Alberta can go its own way
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
199.04851
Summary
In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling on Alberta s challenge to the Trudeau government's proposed carbon tax, many are wondering what s next for Alberta and its premier, Danielle Smith, in their fight against the federal government's carbon tax.
Transcript
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Western Standards, Nigel Hannaford at a press conference the other day asked Premier Daniel
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Smith what she will do to fend off the proposed federal incursion into Alberta's jurisdiction
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with electrical generation. She finished her answer basically saying, we will go our own way.
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That's her own words. Now, Smith isn't saying the government's going to pursue an independence
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referendum in Alberta anytime soon, but she's well aware too that her statement left room
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for people to take that as an unspoken threat. Alberta's Premier is an experienced and skilled
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communicator. Her choice of words was no mistake. Now, in the near future, Alberta will go its own
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way with the current plan to reach net zero emissions by 2050, no matter what Ottawa thinks.
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The goalposts, though, are 15 years apart, whereas, you know, Gilboa wants to reach that goal at 2035.
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And there's little indication that Gilboa or Smith are willing to even entertain the notion of changing
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their targets. So this battle is just beginning. Now, Gilboa is following the typical liberal playbook.
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He's slapping down the West to win support in the East. The net zero electric generation targets are
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going to be easily met in Ontario and Quebec, where they're rich in hydroelectric resources and they
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have nuclear reactors. The 2035 net zero target for Alberta, though, is utterly impossible to reach
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without crippling Alberta's economy and threatening domestic energy security. Right now, fossil fuel
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supplies almost 80 percent of the province's energy needs. And that can't change that much in 12 short
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years. The province has no major rivers to dam. And the way Canada works, it would take decades to get
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a large scale nuclear power generation plant up and running if it was ever even approved. I mean,
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despite years and billions in investment in solar and wind generation projects, they still only supply
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a small percentage of the Alberta power grid. And they'll always need to be backed up with gas generators
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for the days when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow. It does happen. Smith can't bend
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on that, and she won't bend. And Gilboa won't budge either. So what next? Well, this battle's surely
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going to head to Canada's courts, and it'll move at the typical glacial pace. So it's going to be a war
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fought in slow motion with plenty of heated rhetoric as the challenges creep through the system.
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Eventually, the Supreme Court will rule on the dispute, and it will rule in favor of the liberal
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government. I mean, the Constitution's little more than a set of suggestions when it comes to
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protecting Alberta's constitutional authority and jurisdiction and energy generation. We established
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that when the Supreme Court upheld the carbon tax. The court is stacked. And when it feels that it's
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in the public good, particularly central Canada's public good, you know, when it feels it's better to
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step on Alberta's rights in that case, it'll step on Alberta's rights every time. Now, Premier Smith is
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saying she's willing to pull out all the stops to stop Ottawa's incursion upon the province.
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Now, time will tell if she really means it, though, because once the battle is finished
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in the courts and Alberta has lost, the federal government will then move on to the punitive
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stage if we don't cooperate out here in the West. They'll cut transfer payments as they demand
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capitulation, and the impact Albertans will be harsh. We'll be starved of the transfers of our
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own money back to us. At this point, there's only going to be one thing that'll make Ottawa back off.
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Alberta needs to begin the process of truly going its own way. No doublespeak, no veiled threats.
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Alberta needs to work towards invoking a referendum on independence under the Clarity Act.
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The only other option is a surrender to the Trudeau Liberals, and that would only open the door,
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of course, to more incursions. We might as well just give up having a provincial government.
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No, I don't expect Premier Smith to start threatening a move towards provincial independence,
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at least not yet. Most Albertans would still prefer to see the standoff somehow settled within
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Confederation, or at least for now. Once all the legal challenges have failed and all of the tools
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have been taken out of the toolbox, used and broken, only one path is going to remain.
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And that's the path to full independence. Now time will tell whether Premier Smith is going to be
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willing to take that path. She is the most independence-minded, inclined Premier Alberta's
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had to date, though. So we've got some interesting times ahead of us.