.

00:16:02.095 --> 00:16:04.898
Prospector Edmond Horne
crossed the Quebec border

00:16:04.964 --> 00:16:06.966
into the region of Rouyn

00:16:07.067 --> 00:16:10.637
and discovered a copper deposit
the size

00:16:10.704 --> 00:16:12.205
of Montreal's Place Ville-Marie,

00:16:12.272 --> 00:16:14.974
large enough to build a smelter
on the site.

00:16:16.643 --> 00:16:19.612
There was no one around,
not even Indians.

00:16:19.679 --> 00:16:21.214
This time, the financiers

00:16:21.281 --> 00:16:24.417
wouldn't let the fortune hunters
have the run of the place,

00:16:24.484 --> 00:16:25.852
as they'd had in Cobalt.

00:16:25.919 --> 00:16:29.356
In 1926,
Quebec passed a special law

00:16:29.422 --> 00:16:31.891
allowing the new copper kings

00:16:31.958 --> 00:16:35.895
to design and manage
their own town,

00:16:35.962 --> 00:16:37.697
which would follow
the exact contour

00:16:37.764 --> 00:16:39.265
of the mining concession.

00:16:41.067 --> 00:16:44.537
The mine manager would act
as a mayor and police chief

00:16:44.604 --> 00:16:47.607
of the new mining town,
to be called Noranda.

00:16:49.542 --> 00:16:53.680
The Mining Law was amended
for the circumstances.

00:16:53.747 --> 00:16:57.684
The company town was exempted
from all forms of taxes

00:16:57.751 --> 00:16:59.285
for 15 years.

00:17:00.520 --> 00:17:03.423
The law also specified
that no landowner,

00:17:03.490 --> 00:17:06.860
tenant or occupant
in the district of Rouyn

00:17:06.926 --> 00:17:10.730
could claim damages caused
by noxious gases and smoke

00:17:10.797 --> 00:17:13.767
produced during the operation
of a smelter.

00:17:21.641 --> 00:17:24.377
Thus, Noranda would control

00:17:24.444 --> 00:17:28.548
its own subsoil, soil and sky.

00:17:28.615 --> 00:17:30.317
And that's how Quebec
quietly became

00:17:30.383 --> 00:17:33.453
the best place in the world
to invest in mining.

00:17:35.088 --> 00:17:37.424
You can't break the law...

00:17:37.490 --> 00:17:39.793
when you are the law.

00:17:39.859 --> 00:17:41.961
(old French folk song)

00:17:56.176 --> 00:17:58.611
Those who didn't find jobs
in the mines

00:17:58.678 --> 00:18:00.246
would spend the Depression years

00:18:00.313 --> 00:18:03.116
at the gates
of the mining concession

00:18:03.216 --> 00:18:05.285
forming the town of Rouyn.

00:18:07.053 --> 00:18:09.055
(music)

00:18:12.125 --> 00:18:13.827
Gold producers didn't feel
the Great Depression at all.

00:18:13.893 --> 00:18:16.062
When currency is devalued,

00:18:16.096 --> 00:18:20.767
those who have a lot of it
exchange it for gold bars.

00:18:20.834 --> 00:18:22.635
And that's still the case today.

00:18:22.702 --> 00:18:23.937
During the Great Depression,

00:18:24.070 --> 00:18:26.339
the American Congress
increased the value

00:18:26.406 --> 00:18:29.242
of an ounce of gold by 40%

00:18:29.309 --> 00:18:32.579
in order to boost the value
of its reserves.

00:18:32.646 --> 00:18:34.781
This would translate
to pure profit

00:18:34.848 --> 00:18:37.350
for the already prosperous mines
in Timmins.

00:18:37.417 --> 00:18:40.053
And now
they were rolling in dough,

00:18:40.053 --> 00:18:41.488
pumping out profits

00:18:41.554 --> 00:18:43.390
day and night.

00:18:43.456 --> 00:18:45.558
There was even enough left over
for the town's poor,

00:18:45.625 --> 00:18:47.060
who received food baskets

00:18:47.060 --> 00:18:49.195
crowned
by a somewhat ambiguous gift:

00:18:49.262 --> 00:18:51.731
a turkey.

00:18:51.798 --> 00:18:53.533
Lots of turkeys

00:18:53.600 --> 00:18:55.268
for lots of poor people.

00:18:56.803 --> 00:18:58.271
(bell ringing)

00:19:01.541 --> 00:19:04.611
These shacks were home
to miners' widows and orphans.

00:19:04.678 --> 00:19:06.313
They won't be coming out

00:19:06.379 --> 00:19:08.782
to display their misery
for the camera.

00:19:15.522 --> 00:19:17.090
(music)

00:19:36.176 --> 00:19:39.446
Beginning in 1920,
mining-company bosses

00:19:39.512 --> 00:19:43.950
joined together to form
the Ontario Mining Association.

00:19:44.050 --> 00:19:46.820
Among other topics
they discussed

00:19:46.886 --> 00:19:49.522
were miners' salaries
and working conditions.

00:19:49.589 --> 00:19:53.159
Yet the miners' associations
were still not recognized.

00:19:53.226 --> 00:19:56.963
Once again, they would be
roundly defeated in strikes

00:19:57.063 --> 00:19:59.099
at Noranda and Kirkland Lake.

00:19:59.165 --> 00:20:01.034
One thing for certain, though,

00:20:01.101 --> 00:20:04.037
workers would no longer settle
for Christmas turkeys.

00:20:04.104 --> 00:20:08.041
Increasingly, in the early '30s,

00:20:08.108 --> 00:20:11.878
they began meeting openly
in the streets on May Day,

00:20:11.945 --> 00:20:13.780
to demonstrate
International Workers' Day,

00:20:13.847 --> 00:20:16.082
as you can see here in Timmins.

00:20:20.887 --> 00:20:22.722
They're probably
still in turmoil

00:20:22.789 --> 00:20:25.392
over the tragedy that occurred
not so long ago,

00:20:25.458 --> 00:20:28.395
when a fire broke out
deep in the Hollinger Mine.

00:20:30.497 --> 00:20:34.768
No mine in Ontario
had a rescue team on site.

00:20:34.834 --> 00:20:37.804
They called in
the nearest rescue team,

00:20:37.871 --> 00:20:40.874
which arrived from Pennsylvania
22 hours later.

00:20:40.940 --> 00:20:44.911
Thirty-nine men were
already dead by asphyxiation.

00:20:46.579 --> 00:20:49.082
The miners were buried
in a common grave.

00:20:51.785 --> 00:20:55.055
The employees chipped in
to erect this monument.

00:20:55.121 --> 00:20:56.756
It also bears witness

00:20:56.823 --> 00:20:58.124
to their budding solidarity,

00:20:58.191 --> 00:21:00.327
which would take
another 15 years

00:21:00.393 --> 00:21:03.129
to shape itself
into a real union.

00:21:04.898 --> 00:21:07.367
(archival footage): To supply
the increasing demands,

00:21:07.434 --> 00:21:10.704
it has been necessary to open
several additional mines,

00:21:10.770 --> 00:21:12.906
and this district
is now recognized

00:21:12.973 --> 00:21:16.209
as the greatest source of nickel
in the world.

00:21:16.276 --> 00:21:18.912
(narrator): The mining industry
was now ready

00:21:18.979 --> 00:21:20.447
for the great rearmament.

00:21:20.513 --> 00:21:23.950
And the German army
was still a good client.

00:21:24.050 --> 00:21:26.553
A proliferation of nickel mines
would spring up

00:21:26.619 --> 00:21:28.254
in this ancient meteorite crater

00:21:28.321 --> 00:21:30.457
that constitutes
the Sudbury Basin.

00:21:32.759 --> 00:21:35.929
Falconbridge,
a new financial group,

00:21:36.062 --> 00:21:38.164
began exploiting
a series of deposits

00:21:38.231 --> 00:21:41.201
that Thomas Edison,
inventor of the electric chair,

00:21:41.267 --> 00:21:43.069
had once prospected in vain.

00:21:43.103 --> 00:21:45.372
Guess he didn't have
enough light.

00:21:47.641 --> 00:21:50.243
The United States
was preoccupied

00:21:50.310 --> 00:21:52.912
by this geographical
nickel monopoly.

00:21:52.979 --> 00:21:56.883
Just in case, the Americans
had a plan up their sleeve

00:21:56.983 --> 00:21:59.786
to invade the city of Sudbury
from Minnesota

00:21:59.853 --> 00:22:01.755
and seize its mineral deposits.

00:22:03.690 --> 00:22:08.228
The importance of the city
was underlined when George VI

00:22:08.294 --> 00:22:11.364
visited on June 3, 1939.

00:22:11.431 --> 00:22:13.900
The miners were nervous
as they watched his queen

00:22:13.967 --> 00:22:15.702
descend into the mineshaft,

00:22:15.769 --> 00:22:18.571
since it was supposed
to be bad luck

00:22:18.638 --> 00:22:20.407
for women to go underground.

00:22:20.473 --> 00:22:21.875
They were right.

00:22:21.941 --> 00:22:24.778
Three months later,
World War II broke out.

00:22:27.147 --> 00:22:29.382
♪ Catch the cage down boys ♪

00:22:29.449 --> 00:22:32.218
♪ Before the sun
starts to shine ♪

00:22:32.285 --> 00:22:36.389
♪ Three rings of the bell ♪

00:22:36.456 --> 00:22:39.392
♪ Will get you the bottom
of the mine ♪

00:22:39.459 --> 00:22:42.729
♪ Walk down the drift past ♪

00:22:42.796 --> 00:22:44.764
♪ The roar of the fans ♪

00:22:46.499 --> 00:22:48.768
♪ For another day drillin' ♪

00:22:48.835 --> 00:22:51.071
♪ Gettin' ready to blast ♪

00:22:51.137 --> 00:22:53.974
♪ 'Cause we are soldiers ♪

00:22:54.074 --> 00:22:56.876
♪ In the war underground ♪

00:22:56.943 --> 00:22:59.679
♪ And we fight every day ♪

00:22:59.746 --> 00:23:02.649
♪ For nickel copper and gold ♪

00:23:04.117 --> 00:23:07.087
♪ We are soldiers ♪

00:23:08.888 --> 00:23:11.758
♪ In the war down below ♪

00:23:14.594 --> 00:23:17.964
♪ And the dust and the diesel ♪

00:23:20.767 --> 00:23:23.637
♪ Is our greatest foe ♪

00:23:27.173 --> 00:23:31.811
♪ We are soldiers ♪

00:23:31.878 --> 00:23:35.315
♪ In the war down below ♪

00:23:38.118 --> 00:23:41.054
♪ We fight every day ♪

00:23:41.054 --> 00:23:45.925
♪ For nickel copper and gold ♪

00:23:52.565 --> 00:23:55.235
- It's... just smokey,

00:23:55.302 --> 00:23:57.570
dusty, dark.

00:23:57.637 --> 00:24:01.241
Everywhere your light isn't,
it's dark.

00:24:01.308 --> 00:24:03.877
And open holes. You gotta be...

00:24:03.943 --> 00:24:06.279
You're always watching
for open holes.

00:24:06.346 --> 00:24:07.881
You're walking around there

00:24:07.947 --> 00:24:10.717
lookin' at the cracks
above your head,

00:24:10.784 --> 00:24:14.054
wondering if they're gonna
fall on you.

00:24:14.120 --> 00:24:18.391
And sometimes chunks fall
and you hear grinding, groaning,

00:24:18.458 --> 00:24:20.894
and the ore body moving.

00:24:20.960 --> 00:24:22.929
Uh, it's a scary place.

00:24:24.431 --> 00:24:28.468
You go in there,
it's 40-45 Celsius in the mines,

00:24:28.535 --> 00:24:30.437
sometimes.

00:24:30.503 --> 00:24:33.073
And you gotta work, bullwork.

00:24:34.841 --> 00:24:37.911
(narrator): They tackled
the richest deposits.

00:24:39.946 --> 00:24:44.117
Seven days a week,
with every second Sunday off,

00:24:44.184 --> 00:24:48.855
the men of Sudbury supplied 95%
of the Allies' demand.

00:24:48.922 --> 00:24:51.491
They extracted more nickel
during the war

00:24:51.558 --> 00:24:54.894
than in the first 55 years
of their history.

00:24:54.961 --> 00:24:56.863
In 1942, 4,000 men

00:24:56.930 --> 00:24:59.065
were hired in Sudbury's mines,

00:24:59.065 --> 00:25:02.936
and 4,000 more quit their job
from exhaustion,

00:25:03.069 --> 00:25:07.307
despite what were now the
highest salaries in the country.

00:25:28.795 --> 00:25:30.296
But for the workers of Sudbury,

00:25:30.363 --> 00:25:32.632
the sweetest victory
was most likely

00:25:32.699 --> 00:25:34.968
the accreditation
of their leftist union,

00:25:35.068 --> 00:25:37.737
the Mine, Mill and Smelter
Workers Union,

00:25:37.804 --> 00:25:39.139
in 1944,

00:25:39.205 --> 00:25:41.608
after 60 years of struggle.

00:25:43.143 --> 00:25:45.145
The fact that Stalin's Russia

00:25:45.211 --> 00:25:47.280
was fighting
alongside the Allies

00:25:47.347 --> 00:25:50.717
fostered a more tolerant
attitude in America

00:25:50.784 --> 00:25:53.320
towards unions
with communist allegiances.

00:25:54.954 --> 00:25:56.790
And so, the flying fortresses

00:25:56.856 --> 00:25:59.426
that fire-bombed German
civilians in Dresden

00:25:59.492 --> 00:26:02.262
and dropped the atomic bomb
on Hiroshima

00:26:02.329 --> 00:26:05.131
were plated with union nickel.

00:26:09.669 --> 00:26:11.972
Those events put an end
to the war,

00:26:12.072 --> 00:26:14.140
but not to deaths in the mines.

00:26:15.642 --> 00:26:18.545
That same year,
a shaft cable broke

00:26:18.611 --> 00:26:20.947
at the Paymaster Mine
in Timmins.

00:26:21.081 --> 00:26:24.150
Sixteen men fell 500 metres
to their deaths.

00:26:24.217 --> 00:26:26.953
The cable had rusted
from the inside.

00:26:27.053 --> 00:26:29.756
No one was ever held to account.

00:26:36.629 --> 00:26:38.665
(archival footage):
To the aircraft industry,

00:26:38.732 --> 00:26:40.400
who require
nickel-containing alloys

00:26:40.467 --> 00:26:41.768
having great strengths,

00:26:41.835 --> 00:26:44.871
as well as high resistance
to fatigue or shock...

00:26:44.938 --> 00:26:46.906
(narrator):
The war was good business

00:26:46.973 --> 00:26:48.308
for the mining companies,

00:26:48.375 --> 00:26:50.410
as was the reconstruction
of Europe.

00:26:50.477 --> 00:26:53.113
In addition, nickel now entered

00:26:53.179 --> 00:26:54.547
into the manufacture

00:26:54.614 --> 00:26:57.550
of all kinds
of day-to-day hardware.

00:26:57.617 --> 00:27:00.687
All this to the benefit of Inco,

00:27:00.754 --> 00:27:03.390
which still set
world nickel prices.

00:27:03.456 --> 00:27:06.092
Our mining companies got richer,

00:27:06.159 --> 00:27:10.463
but they wouldn't be sharing
their extra wealth.

00:27:10.530 --> 00:27:12.866
Their directors
looked to invest in countries

00:27:12.932 --> 00:27:15.235
where mining laws
were even more lax,

00:27:15.302 --> 00:27:17.671
with a penchant
for non-democratic countries:

00:27:17.737 --> 00:27:19.406
Noranda in Chile,

00:27:19.472 --> 00:27:21.141
Inco in Indonesia,

00:27:21.207 --> 00:27:23.476
Falconbridge
in the Dominican Republic,

00:27:23.543 --> 00:27:27.314
where it was granted
a perpetual tax reduction.

00:27:27.380 --> 00:27:29.416
Our governments hardly claimed

00:27:29.482 --> 00:27:33.119
any of this spiralling wealth
for themselves.

00:27:33.186 --> 00:27:35.388
Instead,
they encouraged the formation

00:27:35.455 --> 00:27:37.757
of a private parallel universe,

00:27:37.824 --> 00:27:40.060
whose global capital
was Toronto.

00:27:40.060 --> 00:27:42.729
60% of the world's
mining companies

00:27:42.796 --> 00:27:45.465
were listed on its exchange.

00:27:45.532 --> 00:27:49.302
It's in this city
that industrial predators

00:27:49.369 --> 00:27:51.905
of natural resources are bought,

00:27:51.972 --> 00:27:54.441
sold, taken over and merged:

00:27:54.507 --> 00:27:56.543
the stock exchange.

00:27:56.609 --> 00:27:59.212
Every year, the mining world

00:27:59.279 --> 00:28:01.982
celebrates its extravagant
prosperity there.

00:28:02.082 --> 00:28:04.384
(music playing)

00:28:26.606 --> 00:28:30.343
Towards the end of the '60s,
a protest movement was shaped

00:28:30.410 --> 00:28:33.146
to try to undermine
the mining companies' impunity.

00:28:35.615 --> 00:28:38.184
Those most directly concerned
took the first steps.

00:28:38.251 --> 00:28:42.489
Sudbury's mining unions
discovered that half their men

00:28:42.555 --> 00:28:45.058
died younger
than the national average;

00:28:45.125 --> 00:28:48.428
so did one-third
of the city's population.

00:28:50.130 --> 00:28:54.467
Human health was the main issue
that fuelled a strike

00:28:54.534 --> 00:28:57.570
led jointly by Falconbridge
and Inco workers.

00:28:57.637 --> 00:29:00.674
(Séguin): In 1969,
there was 18,000.

00:29:02.275 --> 00:29:04.344
18,000 on strike
from Local 6500.

00:29:04.411 --> 00:29:07.814
It was the biggest local
in North America at that time.

00:29:07.881 --> 00:29:10.483
Nobody moved in or out.
The police were...

00:29:10.550 --> 00:29:12.585
They brought five detachments
of police,

00:29:12.652 --> 00:29:14.621
with dogs and the works, in,

00:29:14.688 --> 00:29:17.691
and they were supposed
to open the picket lines;

00:29:17.757 --> 00:29:19.459
they didn't move on them.

00:29:19.526 --> 00:29:22.495
Wasn't about money;
it was about being treated

00:29:22.562 --> 00:29:25.098
like a human being
in the workplace

00:29:25.165 --> 00:29:28.201
and about protecting your life
and your health.

00:29:28.268 --> 00:29:30.937
They were all high
on lung cancer,

00:29:31.071 --> 00:29:32.572
and we finally proved

00:29:32.639 --> 00:29:36.977
that the lung cancers
were related to the silica dust,

00:29:37.077 --> 00:29:39.646
probably.
But in the gold mines,

00:29:39.713 --> 00:29:43.116
like all of mining,
it's not only that.

00:29:43.183 --> 00:29:45.752
There's silica dust,
it's cadmium, arsenic...

00:29:45.819 --> 00:29:47.654
There were so many carcinogens,

00:29:47.721 --> 00:29:50.724
we didn't know
which one was causing it.

00:29:50.790 --> 00:29:52.592
And we finally won it.

00:29:52.659 --> 00:29:55.295
Now we've progressed, of course.
We've got union-appointed

00:29:55.362 --> 00:29:57.864
safety inspectors
in all the departments,

00:29:57.931 --> 00:30:00.934
and things have changed,
but I tell ya,

00:30:01.001 --> 00:30:05.138
that's only in recent years
and only because of the union.

00:30:05.205 --> 00:30:09.242
In the gold mines alone,
we compensated...

00:30:09.309 --> 00:30:12.812
500 million dollars
went to widows.

00:30:12.879 --> 00:30:15.181
500 million dollars
that was rightly theirs,

00:30:15.248 --> 00:30:16.516
which was denied them,

00:30:16.583 --> 00:30:20.453
and we had to fight and fight
and fight and get 'em.

00:30:20.520 --> 00:30:23.657
In most cases,
it didn't go to the victim;

00:30:23.723 --> 00:30:25.525
it went to the survivors.

00:30:25.592 --> 00:30:27.193
So if you'd say...

00:30:27.260 --> 00:30:29.696
you might figure 10 times that,

00:30:29.763 --> 00:30:33.600
there's probably 20,000 died

00:30:33.667 --> 00:30:36.770
of occupational diseases,
really.

00:30:36.836 --> 00:30:39.005
(narrator):
Twenty-thousand deaths.

00:30:39.072 --> 00:30:41.341
Like in a war.

00:30:41.408 --> 00:30:43.910
The mining companies
were just as hard

00:30:43.977 --> 00:30:46.713
on the communities
living on their concessions

00:30:46.780 --> 00:30:49.182
as they were on their employees.

00:30:49.249 --> 00:30:53.520
In 1968, the small towns
surrounding Sudbury

00:30:53.586 --> 00:30:57.357
still had no sewer systems,
aqueducts or sidewalks.

00:30:57.424 --> 00:31:00.660
They were just as frugal
towards the state

00:31:00.727 --> 00:31:03.196
as they were
towards civil society.

00:31:03.263 --> 00:31:06.399
In 1973,
while Inco owed the government

00:31:06.466 --> 00:31:09.202
300 million dollars in taxes,

00:31:09.269 --> 00:31:11.438
it paid its shareholders...

00:31:11.504 --> 00:31:13.707
300 million dollars.

00:31:13.773 --> 00:31:16.076
Payment of taxes
was systematically deferred

00:31:16.142 --> 00:31:17.577
from year to year.

00:31:17.644 --> 00:31:19.446
Their political opponents

00:31:19.512 --> 00:31:22.515
began calling
the mining companies

00:31:22.582 --> 00:31:24.517
corporate bums.

00:31:24.584 --> 00:31:26.286
Finally, in the mid-'70s,

00:31:26.353 --> 00:31:28.088
Inco paid its municipal taxes

00:31:28.154 --> 00:31:31.057
to Sudbury for the first time.

00:31:31.124 --> 00:31:32.525
And even then,

00:31:32.592 --> 00:31:36.062
only on the value
of the buildings on its land.

00:31:36.129 --> 00:31:39.633
This practice continues
in all mining towns to this day.

00:31:39.699 --> 00:31:43.536
- We have an act
called an Aggregates Act

00:31:43.603 --> 00:31:46.072
in the province of Ontario.

00:31:46.139 --> 00:31:48.441
You have to pay the city...

00:31:48.508 --> 00:31:50.477
in which you're operating,
Sudbury,

00:31:50.543 --> 00:31:55.248
you have to pay us seven cents
for every ton of gravel

00:31:55.315 --> 00:31:57.717
that you scrape
off your property

00:31:57.784 --> 00:31:59.586
to sell to contractors.

00:32:00.854 --> 00:32:02.122
Okay?

00:32:04.257 --> 00:32:06.660
But I don't get one penny

00:32:06.726 --> 00:32:08.728
from any of the minerals

00:32:08.795 --> 00:32:12.065
that are taken
out of the ground here

00:32:12.132 --> 00:32:14.501
and processed and sent abroad.

00:32:14.567 --> 00:32:17.070
I don't get one penny.

00:32:17.070 --> 00:32:20.173
- The only thing the
municipality gets from the mine

00:32:20.240 --> 00:32:22.309
is they can tax the buildings.

00:32:22.375 --> 00:32:25.545
But how many buildings are there
in a mine?

00:32:25.612 --> 00:32:28.248
And Hollinger Mine
had 700 miles of tunnels

00:32:28.315 --> 00:32:29.883
and some buildings.

00:32:29.916 --> 00:32:32.519
So the wealth goes south,

00:32:32.585 --> 00:32:35.155
and then the communities
are left in a situation:

00:32:35.221 --> 00:32:37.190
they have to pay
for the infrastructure,

00:32:37.257 --> 00:32:40.627
when the trucks go up and down
the roads with the ore...

00:32:40.694 --> 00:32:42.395
That's the responsibility
of the municipality.

00:32:42.462 --> 00:32:44.831
And then
when the mine shuts down,

00:32:44.898 --> 00:32:47.934
the community has to go
and beg Queen's Park

00:32:48.068 --> 00:32:49.703
and big Ottawa for help.

00:32:49.769 --> 00:32:52.405
- So does the mayor do
in the absence of that?

00:32:52.472 --> 00:32:54.708
Well, the mayor...

00:32:54.774 --> 00:32:56.876
puts on his... sackcloth,

00:32:56.943 --> 00:33:00.780
he puts his ashes on his head,

00:33:00.847 --> 00:33:03.216
he takes his tin cup

00:33:03.283 --> 00:33:06.086
and I go begging to
the mining companies for money.

00:33:07.587 --> 00:33:10.357
"Please, sir,
would you give us some money

00:33:10.423 --> 00:33:12.425
"to help build a water plant?

00:33:12.492 --> 00:33:14.928
"Please, sir,
will you give some money

00:33:15.061 --> 00:33:17.130
to help build a track?"

00:33:19.132 --> 00:33:20.800
So... I beg.

00:33:22.969 --> 00:33:24.437
That's what I do.

00:33:25.805 --> 00:33:28.742
So I've developed a new skill.

00:33:28.808 --> 00:33:30.310
It's called begging.

00:33:33.413 --> 00:33:36.216
(narrator): This persistent
government spinelessness

00:33:36.282 --> 00:33:38.418
also allowed
foreign corporations

00:33:38.485 --> 00:33:41.855
to acquire
large Canadian mining companies.

00:33:41.921 --> 00:33:46.493
In the fall of 2006, Vale,
a Brazilian company,

00:33:46.559 --> 00:33:48.061
took over Inco.

00:33:48.128 --> 00:33:51.831
That same fall, Xstrata,
a German-Swiss firm,

00:33:51.898 --> 00:33:54.200
took control
of Falconbridge-Noranda.

00:33:54.267 --> 00:33:57.470
These two Canadian companies
could have merged

00:33:57.537 --> 00:34:00.874
to form
a major global mining complex.

00:34:00.940 --> 00:34:02.342
- Falconbridge and Inco

00:34:02.409 --> 00:34:04.411
were international
mining giants.

00:34:04.477 --> 00:34:07.414
Their reputation,
they invested in the region...

00:34:07.480 --> 00:34:10.383
They weren't sweethearts,
they were tough guys,

00:34:10.450 --> 00:34:12.552
but they were
international players,

00:34:12.619 --> 00:34:16.056
and they were allowed
to be taken over

00:34:16.122 --> 00:34:18.291
by Xstrata, a corporate raider;

00:34:18.358 --> 00:34:22.796
and Vale, with no commitments
at all to the region.

00:34:22.862 --> 00:34:26.833
So now we've lost our ability
as a country

00:34:26.900 --> 00:34:29.069
to have
big international players,

00:34:29.135 --> 00:34:32.172
and we see
what Xstrata and Vale...

00:34:32.238 --> 00:34:33.974
They took the resources,

00:34:34.074 --> 00:34:37.577
the greatest base-metal
resources in North America,

00:34:37.644 --> 00:34:39.913
and they're putting
nothing back.

00:34:39.980 --> 00:34:42.182
It's, uh...
You talk to anybody,

00:34:42.248 --> 00:34:44.417
not just northerners,
not just miners...

00:34:44.484 --> 00:34:47.053
You talk to corporate executives
in Toronto,

00:34:47.120 --> 00:34:50.824
and they'll say, "What happened
here was a crime."

00:35:22.956 --> 00:35:24.524
(crowd chanting):
Workers united

00:35:24.591 --> 00:35:26.259
will never be divided! ...

00:35:27.761 --> 00:35:30.397
(narrator): In 2009,
the Brazilian firm Vale

00:35:30.463 --> 00:35:34.601
set off a strike in Sudbury
by demanding a radical overhaul

00:35:34.668 --> 00:35:36.569
of its workers'
collective agreement,

00:35:36.636 --> 00:35:38.071
a first in 60 years.

00:35:40.140 --> 00:35:43.443
The company contested workers'
participation in profits

00:35:43.510 --> 00:35:47.414
and imposed pension-plan
cutbacks for new workers.

00:35:47.480 --> 00:35:49.082
Up to that time,

00:35:49.149 --> 00:35:51.584
these had been
established union gains.

00:35:53.453 --> 00:35:55.855
(man): You know,
mining's been in our blood

00:35:55.922 --> 00:35:57.457
for many, many years. Yes.

00:35:57.524 --> 00:36:00.060
I'm the last generation alive.

00:36:01.761 --> 00:36:04.531
My great-grandfather,
my grandfather, my father,

00:36:04.597 --> 00:36:06.967
have all been fighting for,
uh...

00:36:07.067 --> 00:36:10.603
what we have today,
our way of life today.

00:36:10.670 --> 00:36:13.073
And, uh,
and we're still fighting.

00:36:13.106 --> 00:36:15.642
And it's sad to see, um...

00:36:15.709 --> 00:36:18.645
that we are still fighting
for things

00:36:18.712 --> 00:36:22.082
that were fought for
back in the '30s,

00:36:22.115 --> 00:36:24.584
um... '40s, '50s, '60s and on.

00:36:24.651 --> 00:36:26.353
- What's at stake
is the history.

00:36:26.419 --> 00:36:28.755
The history of our fathers,
of our grandparents,

00:36:28.822 --> 00:36:30.824
the people who worked
in the mines,

00:36:30.890 --> 00:36:32.292
who gave up their lives.

00:36:32.359 --> 00:36:35.862
You know, some 700 fatalities at
Inco in their 100-year history.

00:36:35.929 --> 00:36:37.631
Those people
gave up their lives,

00:36:37.697 --> 00:36:38.798
they gave up everything,

00:36:38.865 --> 00:36:41.534
to put on the table
what we have today.

00:36:41.601 --> 00:36:43.136
We'll never give it up.

00:36:50.744 --> 00:36:53.613
(narrator): Ten years earlier,

00:36:53.680 --> 00:36:55.715
Mike Harris' Conservative
Ontario government

00:36:55.782 --> 00:36:58.652
had legalized the hiring
of replacement workers.

00:36:58.718 --> 00:37:00.920
Scabs.

00:37:01.054 --> 00:37:03.056
How long have you been here?
- Me?

00:37:03.056 --> 00:37:05.892
Thirty-nine years.
- On the picket line?

00:37:05.959 --> 00:37:08.061
(laughter)
- Hey, it feels like it.

00:37:08.128 --> 00:37:09.529
(laughter)
- Feels like it!

00:37:09.596 --> 00:37:13.667
- No, we're on a 12-hour shift.
- July 13th last year.

00:37:13.733 --> 00:37:16.336
- Yeah, that's when we went
on strike.

00:37:16.403 --> 00:37:18.538
- July 13th. That means...
10 months.

00:37:18.605 --> 00:37:21.174
- Going on 11.
- Ten months and change.

00:37:21.241 --> 00:37:22.409
- What does she want?

00:37:22.475 --> 00:37:25.111
- She wants to reinforce
that there are only eight

00:37:25.178 --> 00:37:28.114
allowed in the line.
I'm telling you that these guys

00:37:28.181 --> 00:37:29.916
are not picketing--
- No, they're doing...

00:37:29.983 --> 00:37:31.651
(narrator): Today,
there can't be more

00:37:31.718 --> 00:37:34.955
than eight striking workers
at a time on a picket line,

00:37:35.055 --> 00:37:38.291
so the presence of our
camera crew is a problem here.

00:37:38.358 --> 00:37:40.527
- So they're saying,
because of your four people

00:37:40.593 --> 00:37:43.330
in your crew, it's too much
for our picket line.

00:37:43.396 --> 00:37:45.598
- Yes, but we are not miners.
- That's correct.

00:37:47.300 --> 00:37:48.768
(narrator):
Picketers can still keep scabs

00:37:48.835 --> 00:37:50.937
from entering the factory lot
in their vehicles.

00:37:51.071 --> 00:37:53.773
But only for eight minutes.

00:37:55.442 --> 00:37:57.844
A pretence of a picket line.

00:37:57.911 --> 00:38:00.880
The balance of power
has been destroyed.

00:38:37.550 --> 00:38:39.753
(crowd chanting):
Hey-hey, ho-ho...!

00:38:39.819 --> 00:38:42.689
(narrator): There are no longer
18,000 workers

00:38:42.756 --> 00:38:46.059
as there had been in 1969,
but 3,000.

00:38:46.126 --> 00:38:47.894
Times had changed.

00:38:47.961 --> 00:38:50.263
Machines had replaced men.

00:38:52.098 --> 00:38:54.467
Inco's employees
no longer represent

00:38:54.534 --> 00:38:57.370
more than 5%
of Sudbury's workers.

00:38:57.437 --> 00:38:59.506
So a Brazilian company was able

00:38:59.572 --> 00:39:02.842
to tear up a collective
agreement in a climate

00:39:02.909 --> 00:39:05.945
of general indifference.
(indistinct message on bullhorn)

00:39:07.080 --> 00:39:09.082
Before the conflict began,

00:39:09.149 --> 00:39:12.852
nickel traded at $50,000 a ton.

00:39:12.919 --> 00:39:15.355
Then, as the strike dragged on,

00:39:15.422 --> 00:39:18.758
the price dropped
to $5,000 a ton.

00:39:21.294 --> 00:39:23.630
The strike seemed to suit
the company's interests.

00:39:28.702 --> 00:39:30.570
Canada's exports of raw ore

00:39:30.637 --> 00:39:33.239
have increased fifteen-fold
in 50 years.

00:39:34.841 --> 00:39:38.611
The volume of transformed ore
has remained the same.

00:39:38.678 --> 00:39:40.280
Thus we are selling

00:39:40.347 --> 00:39:42.482
more and more untreated ore.

00:39:48.254 --> 00:39:50.657
- We create the resources,
we have the expertise,

00:39:50.724 --> 00:39:52.525
and they make money doing it!

00:39:52.592 --> 00:39:55.061
But they just wanna
make more money, uh...

00:39:55.095 --> 00:39:56.563
in China.

00:39:56.630 --> 00:39:59.399
My argument is, these resources,
at the end of the day,

00:39:59.466 --> 00:40:01.001
belong to the people of Ontario,

00:40:01.067 --> 00:40:02.736
they belong
to the people of Canada,

00:40:02.802 --> 00:40:05.171
and we have a right
to benefit from them.

00:40:05.238 --> 00:40:07.874
And if Xstrata
doesn't wanna play, uh...

00:40:07.941 --> 00:40:10.176
as a good corporate citizen,
then...

00:40:10.243 --> 00:40:12.912
I don't think
they should be here.

00:40:12.979 --> 00:40:15.582
- But, you know,
why aren't we producing

00:40:15.649 --> 00:40:18.218
in Quebec
for the people of Quebec

00:40:18.285 --> 00:40:21.288
products from nickel or copper
or gold or...

00:40:21.354 --> 00:40:23.790
or hospital supplies?

00:40:23.857 --> 00:40:26.926
Uh, we could produce all kinds
of stuff for the people.

00:40:26.993 --> 00:40:28.862
And make money for the company.
- Yeah.

00:40:28.928 --> 00:40:32.532
- No, we take it and send it
all the way to the States

00:40:32.599 --> 00:40:35.368
and then we buy it back
at twice the value,

00:40:35.435 --> 00:40:38.438
or three times the value it was
when we sold it

00:40:38.505 --> 00:40:40.974
as a raw material. Stupid.
We've never grown up.

00:40:41.041 --> 00:40:43.943
- Xstrata still sends its...

00:40:44.010 --> 00:40:48.481
its nickel over to, um,
Kristiansand in Norway

00:40:48.548 --> 00:40:50.283
to be refined, okay?

00:40:50.350 --> 00:40:52.118
Precious metals from Inco

00:40:52.185 --> 00:40:54.421
goes to Clydach, in Wales,

00:40:54.487 --> 00:40:57.090
to be refined. Okay?

00:40:57.157 --> 00:40:59.826
So with public ownership...

00:41:01.661 --> 00:41:04.564
...the accountability,
the political accountability

00:41:04.631 --> 00:41:07.467
for demanding that our resources

00:41:07.534 --> 00:41:12.706
be taken from the ground
to the final stage

00:41:12.772 --> 00:41:14.541
right in our community.

00:41:14.607 --> 00:41:19.579
That was one of the advantages
I saw for public ownership.

00:41:19.646 --> 00:41:23.283
To determine the path
on which our resources

00:41:23.316 --> 00:41:27.053
will be used
for the benefit of Canadians.

00:41:27.053 --> 00:41:30.123
That's, uh... that's the goal.

00:42:38.825 --> 00:42:41.928
- With private ownership
in this country

00:42:42.062 --> 00:42:45.665
comes all the privileges
of private ownership.

00:42:45.732 --> 00:42:47.667
They can do
what the fuck they want

00:42:47.734 --> 00:42:49.069
whenever they wanna do it.

00:43:26.573 --> 00:43:30.076
(narrator): Until 1979,
the law prevented anyone

00:43:30.076 --> 00:43:33.079
from suing Inco
for environmental damages.

00:43:34.948 --> 00:43:37.183
- I did the calculations,

00:43:37.250 --> 00:43:39.786
the amount of profit
that Inco made

00:43:39.853 --> 00:43:42.055
and the amount
of ecological damage

00:43:42.088 --> 00:43:44.691
that they caused.
- Mm-hmm.

00:43:44.758 --> 00:43:46.926
- And when I calculated the two,

00:43:47.060 --> 00:43:49.596
all we owed them was $2.75

00:43:49.663 --> 00:43:53.099
and bus fare
to get the hell outta town.

00:44:55.662 --> 00:44:58.531
(narrator): That was the person
in charge of the environment

00:44:58.598 --> 00:45:00.934
in mining heaven.

00:45:01.067 --> 00:45:05.071
Her job really consists of
handing out licenses to pollute.

00:45:05.105 --> 00:45:08.608
For example, to this factory
we're flying over,

00:45:11.278 --> 00:45:15.081
the Horne Smelter, owned
by what used to be Noranda,

00:45:15.115 --> 00:45:16.616
now Xstrata.

00:45:18.084 --> 00:45:21.054
The last copper smelter
in Canada.

00:45:21.087 --> 00:45:24.224
Twenty-five-million tons
of sulphur smoke

00:45:24.291 --> 00:45:26.126
spewed from its smokestacks.

00:45:26.192 --> 00:45:29.429
It was one of America's
biggest polluters.

00:45:31.598 --> 00:45:35.101
Copper is no longer
easy to find in Quebec,

00:45:35.168 --> 00:45:38.672
so this smelter is now
a multi-purpose incinerator

00:45:38.738 --> 00:45:41.341
extracting precious metals
from dumping grounds.

00:45:41.408 --> 00:45:44.344
Even from the US dumps.

00:45:44.411 --> 00:45:46.446
Heavy-metal galore.

00:45:50.216 --> 00:45:52.886
(speed-metal music)
(man): Woo-hoo!

00:46:17.243 --> 00:46:19.813
(narrator): At the end
of the '80s,

00:46:19.879 --> 00:46:21.615
our governments
provided the company

00:46:21.681 --> 00:46:23.483
with a sulfuric-acid factory

00:46:23.516 --> 00:46:26.052
to retrieve the sulphur
from the smokestacks.

00:46:26.119 --> 00:46:29.055
This was all located
close to peoples' homes.

00:46:45.071 --> 00:46:48.074
(narrator):
When making sulfuric acid,

00:46:48.074 --> 00:46:51.077
sulphur trioxide
is also produced

00:46:51.144 --> 00:46:53.713
as a byproduct.
It's a lethal gas.

00:46:53.780 --> 00:46:55.548
You don't want
an accident happening

00:46:55.615 --> 00:46:57.917
on a still summer night.

00:46:58.051 --> 00:46:59.819
Should an incident occur,

00:46:59.886 --> 00:47:01.855
the only advice
given to the population

00:47:01.921 --> 00:47:03.390
is to go indoors,

00:47:03.456 --> 00:47:06.259
seal all the openings
and watch TV.

00:47:39.926 --> 00:47:42.963
But smoke isn't
the only problem here.

00:47:43.063 --> 00:47:45.699
Every year,
the population is exposed

00:47:45.765 --> 00:47:48.835
to a rain
of heavy metal contamination:

00:47:48.902 --> 00:47:53.340
23,600 kilos of arsenic,
60,000 tons of lead,

00:47:53.406 --> 00:47:55.475
10 tons of sulfuric acid,

00:47:55.542 --> 00:47:58.912
not to mention dioxins
and furans.

00:49:34.407 --> 00:49:36.509
Twice in the last 20 years,

00:49:36.576 --> 00:49:39.813
the company has removed
the soil from the neighbourhood,

00:49:39.879 --> 00:49:41.615
ripped out lawns,

00:49:41.681 --> 00:49:45.151
and replaced the gravel
in the lanes.

00:51:04.564 --> 00:51:06.366
In Quebec,
contamination norms

00:51:06.433 --> 00:51:09.169
haven't been revised
in 30 years.

00:51:09.235 --> 00:51:12.339
It's not known whether
the residents of Notre-Dame

00:51:12.405 --> 00:51:14.474
have been more exposed
to illness

00:51:14.541 --> 00:51:17.210
than other folks
in other neighbourhoods.

00:51:17.277 --> 00:51:19.913
No more studies
are being conducted.

00:51:19.980 --> 00:51:23.083
You can't find
what you're not looking for.

00:51:23.116 --> 00:51:25.051
Hundreds of mines
throughout history

00:51:25.085 --> 00:51:28.221
have left just as many poisoned
chalices behind.

00:51:28.288 --> 00:51:30.156
Mine-residue sites,
often abandoned,

00:51:30.223 --> 00:51:32.959
whose owners
are nowhere to be found.

00:51:33.059 --> 00:51:36.296
A company
can easily go bankrupt,

00:51:36.363 --> 00:51:38.798
but eternity cannot.

00:51:38.865 --> 00:51:42.335
So we've become eternally
responsible for this situation.

00:51:42.402 --> 00:51:45.438
When desirable metals
are concentrated,

00:51:45.505 --> 00:51:47.974
so are hazardous materials.

00:51:48.074 --> 00:51:50.644
These dumping grounds
wouldn't be tolerated

00:51:50.710 --> 00:51:52.445
in heavily populated areas,

00:51:52.512 --> 00:51:55.315
whereas here,
between Rouyn and Val-d'Or,

00:51:55.382 --> 00:51:57.817
it seems like we've gotten used

00:51:57.884 --> 00:51:59.552
to the idea of being home

00:51:59.619 --> 00:52:01.755
to one of the largest
chemical dumps

00:52:01.821 --> 00:52:03.123
in North America.

00:52:03.189 --> 00:52:06.059
And right here, at the spot

00:52:06.059 --> 00:52:07.694
where the water parts.

00:56:10.070 --> 00:56:12.973
We were given an industrial tour
of the mine,

00:56:13.073 --> 00:56:14.874
courtesy of management.

00:56:14.941 --> 00:56:18.178
Of course,
it looks like a model mine.

00:56:18.244 --> 00:56:21.681
Safer. Nevertheless,
mining is still

00:56:21.748 --> 00:56:23.216
the most dangerous job of all.

00:56:39.733 --> 00:56:43.336
Two-hundred-thirteen
non-unionized workers.

00:56:43.403 --> 00:56:46.973
Who needs a union with salaries

00:56:47.073 --> 00:56:49.509
of $80,000 a year?

00:56:49.576 --> 00:56:53.280
Nowadays, some mines
don't even have employees.

00:56:53.346 --> 00:56:54.714
Everything is contracted out.

00:56:54.781 --> 00:56:56.883
A strong trend in new mines.

00:57:08.795 --> 00:57:11.932
Compared to 50 years ago,
10 times fewer workers

00:57:12.065 --> 00:57:15.502
are now needed to treat
the same amount of ore.

00:57:15.568 --> 00:57:17.070
Mechanization,

00:57:17.070 --> 00:57:20.607
technology and computerization
do the job now.

00:57:20.674 --> 00:57:22.642
Yet for the region,

00:57:22.709 --> 00:57:25.712
local salaries
are just about the only returns

00:57:25.779 --> 00:57:27.514
to the community.

00:57:27.580 --> 00:57:29.616
And now, let's talk business.

00:57:29.716 --> 00:57:32.352
This little mine brings in

00:57:32.419 --> 00:57:35.522
$750,000 a day.

00:57:35.589 --> 00:57:37.490
Here, an ounce of gold

00:57:37.557 --> 00:57:40.961
sells for four times
what it costs to produce.

00:58:03.116 --> 00:58:05.051
How sweet it is.

00:58:05.051 --> 00:58:08.288
Discretion has attained
unsuspected heights.

00:58:08.355 --> 00:58:11.725
Over the last 10 years,
the company that owns Goldex

00:58:11.791 --> 00:58:13.793
paid 5% tax on its profits.

00:58:13.860 --> 00:58:15.862
That's five or six times less

00:58:15.929 --> 00:58:18.331
than the Canadian
industry average.

00:58:18.398 --> 00:58:22.769
And when it comes to royalties,
despite the fact

00:58:22.836 --> 00:58:25.739
that these non-renewable
mineral deposits

00:58:25.805 --> 00:58:27.240
are public property,

00:58:27.307 --> 00:58:31.678
the vast majority of mining
companies operating in Quebec

00:58:31.745 --> 00:58:35.181
paid no royalties
between 2002 and 2008,

00:58:35.248 --> 00:58:39.152
although they generated
17 billion dollars in wealth.

00:58:39.219 --> 00:58:43.423
That's according to Quebec's
Comptroller General.

00:58:43.490 --> 00:58:45.058
In reality,
government expenditures

00:58:45.091 --> 00:58:48.828
to the mining sector
are continually on the rise.

00:58:48.895 --> 00:58:51.831
The benefits it derives
from this sector

00:58:51.898 --> 00:58:53.466
are constantly decreasing.

00:59:09.082 --> 00:59:11.484
But sometimes
the industry gets lucky,

00:59:11.551 --> 00:59:13.954
as it did here.

00:59:14.054 --> 00:59:17.257
The Goldex Mine extended
a pipe 20 kilometres

00:59:17.324 --> 00:59:20.193
in order to spread
the liquid byproduct

00:59:20.260 --> 00:59:22.162
of its rock-crushing process

00:59:22.228 --> 00:59:24.864
over a very problematic
mine-residue site.

01:00:27.894 --> 01:00:30.997
Goldex needed land
to dispose of its slurry.

01:00:31.064 --> 01:00:34.200
This project cost the company
next to nothing,

01:00:34.267 --> 01:00:36.937
but it cost us
35 million dollars.

01:00:37.003 --> 01:00:40.573
And we'll still have to spend
several billion dollars

01:00:40.640 --> 01:00:42.142
to clean other sites.

01:01:11.071 --> 01:01:13.840
The coloured parts of the map

01:01:13.907 --> 01:01:17.177
correspond to Quebec's
territories held by mines.

01:01:17.243 --> 01:01:19.112
Under claim.

01:01:19.179 --> 01:01:22.082
225,000 claims.

01:01:22.082 --> 01:01:25.352
The most populated part
of Abitibi is under claim.

01:01:25.418 --> 01:01:29.856
Even the core of its cities
is subject to being blown up.

01:02:39.392 --> 01:02:43.063
Only 6% of Abitibi's
natural territory

01:02:43.063 --> 01:02:44.464
is protected.

01:02:44.531 --> 01:02:46.566
We're in
the Piché-Lemoyne forest,

01:02:46.633 --> 01:02:50.503
in the heart of mining country
between Val-d'Or and Malartic.

01:02:50.570 --> 01:02:52.939
The government
selected this area

01:02:53.073 --> 01:02:55.642
to create a protected zone.

01:02:55.709 --> 01:02:59.546
But the fact that it's claimed
by the mining companies

01:02:59.613 --> 01:03:02.382
prevents the project
from being carried out.

01:03:22.636 --> 01:03:26.072
In addition,
only a few kilometres away,

01:03:26.072 --> 01:03:28.975
they're developing
a huge mining site,

01:03:29.075 --> 01:03:30.910
the Osisko project.

01:04:09.416 --> 01:04:10.784
Malartic,

01:04:10.850 --> 01:04:14.254
a small town
not far from Val-d'Or,

01:04:14.321 --> 01:04:19.125
has seen seven mines open
and close in its short history.

01:04:19.192 --> 01:04:20.727
Despite all the wealth
created here,

01:04:20.794 --> 01:04:22.662
it has still become
the poorest city

01:04:22.729 --> 01:04:24.164
in the region,

01:04:24.230 --> 01:04:26.366
losing half its population.

01:04:27.200 --> 01:04:30.203
Even the local Tim Hortons
had to close.

01:04:32.138 --> 01:04:33.974
In circumstances like those,

01:04:34.074 --> 01:04:37.377
any project
offering 400 to 500 jobs

01:04:37.444 --> 01:04:39.980
would be welcome.

01:04:40.080 --> 01:04:42.482
The parade is led
by Mr. Corbeil.

01:04:42.549 --> 01:04:44.684
When he's not
a government minister,

01:04:44.751 --> 01:04:48.054
he works for the mines.
(greeting children in French)

01:04:48.121 --> 01:04:51.791
A very efficient go-between
when it comes to facilitating

01:04:51.858 --> 01:04:53.493
certain touchy projects,

01:04:53.560 --> 01:04:56.129
like expropriating people
from their neighbourhood

01:04:56.196 --> 01:04:58.865
to make room
for private enterprise.

01:06:57.284 --> 01:06:59.719
The project is so big,

01:06:59.786 --> 01:07:03.890
the government feels obliged
to hold public hearings

01:07:03.957 --> 01:07:05.392
to determine
whether the destruction

01:07:05.458 --> 01:07:07.861
of an entire neighbourhood
might affect the environment.

01:07:09.362 --> 01:07:12.065
But as the hearings continue,
they keep moving houses.

01:07:13.700 --> 01:07:17.070
Osisko has already spent
200 million dollars.

01:07:18.405 --> 01:07:21.541
At this stage, the government
hasn't yet authorized

01:07:21.608 --> 01:07:23.310
exploitation of the mine.

01:07:23.376 --> 01:07:26.079
It's not known
under what circumstances

01:07:26.079 --> 01:07:29.716
the company could have obtained
the state's blessing.

01:08:19.566 --> 01:08:21.067
(drumming)

01:08:28.742 --> 01:08:31.678
Strange, isn't it,
how a town's prosperity

01:08:31.745 --> 01:08:35.916
could stem from the annihilation
of one of its neighbourhoods?

01:08:35.982 --> 01:08:39.786
The law allows expropriation
for reasons of public utility,

01:08:39.853 --> 01:08:43.089
like building a hospital
or a road.

01:08:43.156 --> 01:08:45.458
Yet here, a private company

01:08:45.525 --> 01:08:47.327
armed with the power
to expropriate

01:08:47.394 --> 01:08:49.162
was able to buy or demolish

01:08:49.229 --> 01:08:51.064
all the houses
in a neighbourhood

01:08:51.064 --> 01:08:52.499
at market value.

01:08:52.565 --> 01:08:54.901
By mutual agreement, of course.

01:09:00.140 --> 01:09:02.842
Everyone except one, Ken Massé,

01:09:02.909 --> 01:09:05.078
who evidently
doesn't understand

01:09:05.078 --> 01:09:08.415
this new concept
of social acceptance.

01:09:31.071 --> 01:09:32.739
(background chatter)

01:09:34.341 --> 01:09:37.410
- Once you have made a discovery
and you have a feasibility study

01:09:37.477 --> 01:09:39.746
that says it would be economic
to mine it,

01:09:39.813 --> 01:09:41.314
then putting together
the right people

01:09:41.381 --> 01:09:43.483
that will handle, uh...

01:09:43.516 --> 01:09:46.453
relations with the people
who live in the area,

01:09:46.519 --> 01:09:49.489
people who know how
technically to develop a mine

01:09:49.556 --> 01:09:52.325
and operate it.
And having the financing.

01:09:52.392 --> 01:09:55.495
But, again, people are willing
to do that in Quebec

01:09:55.562 --> 01:09:57.764
because,
as far as an investment climate,

01:09:57.831 --> 01:09:59.733
it's a very low-risk area.

01:09:59.799 --> 01:10:02.002
The government's not gonna
change the rules,

01:10:02.068 --> 01:10:04.838
the government is not going
to give you troubles.

01:10:04.905 --> 01:10:08.708
You do things right and
you'll be able to run a mine.

01:10:10.310 --> 01:10:13.046
(narrator): As far as mining
companies are concerned,

01:10:13.113 --> 01:10:15.482
Quebec isn't going
to change the rules,

01:10:15.548 --> 01:10:17.584
Quebec isn't going
to make trouble.

01:10:17.651 --> 01:10:20.487
There's very little
financial risk involved here.

01:10:20.553 --> 01:10:24.324
But for those who will have
to live beside the hole

01:10:24.391 --> 01:10:26.359
and have invested
so much in their homes...

01:15:11.077 --> 01:15:13.647
The hole in Malartic
will never be filled,

01:15:13.713 --> 01:15:16.683
nor will the future
open-pit mines in Abitibi.

01:15:16.716 --> 01:15:21.054
It's as if we're the last people
who'll ever live in this place.

01:15:21.054 --> 01:15:24.090
For the sake
of the generations to come,

01:15:24.157 --> 01:15:27.160
we must assess
what needs to be protected.

01:15:27.227 --> 01:15:28.762
Even though mining companies

01:15:28.828 --> 01:15:31.097
have been pioneers
in distant territories,

01:15:31.164 --> 01:15:35.835
it doesn't give them the right
to act in Wild West fashion.

01:15:35.902 --> 01:15:39.606
Mineral resources are,
by definition, publicly owned,

01:15:39.673 --> 01:15:43.410
and the contract
that binds our government

01:15:43.476 --> 01:15:48.315
to the mining sector is almost
legalizing corporate vandalism.

01:15:48.381 --> 01:15:50.483
It's astonishing,
the amount of money

01:15:50.550 --> 01:15:55.055
that has eluded us in the past
and continues to do so.

01:15:55.055 --> 01:15:58.325
We could put it
to such good use.

01:15:58.391 --> 01:16:02.162
Almost all the profits
are handed over to shareholders,

01:16:02.229 --> 01:16:05.165
who don't even know we exist.

01:16:05.232 --> 01:16:08.335
This mining law
must be rewritten.

01:16:08.401 --> 01:16:10.070
Protection of the territory

01:16:10.070 --> 01:16:12.372
and respect
for civic development

01:16:12.439 --> 01:16:15.308
must now govern
all mining activity.

01:16:15.375 --> 01:16:19.312
This is increasingly the case
around the world,

01:16:19.379 --> 01:16:22.315
like in Australia,
Ecuador and Botswana.

01:16:22.382 --> 01:16:24.651
If not,
the north will be ransacked,

01:16:24.718 --> 01:16:26.953
and the St. Lawrence Valley
as well.

01:16:27.053 --> 01:16:30.056
Because gas and oil
are underground,

01:16:30.090 --> 01:16:34.127
and therefore subjected
to the same mysterious law.

01:16:34.194 --> 01:16:37.731
It's about time we became
masters in our own house.

01:16:39.399 --> 01:16:40.901
(music)

01:16:47.707 --> 01:16:50.277
Closed Captioning:
CNST, Montreal