Western Standard - May 17, 2026


CORY MORGAN： Alberta's humiliating negotiation process with Carney must end


Episode Stats


Length

4 minutes

Words per minute

180.55

Word count

861

Sentence count

36

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Toxicity

2

sentences flagged

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

I just get tired of these victory lap ceremonies being done when there's no victory. Among politicians in the federation, only Alberta must go through the humiliating ritual of groveling and negotiating with the federal government to develop its industries and export its products.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 yeah i just get tired of these victory laps being done when there's no victory so i mean among
00:00:11.740 politicians in the federation only alberta must go through the humiliating ritual of groveling
00:00:17.900 and negotiating with the federal government to develop its industries and export its products
00:00:22.020 ontario's premier doesn't have to beg for permission to expand automotive manufacturing
00:00:26.500 and Quebec doesn't have to snivel if it wants to expand a maple syrup plantation.
00:00:31.860 Alberta, though, is reduced to having to offer concessions to be allowed to do
00:00:35.840 what every other oil-producing jurisdiction on the planet does, and they don't hesitate.
00:00:42.240 There's little indication the federal government has any interest in allowing Alberta to expand
00:00:45.980 its resource production and export infrastructure.
00:00:49.380 Kearney has talked and talked and talked.
00:00:51.740 For over a year now, we are an inch closer to getting something done than we were a year ago.
00:00:56.480 Premier Daniel Smith keeps setting deadlines and they keep passing.
00:01:00.100 Now Smith's celebrating that her and Carney had more officially entrenched the MOU they created long ago.
00:01:05.500 But what does that mean?
00:01:06.820 Has Carney repealed the No More Pipelines Act, which has stalled development in Alberta for years?
00:01:11.640 Has Carney repealed the tanker ban on the West Coast, despite tankers constantly docking in eastern Canadian ports?
00:01:18.120 Has Carney retracted his assertion that Indigenous consent is going to be required to get projects constructed?
00:01:24.300 Has Carney retracted his assertion that provincial permission must be attained by BC or Quebec to get pipelines constructed?
00:01:32.600 Unless all of these things have been done, nothing of note is going to be expanding in Alberta. 0.95
00:01:37.040 Canada is uncompetitive on the world market and is going to remain so until the government chooses to get out of the damn way.
00:01:42.660 No pipeline has ever been talked into the ground, but Carney and Smith appear determined to try that method.
00:01:48.800 Alberta and Albertans have had enough as private investors, as have private investors.
00:01:53.480 I mean, according to an RBC report, over a trillion dollars in potential investment has already fled Canada in the last decade, and most of that was oil and gas.
00:02:02.460 The conditions causing that capital flight haven't been addressed.
00:02:06.120 Thus, that capital flight's just going to continue.
00:02:08.600 If Mark Carney truly wants to see these projects done, he can say so at any time.
00:02:13.180 He can declare these projects to be in the national interest and that he'll use his constitutional authority to get them done.
00:02:19.660 He won't do that, though.
00:02:20.500 He just offers more mealy-mouthed promises and more negotiations.
00:02:24.540 His major projects office, remember that thing?
00:02:27.280 It was created almost a year ago with the ostensible goal of fast-tracking approvals.
00:02:31.240 So far, it hasn't approved a single one.
00:02:33.120 I think we can safely call that initiative a failure.
00:02:36.100 It's an office of false hopes and continued deferral.
00:02:39.440 Nothing more.
00:02:40.480 It appears to be that way by design.
00:02:42.520 Carney pretends the holdup is with a lack of interest from private investors,
00:02:45.740 and that's just an outright lie.
00:02:46.820 Private companies desperately want to produce and export more oil and gas while world energy prices are spiking.
00:02:53.420 They've made it no secret, though, of what's holding them up.
00:02:56.320 Sunova CEO John McKenzie called Canada's energy policies myopically focused on the climate agenda,
00:03:02.600 arguing they've made resource development and investment in the country uncompetitive with the rest of the world.
00:03:09.260 Canadian Natural Resources Limited CEO Scott Stouth argued that companies investing in carbon capture and storage
00:03:15.600 shouldn't face an additional industrial carbon tax on top of those costs,
00:03:20.880 helling the policy an economic burden that undermines long-term growth.
00:03:24.800 The Oil Sands Alliance, all the heavyweights,
00:03:26.560 they released a statement saying because of complex regulatory processes,
00:03:30.160 uncompetitive carbon frameworks, and fiscal systems that don't incent growth,
00:03:33.980 there's not been a major new Greenfield Oil Sands project sanctioning Canada since 2013.
00:03:40.180 An investment has dramatically declined.
00:03:42.420 premier smith i guess she was obligated to show she was willing to deal with the federal government
00:03:47.080 in good faith but the time for playing nice is done she needs to approach these negotiations 0.99
00:03:51.860 now with teeth and scheduling a referendum on independence will do that no more pussy 0.93
00:03:56.180 footing around just announce it's going to be held and that it's going to be asking the
00:03:59.940 constitutional question not lucasic's status quo version albertans have had enough waiting things
00:04:05.080 are stalled quit putting out these press releases and false victories shaking hands premier smith
00:04:10.280 must start the referendum clock ticking, and it must make it clear that Carney's inaction
00:04:14.000 is going to increase support for the S-side. If she doesn't schedule the vote, not only is she
00:04:18.780 setting herself up for more embarrassment as Carney plays with her, but she will be opening 0.74
00:04:23.600 up her right flank for a party split as independent supporters start to put real pressure on her.
00:04:28.300 Nothing shy of a project scheduled with dirt anticipated to move soon is going to satisfy
00:04:33.200 Albertans now. No more paper, guys. Smith must demand nothing less and must give Albertans the
00:04:38.440 democratic means to express their thoughts on the federation through a referendum talk is cheap
00:04:43.420 and we've had enough all right