Let Alberta run its own race
By Lethbridge Herald Opinon on March 6, 2020.
Imagine a runner. She walks to the starting line of her race and takes her place, but before the whistle is blown, she leans down and ties her shoelaces together, securely fastening one shoe to the other. Then, she turns herself around so that she is standing backwards.
The other runners are lined up across the starting line. Their shoes are properly tied and they are facing in the right direction. The whistle is blown and the runners take off. Of course, the runner with her shoes tied together and facing the wrong direction not only looks foolish, but is at an undeniable disadvantage. This is Canada. Rather, this is Canada under the current government.
Instead of focusing on the economic prosperity and security of our country, the prime minister has advanced anti-industry policies like the carbon tax, C-69 and C-48, proving he is more interested in upholding his own image and ideals than about the well-being of Canadians.
He wants to be seen as caring for the environment. Yet, science reveals that no measurable advancements have been made under his leadership.
Last week, Teck Frontier Ltd. withdrew its application for a massive oilsands mine in Alberta just days before the federal deadline to approve the project. This initiative would have created 7,000 jobs and contributed $70 billion in federal, provincial and municipal taxes – money that would have been used to build schools, hospitals, roads and many other important infrastructure projects.
Whether it is supporting anti-energy activists, creating unnecessary regulation, or a deliberate lack of co-operation, it appears this government will do whatever is necessary to kill Canada’s energy sector.
On Tuesday, Feb. 25, my Conservative colleague, Shannon Stubbs, called for an emergency debate in the House of Commons on the Teck Frontier Mine decision. During the debate, I delivered a speech pleading with the members of the governing party to weigh the decisions we are making and how they will impact the generations that will come after us.
There are 338 of us who have been entrusted with a seat in the House of Commons and the responsibility of making decisions on behalf of the country. We are common people representing other common people who elected us to speak out on their behalf. This must never be taken for granted.
As I stood on the floor of the chamber, I spoke of the plight faced by the people of Alberta.
I called attention to the fact that Trudeau is fostering a chaotic and unstable environment. Who would want to invest in a country where their projects may get cancelled because radical activists block roads, railways and ports, while the police are instructed by the prime minister to turn a blind eye?
Trudeau is sending a message to the world that Canada is closed for business.
Our country is being held hostage by paid protesters who hate energy progress. Meanwhile, the prime minister is standing by watching environmentally responsible job-creating projects die.
By stunting the Canadian oil and gas sector, Trudeau is actually causing global GHG emissions to go up. If he truly cared about the environment, he would be the one leading the charge in getting oil and gas projects approved in Canada.
We still need energy. But instead of developing our own oil and gas sector under the world’s strictest environmental standards, we will continue to bring it in from Saudi Arabia, where zero environmental regulations are in place and the oil and gas we purchase is shipped over to Canada on barges and then transported by rail. Sixteen transport ships produce the same amount of pollution as all the cars in the world. What is environmentally friendly about that?
The destruction of Canada’s energy sector isn’t an Alberta problem. This is an all-of-Canada problem. Our entire nation is at stake. Our national unity is suffering and the prime minister doesn’t seem to care.
Canada is in crisis.
The refusal to allow for the development of our energy industry and draw investment into our country is actually a refusal to take his place as the prime minister and lead the country well. It is an abdication of his role as head of state, and it is wrong. We are leaderless and thus, set up to fail.
It is time for action.
My colleagues and I will continue to call on the Liberal government to step aside and let Alberta run. We are strong, we are innovative, and we are powerful. We don’t want handouts. We just want to work. It’s time for Trudeau to implement policies that will facilitate an environment of economic prosperity or get out of the way.
Rachael Harder is the Conservative MP for Lethbridge. Her column appears monthly.
22-21
The folks at Teck stated they needed 3 Ps: Partners, Pipelines and Price. Even global investors are not wishing to invest in fossil fuels anymore, Pipelines are taking a long time to be built and the most important, Price. They said they needed the price on a barrel of oil to be $75 to make the project pay. This is very unlikely to happen now, and in the future.
Perhaps, for another perspective, this might be a good read:
“What really happened to the Teck Frontier oilsands mine? It’s the market, stupid!”
http://www.albertapolitics.ca/2020/02/what-really-happend-to-the-teck-frontier-oilsands-mine-its-the-market-stupid/
Other global factors include that still, Saudi Arabia are the controllers of global oil prices, the American Shale Boom and the American deep water port, LOOP. The Shale Boom and LOOP have both, been said to have turned global oil economics and shipping, upsidedown. This is why, it is vital that Canada/Alberta, et al wean off of fossil fuels. It has been known, for years, that this sector will start fading. Where the $trillion dollar money trail is heading globally, is to renewable tech. Will Canada/Alberta fall behind?
And “let Alberta run?” We are, now, having to sit back and watch the Kenney UCP wreck our Alberta.
Perhaps the question could be: Are Albertans just going to sit back and watch the Kenney UCP wreck Alberta?
while we can figure rachel did not likely write this rubbish, we can at least be certain she endorsed it. in case you did not get the memo, rachel – and, clearly, you do not seem to understand: the world is changing…again. alberta oil is ever the more becoming a fossil fuel.
change happens, but cdn cons, reformers and ucp types just cannot let go of the past. alberta needs a new plan…it needed to develop a new plan decades ago, so that we would not be in the position we now contend with. the brunt of our jobs have too long been based in oil extraction (and simply letting all our primary resources be taken from us for a song…and almost always with a devalued dollar to allow for maximum rape); too few jobs in developing, processing, manufacturing, and technology…. never a leader; always a follower because of brown-nosing, lazy, unimaginative, self serving, greedy politicians and canadian businessmen that only know how to ride american coattails.
all of this mess and theft and stagnated, stunted growth under the “leadership” – lol; can’t say that without laughing – of con and con-type govts. bravo! must have been ndp in disguise, right?!
alberta has had many chances to do two necessary things: 1) take in fair payments (should have maintained majority ownership in all projects, like norway) all the way along, whilst practicing responsible stewardship of the land; 2) diversifying the economy, knowing full well alberta oil would not be king forever. nada on both accounts. worse still, never learned from several lessons of oil boom and bust.
the further embarrassment of all this is that even during peak oil times this century, the biggest source of our govt income came from gaming! not from tourist pockets, either.
go it alone? run their own race?!! what are you going to do, try and make us las vegas of the north? build up a casino and showroom complex in the desert badlands? serve the gamers groundwater tainted by fracking poisons?
talk about going from dumb to dumber. laces tied together; facing backward…sure sounds like alberta, eh? but not because of its relationship with canada, but because of its struggling relationship with the likes of change, honesty, integrity, foresight, compassion, and the reality that is change. one can only surmise that trying to hold back the hands of time – wrestling with change – thwarts intelligence and good judgement.
Unfortunately, Ms. Harder demonstrates an inability to grasp that divestment in fossil fuels is occurring. For example, the Republic of Ireland is the first country to divest completely in fossil fuel companies in the passing of an all party bill in its lower parliament. Norway has partially divested from investment in fossil fuels and is giving consideration to further divestment.
This, together with diversified resource industry companies like Teck, who responded to the reality that their criteria for investing in Alberta was not going to be met caused Teck to move on. The reasons for Teck’s withdrawal were clearly identified in President and CEO Don Lindsay’s letter to Minister Jonathan Wilkinson:
https://www.teck.com/media/Don-Lindsay-letter-to-Minister-Wilkinson.pdf
This should be a strong signal for both the Canadian and Alberta governments to reassess an obsessive compulsive drive to shore up the fossil fuel industry at the expense of ignoring climate change and moving forward to diversify the economy.
Moreover, it is evident Ms. Harder’s sentiments are aligned with the rantings of conspiracy theorists, think tanks, War Rooms and associated pundits busily engaged in “disproving true facts”.
Indeed, Ms. Harder, Alberta is in crisis, and as a result, Canada is being impacted. But, there is more to prosperity than can be found in neoliberal market fundamentalist ideology.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/25115243?seq=1
Well Biff (Fescue), nothing unusual coming from you today, you once again spout off ridiculous innuendo that does not pertain to the deliverance of our MP Harder’s letter. I can’t wait to hear what your dual persona “Fescue” will be posting! At any rate, you question that MP Harder “did not write this….” what would cause you to suggest this? You obviously do not know and/or understand the education and intelligence of our MP, nor I doubt that you watched her deliver this very speech in our Parliament the othe day! I did, and am truly proud that we have such an eloquent speaker representing Lethbridge, Alberta and all Canadians in the House! So, Biff/Fescue (your both clamoring pseudo name) my suggestion to you (Biff/Fescue) is “put up or shut up” and STOP insulting and trying to intimidate my Member of Parliament by your “pot shot” remarks, being made behind the cloak of your fictitious persona.
Good letter Rachael! Yes our once great province of opportunity and employment is being high-jacked by a bunch of eco-terrorists and law-less thugs and is supported by a impotent federal government that has a spineless leader! It is time for action! Time for Alberta to be the front-runner in clean home-grown energy that the world has a thirst for. What hypocrisy importing oil from countries that could care-less about “human rights” and the law of the land. Yet not a word on this (at least that I have heard) from the loonie-tune “left” in Canada on this massive hypocritical injustice!
The plan for clean home grown energy was Notley’s; a small carbon tax, rebates and investment in renewables.
Kenney’s plan is blackmail of the Federal Govt and a War Room.
(Also I accidentally hit “report comment” and I apologize for that johnny – no mechanism seems to exist to take that click back. Hope your comment isn’t edited out.)