Western Standard - Danielle Smith talks prairie values, pipelines, and Alberta’s path to prosperity

00:00:00.000 Please join me in welcoming a Premier who doesn't flinch when it counts,

00:00:05.200 who governs with courage and clarity, and who stands up for not the ideology, but for her land,

00:00:12.880 her people, and for the future of this province. Please welcome the Honourable Premier Danielle Smith.

00:00:30.000 This is not the Premier.

00:00:38.160 How to disappoint a large and excited group. My apologies. Premier Smith is just delayed by a couple of minutes,

00:00:47.520 but we are looking forward to burning her up on stage. So thank you very much.

00:00:52.320 Thanks, Brian.

00:00:54.320 We will have her with us.

00:00:56.080 That doesn't happen for me. That happens for Premier Smith.

00:01:02.960 So she'll come up in a few moments and give a quick keynote address, and then we'll

00:01:10.320 have a fireside chat and talk a while. It's my pleasure to do this again for those of you that

00:01:15.360 were at the Ottawa edition of Canada Strong and Free Network events. We did this just back in April,

00:01:24.320 and it's also a pleasure because I've known Premier Smith off and on for about 15 years.

00:01:29.200 Is she ready? All right. Now you can stand up and applause again for Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.

00:01:35.200 Why, thank you. Thank you. I hear you just gave a standing O to Brian Lilly.

00:01:56.080 You know, this is a good thing about him having Ben or an old radio and TV guy. He just has to roll with

00:02:03.920 the punches. So I'm glad to be here, and I'm really looking forward to our conversation together.

00:02:08.480 And so thank you for the introduction. And it is, I have a few prepared remarks, so I'll go through those,

00:02:13.760 and then we'll get into a little bit more interaction of it later. But it is such a pleasure.

00:02:18.480 So welcome you here today, and welcome everyone to Calgary. If you're not, if you're from out of

00:02:24.800 province, I should probably find out how many out of province folks do we have here. Wow, look at that. 0.94

00:02:30.400 Almost half the room. That's fantastic. Welcome here. So you'll probably know that there's

00:02:38.000 a bit of a difference in conservatism in Alberta than in other provinces. And let me maybe see if I can

00:02:44.800 help to explain a bit about why that is. Because I know you're discussing conservatism in our nation

00:02:52.320 and the critical role of the West. And so when we talk about conservatism, we often focus on policies

00:02:57.760 and politics. But the values that underpin our movement are far older and more profound. They are,

00:03:05.280 in the case of Alberta conservatism, it is the values of the pioneers who first settled our land.

00:03:11.520 They were a people who came to a vast and open country with little more than the clothes on their

00:03:16.960 back and the belief in their ability to build a better life here with their families. And that is

00:03:22.400 a truly great nation building project. They embraced the spirit of radical free enterprise and rugged

00:03:28.800 individualism. They understood that prosperity was not a handout, but a harvest, a direct result of

00:03:35.520 hard work and thrift and a commitment to family and community. And keep in mind, we've only been a

00:03:41.280 established as a province since 1905. So a lot of the growth and development happened here over 120

00:03:47.520 years. And that's part of, again, I think the reason why we have a little bit of a different founding

00:03:52.000 story than the conservatives that go further east. It's the pioneer spirit that is not a historical

00:03:59.040 footnote. It is a living, breathing part of our identity. It is the grit and innovation you see in our

00:04:05.360 entrepreneurs every single day. And these values, fiscal responsibility, limited government and

00:04:10.400 individual liberty are the very values that allowed the west to flourish. They're the reason why Alberta

00:04:16.560 is and always will be the economic engine of Canada. We have always known that low taxes and a focus on

00:04:22.880 reducing red tape are the most effective ways to create jobs and grow our economy. It's just a matter of

00:04:28.080 common sense. We are a province that proves that pro-growth, low tax, free market policies are the

00:04:35.040 path to prosperity. This, yeah, it is.

00:04:42.480 And this prairie conservatism has always been about more than just numbers on a balance sheet. It is

00:04:47.280 about a fundamental belief in the dignity of every individual and the power of communities to solve

00:04:53.280 their own problems. It's about building a society where people are free not only to succeed but are

00:04:58.080 also encouraged to help one another when times get tough. We are a strong and free people and we

00:05:04.240 always stick together. The historical roots of these values run deep. The people who settled here

00:05:09.920 faced immense challenges, harsh winters, vast distances and a complete lack of infrastructure.

00:05:15.520 They had to be self-reliant but they also had to work together and this balance between individual

00:05:21.040 strength and community cooperation is the essence of prairie conservatism. It is a belief that the

00:05:26.640 government's role is not to be a master but to be a partner, to get out of the way so people can

00:05:32.640 build their businesses, their farms and their communities and take care of their families.

00:05:36.720 Today, as we face new challenges, we have to go back to these foundational values. We have to

00:05:41.200 continue to advocate for our people. We have to ensure that our industries from energy to agriculture

00:05:47.120 to the new industries and technology are free to innovate and compete on the global stage.

00:05:52.080 We are a nation-building province and we must ensure we continue to build for the good of all

00:05:56.640 Canadians. There have always been those who oppose free enterprise, who stand in the way of innovation

00:06:02.560 and the standards of freedom and self-determination. They would rather choose winners in the name of a

00:06:07.280 narrow and limited ideology that villainizes outsiders and preaches against prosperity. And the last 10 years

00:06:14.160 have made that more evident than ever. If you didn't see the video that I released earlier this week,

00:06:19.680 let me highlight some key points that I made there. We all know that Canada is suffering right now with

00:06:25.040 its economy. The last few years have brought an unprecedented inflation crisis, high unemployment,

00:06:30.080 declining GDP, plummeting productivity and hundreds of billions in capital investment that has fled out

00:06:36.160 Canada for other countries. A massive and unsustainable federal deficit and of course the U.S.

00:06:42.720 tariff threat, which has exposed just how dependent we are on one single country for the vast majority 0.99

00:06:48.880 of our exports. It has been an extremely difficult period and many don't seem to want to even recognize

00:06:54.880 that there is a problem. But the good news is that with a few simple policy changes the federal

00:07:00.160 government could meaningfully reverse these trends. They could create hundreds of thousands of jobs, 0.80

00:07:05.680 attract back hundreds of billions of dollars in investment, bolster GDP growth, diversify our trade

00:07:12.560 markets and create new revenue streams for federal and provincial budgets, all without the

00:07:17.120 investment of new tax dollars. All that is standing in the way of that is some common sense and,

00:07:24.080 must be said, a bit of courage by our Prime Minister.

00:07:31.920 Because more than a century and a half after those prairie homesteaders came to our land, one thing is

00:07:36.800 still true. You see, Canada has become, has among the largest supply of valuable natural resources on

00:07:43.840 earth. On a per person basis, our endowment of natural resources far exceeds China and Europe and

00:07:49.920 Russia and even the United States. And it's not even that close. We have incredibly fertile lands and

00:07:55.600 oceans, unmatched supplies of timber, uranium and potash, a treasure trove of critical minerals in every

00:08:01.360 province and every territory. And here in Alberta, we literally live on top of a trillion, more than a

00:08:09.120 trillion barrels of oil and more than a quadrillion cubic feet of natural gas. These oil and gas

00:08:14.880 resources represent an incalculable tens of trillions of dollars of potential wealth for our country if we

00:08:21.920 would just develop it. And if we do, that means hundreds of thousands of new great paying jobs, hundreds

00:08:26.880 of billions in taxes and royalties that could be used for government services and infrastructure

00:08:31.760 and potentially trillions more in all of the spinoff industries that can develop like AI data

00:08:37.280 centres and petrochemicals, environmental technology and a host of other industries that would benefit

00:08:43.280 profoundly from the wealth generated from its development. But for the past 10 years, the federal

00:08:49.040 government led by Justin Trudeau put in place a series of laws and regulations designed to target

00:08:54.160 and phase out of existence Canada's largest economic sector, oil and gas. I know that in Ontario,

00:09:00.880 they think the auto sector is the largest industry. It's not. It's oil and gas. We have about 150

00:09:07.280 billion dollars worth of oil and gas exports that go back and forth across to the United States.

00:09:14.400 But first, how did they do this? They made new pipelines virtually impossible to build through the 0.67

00:09:19.440 passage of the unconstitutional C-69. We call it the no new pipelines bill. It had so much

00:09:24.080 confusion and uncertainty and red tape that Canada earned a reputation as one of the very worst places

00:09:29.600 to invest in the world. They didn't stop there though. The Liberals then specifically targeted what

00:09:35.440 is possibly the most valuable single deposit of natural resources anywhere and that's the Alberta

00:09:40.960 oil sands. They completely banned all oil tankers off the northwest BC coast, effectively landlocking a

00:09:48.240 multi-trillion dollar asset that would have enriched the lives of Canadians for generations. And then to cap it

00:09:52.800 off, the federal government announced an impossible to achieve oil and gas emissions cap or more

00:09:58.480 accurately a production cap that makes new oil and gas production effectively impossible. And if they

00:10:06.000 stay with the stringency they're proposing would mean we would have to shut in up to 2 million barrels

00:10:11.760 of production by 2035. So the funny thing about this particular emissions cap is that it wasn't imposed on

00:10:18.000 any other type of production. It wasn't put on aluminum, it wasn't put on cement, it wasn't put on

00:10:24.400 steel. The cap was placed on just one single sector, oil and gas. The conference board of Canada just

00:10:30.560 released a report, as I mentioned, that not only would the cap cost the Alberta economy roughly one

00:10:36.400 trillion dollars in GDP, 150,000 jobs and 200 billion in provincial revenues by 2050 but it would also

00:10:44.000 impact federal fortunes too. No other nation would ever think to do what Canada has done in the last

00:10:50.240 decade and phase out its most valuable assets worth tens of trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands

00:10:55.120 of jobs for people. But there is one silver lining to these economic challenges. I think Canadians right

00:11:00.080 across the nation are waking up to what has happened. We are now starting to understand that we have only been

00:11:06.240 hurting ourselves. We are far too economically dependent on one customer and if we want to be

00:11:11.920 economically prosperous and independent again we have to take advantage of the incredible endowment

00:11:18.080 of resources that we enjoy. And it wouldn't take a whole lot to get that started either. I have often

00:11:24.640 talked about the nine bad laws but let me just tell you the three that he could get started on right away

00:11:31.760 that would immediately turn our nation's economic fortunes around. First, announcing that Canada would no longer

00:11:37.440 be implementing the oil and gas production cap. That would send a clear signal that Canada wants to expand

00:11:44.160 oil and gas production and reduce emissions through technology and innovation rather than by capping

00:11:49.920 resource development. Second thing, we would like them to announce that Canada will be repealing the oil tanker ban this fall.

00:11:56.480 The federal government can then work with BC and Alberta and Indigenous leaders to build a new resource corridor

00:12:02.320 and bitumen pipeline to ports in the northwest BC coast to access new markets in Asia which is where the greatest

00:12:09.360 growth opportunity lies. And third, announce an overhaul of the C-69 no new pipelines law. And I erase these topics in this

00:12:17.840 context today for one reason. That the spirit that united our nation from Tofino to Charlottetown would not exist

00:12:26.400 under the rhetoric and ideology that has prevailed over the last decade in this nation.

00:12:32.640 The nation that truly

00:12:39.200 the nation that built railroads across a continent could not have happened under the last 10 years.

00:12:45.520 The Somme, Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele, the liberation of the Netherlands.

00:12:49.840 Those victories came from a belief in the natural freedoms of Canada and the strength of our values.

00:13:01.280 And we need to find that again. We need to restore the spirit of the homesteaders.

00:13:05.680 We need to remember the farmers and the miners and the fishermen. The builders of railroads and the navies and

00:13:11.280 the warriors who looked apocalypse in the face.

00:13:20.080 And stood firm.

00:13:20.960 I am incredibly optimistic about the future of Alberta and Canada.

00:13:34.080 We have a resilient economy, a hardworking population,

00:13:37.520 and a shared commitment to building a prosperous future for generations to come.

00:13:44.560 With that, let's get into a good conversation.

00:13:47.040 Good to see you again, Premier.

00:13:59.600 Nice to see you.

00:14:01.600 Nice to see you.

00:14:03.520 Belated happy 120th birthday to you. You're looking great.

00:14:08.960 That's for all of you. That's not for Premier Smith.

00:14:12.880 Big celebration though. This is important.

00:14:14.560 It is important. You know, as I was going around to all...

00:14:18.240 It's very interesting that our birthday, September 1st, happened to fall on Labor Day.

00:14:22.560 I saw you get some flack for that on social media.

00:14:25.760 But you know what? It actually is very telling because I don't think that there is a harder working

00:14:31.040 people than the people of Alberta. And so we were able to tie those two together.

00:14:35.360 It was a really good celebration. And it also...

00:14:38.560 It capped off... I was at a rodeo. It kind of capped off the rodeo summer.

00:14:44.400 And when you think about why do we celebrate rodeo? Well, it's fun to do.

00:14:47.600 We get to dress up as cowboys. We get to be able to enjoy some incredible competitive athletes.

00:14:52.400 But it also harkens back to those Western values that I was talking about.

00:14:57.360 We celebrate our Western values every single year. And it reminds us that we are different.

00:15:02.720 We are special. And those same values, they just build into every person who comes here

00:15:07.440 and wants to make a living and build a business and be wealth creators and job creators.

00:15:11.280 So that celebration is really important.

00:15:15.520 Last time you and I did one of these fireside chats, it was in Ottawa.

00:15:19.360 I opened up by asking you, how does it feel to be a trader?

00:15:22.720 Because that's what people were calling, Premier Smith. I think wrongly, and I told you that at the time.

00:15:27.760 Now I'd like to ask you what it's like to have all the people calling you a trader adopt your

00:15:33.280 recommendations, your policies. Your policies that got you called that are now in vogue.

00:15:38.640 Well, isn't the left funny, Hayme? That when a conservative politician says something,

00:15:43.680 it's outrageous. But when the Liberal Prime Minister says something,

00:15:47.040 oh my goodness, what a statesman. Isn't he being very reasonable in how he's approaching Donald

00:15:52.960 Trump? Well, absolutely right. So I just can't believe that you have to tell me how the Eastern

00:15:58.640 Liberal media is able to do those kinds of mental gymnastics that they're able to completely go 0.78

00:16:04.080 a 180 when the party that they tend to be aligned with says something. But they're

00:16:09.600 immediately out there trying to criticize the conservative for saying the same.

00:16:13.280 Very similar to you speaking to Ben Shapiro, which I thought was very smart. You went down to Florida,

00:16:19.520 talked to Ben Shapiro, and then, oh, what happened the next day? He's speaking to his audience of 9,

00:16:24.400 10 million people, telling them that the tariffs on Canada are a really bad idea and this shouldn't

00:16:28.880 be happening. But you were pilloried for that. The Liberal Cabinet was supposed to hear from the

00:16:34.160 President of the Heritage Foundation and the guy behind Project 2025 this week. And CBC described that in

00:16:39.920 the most, well, very nice tones. Isn't this smart? Well, we met with the Heritage Foundation

00:16:47.200 when Donald Trump first got elected because we knew that the Heritage Foundation was one of many

00:16:52.320 different influential groups on him. And we wanted to understand what kind of policies he was advocating

00:16:58.000 to see if there was some way that we could frame our, the way our talking points and our interests in

00:17:03.200 terms of the U.S. President's interests. But you probably also saw that they had to hire a high-priced

00:17:09.600 consultant to teach them how to talk to Republicans. Well... But they were all Democrats.

00:17:13.680 Well, this is the absurdity, I think, of what we see at the federal level. They were so in the bag for the

00:17:19.600 Democrats that they didn't bother reaching out to find out who the Republicans were. I can tell you,

00:17:24.640 we have a tremendous Washington office. It was led by James Rajat, now led by Nathan Cooper. And our approach has

00:17:31.200 always been, you got to talk to the Democrats because if the White House has a Democrat in,

00:17:38.480 they pull from the governors and the House of Representatives and the Senate from their side

00:17:43.440 of the aisle. So you've got to meet all those guys. And then same in the reverse. You have to know who

00:17:47.840 the future secretaries are going to be. They have not done any of that work in the United States at the

00:17:54.640 embassy level. And so now they're playing catch up. Whereas I was on the air at the same time you were

00:18:00.240 through Trump One. And so I spent a lot of time studying this guy. I spent a lot of time trying to

00:18:05.120 understand why he does the things that he does. I read his book. I read Lighthizer's book. I even

00:18:10.160 read a little bit about his favorite president, McKinley, so that I could understand what it is that he's

00:18:14.560 trying to achieve. And that's far, far more powerful. Part of the reason I also talked to Ben Shapiro's audience

00:18:20.640 is that I wanted them to stop talking as if Canada wanted to be the 51st state. And so

00:18:28.160 I don't know if it got reported. They have gotten into trouble. These are people who flew across the

00:18:33.200 country to go to this Purdue, is it Purdue? Prager University. Prager University event. So these are

00:18:41.200 some of the most well-heeled supporters of the Republican movement. And I said, do you know what

00:18:47.280 happens if Canada joins? You have just added another California and there will never be another

00:18:52.320 Republican in the White House. What are you thinking? And I think that the calls for us to

00:18:58.240 become the 51st state ended up subsiding quite a bit after that. But you know, then it was okay,

00:19:03.920 well does Alberta want to join? And you know what I say? I say, I do not want to trade an overbearing 1.00

00:19:09.680 government in Ottawa for an overbearing government in Washington. Let's not forget,

00:19:13.440 let's not forget that as bad as Justin Trudeau was, Keystone XL was also cancelled five seconds

00:19:21.600 after Joe Biden got elected as the Democrat president. So we have to make sure that we're

00:19:27.360 asserting our economic case regardless of who is in the White House and regardless of who is

00:19:32.560 in Ottawa. But I just wanted to let you know that was also one of the other reasons is that what I

00:19:36.480 realized with Trump is he is going to be influenced by the people who give his party money, who are his

00:19:43.760 supporters, who are his job creators. He's not going to be influenced by me going and saying,

00:19:48.480 oh poor me, you're going to hurt my businesses. That is not the way to talk to him. The way you talk

00:19:53.120 to him is you talk in terms of mutual interest and most importantly in the American interest. And

00:19:57.280 there's a lot of American interest in maintaining their economic ties with Canada, but Alberta in

00:20:02.160 particular. In terms of diversifying, I think repealing Bill C-69 is vital. You've long called

00:20:14.800 for that, but in your video this week you said, amend it. Are you softening the language or is there

00:20:20.560 a reasoning behind that? What's the thinking? I think it probably should be a repeal and replace

00:20:26.480 because the reality is that the federal government does have the regulatory oversight over cross-border

00:20:34.880 pipelines and cross-border transmission lines. So you can't just leave a vacuum. You can't just

00:20:39.680 have no regulation, but you need to have smart regulation. There's a whole section that needs

00:20:43.520 to be repealed where they deign to step in and tell us how to approve projects that are 100 percent within

00:20:49.680 our own borders. That part can be repealed, but they need to revise how they do the regulatory process

00:20:55.920 for how they do cross-border assessments. Because do you remember, like you probably know some of

00:21:01.280 the details on that. Like they were asking, there was a whole conversation about being able to do a

00:21:07.040 gender analysis to make sure that man camps did not have a disproportionate impact on women. And I think

00:21:13.040 there was some sort of intersectionality issue about whether or not it was inclusive enough. And like

00:21:17.920 a pipeline is a technical decision-making process that you have to do. There's no gender to a pipeline, 0.74

00:21:22.720 unless you're speaking French. That's true. In French, everything has a gender. So that's why it 0.98

00:21:29.360 would have to be revised, because there are some substantial sections that are going to be extremely

00:21:35.760 problematic because they're so subjective. They have to get back to a technical analysis of doing

00:21:41.520 these things and remove the ideology out of them and then get out of provincial affairs altogether.

00:21:46.560 So how optimistic are you? You said you're optimistic about Alberta's future, about Canada's future,

00:21:52.560 about Prime Minister Carney working with you. We saw an announcement yesterday that I welcomed on many

00:21:58.080 fronts because he was talking my language. I've said since January 20th, this is not just about tariffs.

00:22:03.840 Get rid of the tariffs tomorrow. We've still got to alter the way our economy runs. Donald Trump is

00:22:09.520 fundamentally altering the global trading system, and we have to adapt. So he was talking about that.

00:22:16.000 He was talking about support for canola. He was, you know, pausing but not scrapping the EV mandate.

00:22:23.200 That's a good start. Are you optimistic that he'll move on the issues that you're raising? You've gone from

00:22:29.280 nine to three. Any hope? We need all nine, but there are certain ones that he has to get started on

00:22:36.560 right away. If we're going to get our bitumen pipeline to the northwest BC coast, you have to

00:22:42.000 have a rewrite of the C-69 policies. You have to get rid of the tanker ban, and you have to get rid

00:22:48.240 of the emissions cap. No point in building a brand new shiny pipeline if you can't encourage your oil

00:22:53.760 producers to fill it. And even if it is filled, you're not allowed to load it on a ship to export it

00:22:58.720 anywhere. Like those are sort of the, those are, I call it the table stakes. Those are the minimum they

00:23:03.920 have to do to at least allow us to get a bitumen pipeline built. And then we have to do the others

00:23:09.440 as well. I wish he had just made the decision not to get rid of the net zero vehicle mandates,

00:23:18.160 because I can tell you, you should all go and talk to your local dealership, because I can tell you,

00:23:23.120 I've talked to one dealership. I don't want to call them out. I just, so I just want you to know,

00:23:28.000 but one dealership has said that they're going to stop selling gasoline and diesel vehicles in January.

00:23:33.840 They're only going to carry EV and hybrids. Another, another dealership is going to. Why?

00:23:41.040 That's how their implementation of the policy. Wow. Yeah, they're going to stop selling. Because

00:23:46.240 remember how it works, right? You have to sell 20% of your vehicles as electric vehicles.

00:23:52.240 So if you can't get the electric vehicle in hybrid inventory, the only way to meet that 20% is to

00:23:57.920 reduce the gas powered diesel vehicles that you're selling. So Alberta buys about 200,000 cars. So

00:24:05.120 we're supposed to, out of nowhere, start buying 40,000 hybrid EVs, right? So if we can't do that,

00:24:11.920 if we only, if we only buy 5,000 hybrid EVs, just do the math on that, it means that they're going to

00:24:17.680 have to reduce the amount of gas powered and diesel vehicles. So don't worry, we're just going back to the

00:24:22.080 old Soviet system where you can just sign up to be able to get your, you know, get your car in 2030

00:24:27.760 and you'll get your dishwasher in 2031, right? What's that old joke? But the plumber's coming

00:24:31.520 in the morning, so you better pick up in the afternoon. Old Reagan joke. But look, by not getting

00:24:38.560 rid of the EV mandate completely, he has not helped the auto industry, which I know is none of your

00:24:45.280 concern too much, but he doesn't help it because it hasn't given them certainty. Your industry needs

00:24:51.920 certainty as well. TC Energy and Enbridge just announced their capital spend for the coming year.

00:24:58.240 Where's it going? US. Yeah. So without certainty, you're not going to get the proponent coming forward

00:25:05.040 and saying, I will, I will back that Northwest pipeline. What do they need to do to give

00:25:13.120 your industry in oil and gas certainty? Well, I can tell you, I think that our industry

00:25:20.000 will always find a way. They always have. Even with the past 10 years of anti-energy policy,

00:25:25.360 somehow after all of the other pipeline proposals had fallen and Kinder Morgans was the last one and

00:25:31.440 they were about to pull out, finally they were motivated to act, bought the pipeline, built it at

00:25:37.200 five times the cost the private sector would have. And at least it got built. But that was a failure

00:25:44.800 process in my view. If that's the only way to get a pipeline built in this country, we have not learned

00:25:49.440 anything. But what our industry does is they look at existing lines and they say, how can I twin that?

00:25:54.800 How can I loop it? How can I use compression? How can I put new lubricants in there to be able to get

00:25:58.960 more volume? And they keep on doing that. So some of these American projects are actually going to

00:26:04.400 help with Canadian production if we get rid of the emissions cap. I've seen at least two million

00:26:10.960 barrels per day of egress proposals that would bring more down to the United States. And so I suppose that

00:26:16.880 would be the path of least resistance is just working with the Americans.

00:26:19.680 But that's still selling at a discount.

00:26:21.680 I would say it's worse than that. It's actually allowing, because what happens is they buy it at

00:26:29.360 low price, it gets down all the way to the Gulf Coast, and then some trader packages up and sells

00:26:33.520 it to somebody else for a higher price. And we're not the ones getting the value of that. But it doesn't

00:26:37.520 do anything to help us diversify markets. And this whole exercise we're going through is not to become

00:26:43.120 more dependent on our US neighbour, it's to be able to find new markets. And the only way to do that

00:26:49.440 is you have to be able to build to the BC coast to be able to access those markets.

00:26:53.440 You had, last time I saw you was here at Stampede, and the next day you had Premier Ford standing next

00:27:00.080 to you. I know that you've had other premiers step forward and say, show Alberta love,

00:27:04.000 which was Premier Ford's message. How important is it for you and your province as you advocate with

00:27:10.960 the federal government to be able to point to those other premiers, like you did at COF,

00:27:15.120 or the polling that's come out recently, and say, look, the country is behind us, you have,

00:27:22.080 you can spend the political capital.

00:27:23.840 And I think both of those are important. We did some polling, and I wrote a letter to each of my

00:27:29.760 premiers to tell them what the support for pipeline development was in their province. And it's above 70%

00:27:36.720 in every province, with the exception of Quebec, where it's still 58%. So it is still a majority there. So that,

00:27:43.360 I think, is influential, because that then gives the premiers, they can be emboldened to be able to

00:27:48.960 push the envelope on some of these things. And each of them are. I mean, look at Tim Houston in Nova

00:27:53.600 Scotia. He reversed the frack ban, and he's talking about developing natural gas. Look at Newfoundland

00:27:58.560 and Labrador. I mean, they've got a number of different projects that they're proposing. Manitoba

00:28:03.520 launched its first gold mine in 15 years. British Columbia has sort of a golden triangle of six or seven

00:28:10.080 mines that they want to develop. So every single province, even the left-wing ones, are looking at

00:28:15.200 ways that they can develop resources, develop new revenue streams, get new jobs. So I would say that

00:28:20.400 it's been very influential to not only have the people say, we're prepared to do this, but to also

00:28:26.480 have the premiers look at it from their own interest. Because the C69, although we call it the No New 0.91

00:28:32.240 Pipelines Bill, is also the No New Mining Bill. And that's part of the reason why Doug's so frustrated.

00:28:36.960 It's got this beautiful opportunity in Ring of Fire. And yet he's got this convoluted process that

00:28:42.320 we'll never see a mine developed unless they streamline it. The Feds were blocking that for

00:28:47.520 two years. So, okay, we've still got a couple minutes left. Good. I wanted to ask you about

00:28:55.040 the, you mentioned that it's not placed on, the emissions cap is not placed on any other industry.

00:29:01.120 I spoke to a gentleman in Toronto who owns a cement company now, and he was telling me about

00:29:06.800 the impact of the industrial carbon tax. So they still got that. He said, a ton of cement creates

00:29:14.400 a ton of greenhouse gas emissions. So your cement is just going to keep getting more expensive due to

00:29:19.120 the industrial carbon tax. But what would that do if you put the emissions cap on all these other

00:29:25.360 industries? We'd have to stop building concrete buildings, wouldn't we? Completely. Well, they'd have to

00:29:29.840 find a way to abate. And if not, they'd shut in. You'd have to. Like there's, if you put an arbitrary

00:29:35.040 emissions cap in, which they have here, which says that you've got to be, I think, like 40% abated by

00:29:40.000 2030 and then 60% abated by 2035. If you can't reach those targets, it's just like what we're talking

00:29:46.400 about with the net zero cars. If you can't build enough net zero cars, then you just have to reduce

00:29:52.160 the amount of gas and diesel power cars that you sell. If you can't produce enough net zero cement,

00:29:57.040 then you have to reduce the amount of CO2-laden cement that you produce. And so that's a spiral

00:30:03.360 downward. So we're getting very close to them having to realize reality. We're realizing reality

00:30:11.040 here in Alberta. And if you look at Newfoundland and Labrador, look at the jobs numbers that just came

00:30:15.120 out in the last week. Who are the two provinces most impacted? Alberta and Newfoundland and Labrador

00:30:22.240 are two oil and gas rich jurisdictions. So we have already, we are already experiencing

00:30:28.720 the results of the last 10 years. Every other jurisdiction is not that far behind us.

00:30:34.880 When you look at if we had gotten Northern Gateway built and Energy East and Keystone XL,

00:30:41.600 we would be producing 2.5 million barrels of oil more per day, which would be generating $55 billion

00:30:48.240 in GDP for our economy, of which the various levels of government get 40%. You can buy, you can fill your

00:30:56.640 NATO commitment with that money. You can make sure that you've got schools and hospitals and roads

00:31:01.760 for that money. And if you don't have a new source of revenue, you just can't keep on borrowing forever

00:31:06.400 as we're seeing. Back in April, you told me that the drop in the price of oil and all the other

00:31:11.120 headwinds was going to result in a $5 billion deficit for your budget. That was your prediction

00:31:17.360 then. It was $7 billion. It's going to be... So how much money are... Well, I'll say last year,

00:31:24.080 because oil and gas prices did help us out, we also got more production to market. We ended up with

00:31:29.760 an $8.3 billion surplus. We were only expecting $300 million. So that's the good news of what happens when

00:31:34.320 you have that volatility. But when it goes down on the other end, we were expecting oil to be 68

00:31:39.280 this year. It's not hit 68 very many days in the first quarter. And so if it continues on at this

00:31:45.360 rate... For Western Canadian select, it's at about what? It's about $10 to $11. There's a differential.

00:31:52.080 So you can normally price off what is WTI and then reduce it by $10 or $11. So we've been trending

00:31:57.280 around $11 less than WTI. But if it continues at what we've seen in this first quarter, we're actually

00:32:02.960 going to have a $6.5 billion deficit this year. So oil and gas... And then the Feds lose out as

00:32:08.240 well, right? Of course they do. Because if those companies are not profitable, the Feds get their

00:32:12.800 money from the corporate income taxes paid and the personal income taxes from the people who work in

00:32:17.360 the industry. And they charge at much higher rates than we do. That's why we get our dollars from

00:32:21.120 royalties. They get our dollars from corporate and personal income tax revenue. They're roughly equivalent,

00:32:26.560 but they're just cutting themselves off when they cut off Alberta. And the other way of looking at it is

00:32:31.920 everybody does well when Alberta does well. And Alberta has been historically happy to share the

00:32:36.480 wealth. But what makes Albertans resentful is when we hear Eastern Canadian provincial premiers say,

00:32:42.560 we don't want you to develop your resources, but keep sending us the money because we want

00:32:45.840 the equalization. That is part of the frustration that we have.

00:32:54.240 Last question for you and then we'll let people get to lunch. I'll circle back to pipelines.

00:32:59.040 Is Churchill realistic for you, for oil and gas, for either liquefied natural gas

00:33:04.480 or for oil exports? Because that's one that the Prime Minister seems to be willing to talk about.

00:33:08.720 It is. You know, I don't want to discount the latest icebreaker technology because I know that

00:33:15.680 Russia's very heavily invested. I think they've got 30 icebreakers. So they have managed to use those to

00:33:21.120 be able to get their product to market. We have none. I think the Americans have one and it caught on fire

00:33:25.840 a few months ago. So that gives you some idea. That's not good. How far behind we are. But it's

00:33:30.480 our responsibility to be able to police and defend our north. And so I think that there's a good,

00:33:37.360 there's sort of good synergy between the economic interest we have and the defense imperatives that

00:33:42.480 we have. So it could be useful, but there needs to be infrastructure built to be able to do that.

00:33:46.320 So I think Churchill or slightly south because Churchill is also a tourism town. And so they may,

00:33:52.720 there is actually another little spinoff line that you could go that is just a port that is slightly

00:33:56.880 further south. But it is also deep water and they could do platforms there. And so we want to talk

00:34:03.200 with the Premier to see what corridors make the most sense. But for sure, if you were able to build new

00:34:09.840 rail infrastructure, highway infrastructure, port infrastructure, a gas pipeline, a bitumen pipeline,

00:34:17.200 and have the icebreakers to be able to make sure that you could have that exported more than six

00:34:22.880 months a year, because I think it freezes over in November and doesn't thaw until May, that's the

00:34:27.840 consideration. Is a six-month transit route going to be economic for anyone to do that? Or does the

00:34:34.400 icebreakers make it a 12-month transit route? And if that's the case, yes. Because then you go up and

00:34:38.720 over to Europe and you can go up and over to the East Coast. So now you can start feeding the East Coast

00:34:43.920 refinery so they don't have to import from Saudi Arabia and Venezuela and other places. So I would

00:34:50.240 say that both of those are viable options. Going all the way, the proposal from Energy East,

00:34:57.440 maybe not so much. When I talk to the industry and they look at the economics, they say the very

00:35:04.320 first priority would be going to the northwest BC coast. But we still have to figure out what the

00:35:10.080 economics look like for Churchill. All right. Despite some headwinds, I'm with you. I'm optimistic for

00:35:15.520 Alberta's future and Canada's future. Premier, thanks so much. Thanks, Brian.

00:35:32.400 Thank you.

00:35:35.840 Thank you.

00:35:37.840 Thank you.

00:35:39.840 Thank you.

Western Standard - September 09, 2025

Danielle Smith talks prairie values, pipelines, and Alberta’s path to prosperity

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