Will tougher rules for approval win over pipeline opponents?

At a time when the federal and several provincial governments have raised the bar on environmental and other standards for the oil patch it is not churlish to ask the question: will these moves, which will add both time and money to already demanding approval processes, win over those people who oppose pipelines and claim that they have no “social licence”. That’s the issue I explore in my column today for the Ottawa Citizen, Calgary Herald and other PostMedia papers. You will be unsurprised to learn that my answer is, “No”. And that means that at some point politicians will have to stop pretending that all that is required is process tweaks, that a better process will win over opponents. It won’t and at some point politicians will have to choose sides. How uncomfortable! Poor things — I almost feel sorry for them. Almost….