The political fallout from Wednesday's English Bay oil spill may prove as hard to contain as the toxic fuel that outpaced and eluded Canada’s sluggish cleanup response.

The political finger pointing was fierce Friday as Premier Christy Clark criticized the federal government for its “totally inadequate” response and opposition MPs hammered Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservatives for federal cuts they say undermine the ability to deal with spills on the west coast.

The stakes are high. The Harper Government has been busy touting Canada’s oil response capabilities as “world class” while aligning itself with major pipeline projects that would see supertankers filled with oil become regular fixtures in English Bay, Burrard Inlet and northern coastal waters.

The spill comes in an election year, and experts say it could harden resistance to Kinder Morgan’s proposed Trans Mountain pipeline expansion and damage the Conservatives in some south coast ridings.

Clark criticized the Canadian Coast Guard for the six hours it took to get an oil-absorbing boom around the leaking bulk grain carrier Marathassa. In fact, it wasn’t the coast guard doing the work but a private company Ottawa called in to help.

Clark said in a Friday news conference she had contacted the prime minister’s office to demand changes.

“Somebody needs to do a better job of protecting this coast, and the coast guard hasn’t done it,” she said. “It is totally unacceptable that we don’t have the spill response that we require here and the federal government needs to step up.”

Clark went so far as to suggest the province could have done a better job if it had been in charge.

“And if that means that in the future the coast guard is relieved of its lead in this and starts taking direction from the province, then perhaps that’s a better way to do it,” she said.

Opposition MPs took aim at Tories they say will be punished in the scheduled October election for keeping silent over federal cuts to West Coast marine safety and the closure of the Kitsilano Canadian Coast Guard station in 2013.

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau said Harper’s cuts undermined the spill response.

“I used to live in this neighbourhood, and I know that any spills of this nature are of serious concern to British Columbians and all Canadians,” Trudeau, a former teacher at the West Point Grey Academy, said in a statement.

New Democratic Party MP Kennedy Stewart said problems managing a relatively minor spill underscore concerns about Kinder Morgan’s proposed expansion and raises doubts about the federal government’s long-standing pledge to create a “world class” tanker safety system.

“When the public health authorities are saying ‘don’t touch this stuff because it’s toxic, don’t go to the beaches,’ it’s a wake-up call for folks here,” said Stewart, the MP for Burnaby Douglas.

“If you want to become a major industrial oil export port like Rotterdam, you’re not going to be able to enjoy your beaches, and that’s a choice the region is going to have to make.”