NDP leadership hopeful Ashton says he's open to reversing federal tanker ban

OTTAWA — NDP leadership candidate Rob Ashton says that he’d be open to lifting the federal moratorium on coastal tanker traffic as prime minister, if he saw clear support for shipping heavy oil through British Columbia’s northern coast.

“If a province says we’re going to block all tankers, B.C., but there’s a project that everybody wants, let’s find a safe way to move those tankers up,” Ashton told the National Post in an interview on Wednesday.

“If, say, from Alberta to B.C., you have community support. You have indigenous support, whether it’s oil being trucked in by rail, truck, or pipelines … And then you get to the water and you can’t move it away, then there has to be a discussion about how do we make this safer,” he added.

“I’m definitely open to that conversation,” said Ashton.

Ashton, a career longshoreman with 30 years of experience working on B.C.’s docks, said that technical measures could be taken to reduce the risk of oil spills and other incidents.

“(Maybe it’s) more tugs to assist the vessels going up, maybe another pilot on board. There are safe ways to do projects,” said Ashton.

The North Coast tanker ban, issued in late 2015 to fulfill a Liberal campaign promise, has become a focal point in a growing impasse between B.C.’s NDP Premier David Eby and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith over the prospect of a new West Coast pipeline.

Eby said earlier this month that a reversal of the tanker ban would be a “direct economic threat” to B.C.’s economy, endangering billions in investment tied to the support of coastal First Nations.

Smith has, in turn, called Eby names like “un-Canadian” and “parochial” for his knee-jerk opposition to a northern B.C. pipeline.

Ashton said on Wednesday that, while he and Eby have the same partisan stripes, they don’t see fully eye-to-eye on this particular issue.

“David (Eby) has good ideas in some places (and) I don’t think it’s my place to say (he’s) right or wrong … because I’m looking at the national stage, and it’s a whole different type of conversation,” said Ashton.

Eby’s office didn’t immediately respond to an inquiry about Ashton’s comments on the tanker ban.

Ashton said in a podcast interview earlier this month that he’d let the NDP’s membership determine the party’s position on building new pipelines.

He’s one of three early contenders to emerge in the race to be the next NDP leader, who will be named at the party’s next convention in Winnipeg, on March 29, 2026. The other two are Edmonton MP Heather McPherson and Vancouver-based filmmaker Avi Lewis.

Pipelines will be a delicate issue for at least two of the three candidates.

McPherson was the only NDP MP to support the expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline to B.C.’s Lower Mainland in 2019 , but has panned Smith’s pitch for a new North Coast pipeline, saying it’s for Alberta and the rest of the country to pivot to a renewables-focused “futures economy.”

She hasn’t said definitively that she’d oppose any new pipeline proposal, but has pointed to the lack of a private sector proponent for the new pipeline as evidence that the world is moving away from fossil fuels.

Lewis says he’s against the construction of any new coastal pipelines and has vowed to aggressively decarbonize Canada’s economy .

The three will come face-to-face in Ottawa on Wednesday night at the campaign’s first candidates’ forum.

National Post rmohamed@postmedia.com

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