Western Standard - HANNAFORD： Carney comes a-courting Alberta but it's all flirt, no commitment

00:00:00.000 Good evening, Western Standard viewers, and welcome to Hannaford, a weekly politics show.

00:00:21.300 It is Thursday, February the 19th. Our guest tonight is Erika Baroutes.

00:00:26.540 Our subject, whether Ottawa intentionally sets up Alberta to fail for readily observable partisan goals.

00:00:35.260 Ms. Baroutes is no stranger to the program.

00:00:37.720 She is the Department Head of Applied Politics and Public Affairs at Macamie College.

00:00:43.580 An Alberta Senator-elect, the founding president of the United Conservative Party.

00:00:48.400 And I think it's fair to say that when you call the Premier's office, you get a call back, right?

00:00:54.300 I would sure hope so.

00:00:56.540 Erika, welcome to the show.

00:01:00.540 Thank you for having me.

00:01:02.160 Tonight, we're exploring a crazy, wild-eyed proposition that makes everything that makes life hard in Alberta starts in Ottawa.

00:01:09.700 Three things.

00:01:10.640 One, there's the pipeline upon which so many revenue hopes are riding, but which, because of Ottawa's demand for green conditions, may never get built.

00:01:18.880 Secondly, there's the impossible Ottawa demand that by 2050, Alberta must have a net-neutral energy grid.

00:01:27.020 Impossible because of the third thing, population growth driven by Ottawa.

00:01:32.060 It was challenging enough when there were three million Albertas, which is what the population here was only five years ago, in July 2000.

00:01:41.140 Check it out with Statistics Canada.

00:01:43.660 Now there are more than five million people living here.

00:01:47.080 That's the insane population growth that Premier Smith is talking about now, and it's not slowing down.

00:01:54.760 You see the effects in schools, in the health services.

00:01:57.960 You might even see it soon with energy security.

00:02:01.400 Providing power for an extra two million people in five years, when you're looking at 10 years to get approvals to even start building something, is incredible.

00:02:10.520 So we're going to talk about that, and meanwhile, we have a globalist prime minister who wants to cut ties with America, Alberta's biggest customer.

00:02:19.100 He's a proponent of global financial cooperation, climate-focused finance reform.

00:02:25.400 Economically, he's a Keynesian, and there's no problem borrowing money, and he's a liberal, and Alberta is almost 100% conservative.

00:02:33.720 I think we've got plenty to talk about.

00:02:35.300 But Erica, before we get into that, Matt Jenneru crossed the floor yesterday.

00:02:42.940 Now, I think you've got some history with Mr. Jenneru, do you not?

00:02:48.220 I do.

00:02:49.620 So I'm not going to call it crossing the floor.

00:02:52.020 I'm going to call it unresigning his resign seat that he talked about in November.

00:02:57.580 So he was not only crossing a floor to the Liberals, a party that has never been elected in Edmonton Riverbend, but also that he, like, undid his resignation that he put out in November, stating that he wanted to spend and focus more time on his family.

00:03:15.940 Maybe his family was like, no, we're good.

00:03:17.720 You just go back.

00:03:18.520 And then he decided, you know, what else could I do as a dumpster fire?

00:03:23.160 Oh, I'll just cross to the Liberals.

00:03:24.680 So my history with him is actually Matt Jenneru, his wife and I, actually all worked together at the legislature in, I think, 2011.

00:03:33.200 He then ran as an MLA for part of the writing in which he now represents as an MP.

00:03:38.820 Under the Progressive Conservative Party, he's been a attendee or supporter of the UCP during my time as president and then has been a member of parliament for the Conservative Party of Canada.

00:03:54.060 So I've known Matt for a long time.

00:03:56.700 The sad thing is, am I surprised he would do something like this?

00:03:59.180 And the answer is no.

00:04:00.460 But I generally just feel very bad for his constituents because this is not what they elected him to do.

00:04:07.400 And he is just, you know, fanboying over Mark Carney and hoping for a better role than he was going to have in Pierre's government.

00:04:17.160 Well, that's.

00:04:19.460 That's all my feelings there.

00:04:21.200 But, yeah, I did work with him.

00:04:22.980 I'm not surprised that he did this, which is also a sad thing to say.

00:04:27.500 Now, OK, we were pretty hard on him yesterday here at the Western Standard.

00:04:31.620 Or maybe I was.

00:04:33.240 But at any rate.

00:04:34.040 He should be.

00:04:34.600 Why should we be hard on him?

00:04:40.920 I just I think this is, you know, one, I wish that if someone wanted to cross the floor, they've got to sit in as an independent or a by-election is is struck.

00:04:50.960 He alluded to having a by-election into stepping down in two months from now and then retracted that because he got a maybe shiny new offer.

00:04:59.680 Or perhaps he thought that maybe his skeletons weren't going to come out of the closet and it was safe to cross the floor now versus November.

00:05:06.080 Who knows?

00:05:06.480 But I do think it's just a very sad thing for democracy.

00:05:10.920 It's a very sad thing for the people of Edmonton Riverbend.

00:05:14.460 There was interest by both the liberals and the conservatives to have a true by-election, which Matt committed to, and then revoked when he felt it was opportunistic for him to do so.

00:05:24.540 You just used the magic word, skeletons.

00:05:28.440 Come on, you can't just leave us hanging.

00:05:30.660 I'm not getting into that.

00:05:31.940 That's not my story to tell.

00:05:34.220 I just think everyone has skeletons.

00:05:38.420 And I think that there was, you know, some apprehension that Matt Jenneru didn't cross the floor under in November.

00:05:46.220 And now why did that change?

00:05:49.100 Either, you know, his family was like, he doesn't even live here anymore.

00:05:53.620 His family lives in Vancouver or in BC.

00:05:56.340 So I don't know how he's going to be an MP here.

00:05:58.620 I guess that's not totally a skeleton, but that is interesting.

00:06:03.280 Look.

00:06:03.740 Well, I'm not giving hot goss here. 0.82

00:06:06.180 I mean, people can go look into it if they want.

00:06:10.260 Exactly.

00:06:10.660 Do you think he actually ever was what we would call a real conservative in the Harper style or the Poirier style?

00:06:18.940 I don't know.

00:06:20.520 I think that he has been maybe more of a progressive conservative, but he did run under many different leaders.

00:06:29.420 He ran under Pierre.

00:06:31.200 So, you know, I find his comments that, like, this isn't the leader I was hoping for.

00:06:37.920 When he's known Pierre his entire political history, Pierre has been consistent with who he is.

00:06:44.260 So I think it's just a cop-out to say that you no longer support the direction of the leader.

00:06:50.340 I think it was more what's in Matt Jenneru's best interest versus what is in the best interest of his constituents and Albertans.

00:06:59.160 And, unfortunately, I think that I can believe by his character.

00:07:04.800 But because, you know, I was a staffer with him.

00:07:08.220 I remember doing some cabinet tours with him and his wife, planning that back in the day.

00:07:14.400 And he then ran.

00:07:15.780 And I think he, I thought he was actually a pretty good MLA under the progressive conservatives.

00:07:24.700 Is he, has he done a lot for Edmonton Riverbend?

00:07:27.540 I mean, that's up to them.

00:07:28.440 They did reelect him, but they reelected him under a very different situation than I think what they're getting now.

00:07:35.180 Okay, well, I guess we'll leave Mr. Jenneru to pay taxes in British Columbia on his family home, at least.

00:07:43.800 And we go ahead and move right now.

00:07:46.240 You know, better off here, notwithstanding the troubles we have.

00:07:49.340 And it's the troubles we have in Alberta, Erica, that we really want to turn our attention now.

00:07:54.920 So you heard the preamble.

00:07:56.720 Well, there's all these things that seem to be stacked up, making it hard for Alberta to do what Alberta wants to do under the leadership of Premier Smith.

00:08:07.520 I'm not sure that it makes that much difference who is Premier of Alberta.

00:08:13.560 It didn't seem to do so when it was Rachel Notley in power, the liberal government.

00:08:19.620 And I'm calling it the liberal government, including the Trudeau years, because there's been a consistency of approach, especially as regards Alberta under the new management.

00:08:31.420 It just seems to be set up to make it difficult for us to succeed, more likely to fail.

00:08:37.200 So do you think the liberals are, in fact, intentionally setting Alberta up to fail, wrapping up our costs by higher immigration? 0.94

00:08:47.420 That's a good question, I would say.

00:08:50.420 Well, there's this too.

00:08:53.480 As they do that, they simultaneously make it harder for us to make money, I mean, through our main industry, oil, to pay those costs.

00:09:01.580 And, you know, is it all a plot to just make it easier to elect liberals here in Alberta?

00:09:09.240 What do you think?

00:09:09.800 So I think it's a good question to ask, because I would say under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the wanting to punish Alberta or do introduce policies that have malicious intent against Alberta and Western Canada is definitely, I would say it was definitely proactive in order to do that.

00:09:38.500 Under Mark Carney, I don't know if it's just lack of policy and politics by him that is trying to do like one step forward that equals two steps back.

00:09:53.940 I mean, he's had no problem kind of poo-pooing his own party's previous policies on some level and wanting to maybe make it appear that he wants to play ball with Alberta or with Western Canada.

00:10:13.160 But it almost is like in spirit or in symbolism rather than actual tangible things.

00:10:21.640 So I think he's in a place where he's going to have to, you know, do the business or get off the pot and pick a lane on is he going to give Alberta and Canada's economic economy what it can do to thrive?

00:10:39.340 Or is he just giving a bunch of falsehoods?

00:10:41.920 I don't think he's doing it maliciously in the same way his predecessor did.

00:10:45.900 But I do think there's some poor policies that if he's truly serious about this, he's going to have to use his constitutional power to make this happen, including access to Tidewater.

00:10:58.820 And it doesn't appear to me that he's wanting to do it.

00:11:01.160 He's wanting to say the right things, but not do the hard work.

00:11:03.480 Okay, well, that's one way of looking at it, all right.

00:11:08.000 You did say that he was not doing it maliciously, but it's possible to do it intentionally, but without malice.

00:11:17.100 Let me just expand on that a moment.

00:11:20.020 What we have here is a prime minister who still holds on to ideas that were fashionable 10, 20, even 50 years ago.

00:11:32.740 He is, for instance, a Keynesian.

00:11:34.660 He believes that the idea is if your economy is under-functioning, then you borrow money.

00:11:40.880 And, you know, they talk about priming a pump.

00:11:43.060 So he believes in that approach.

00:11:45.480 He is also committed to the green philosophy.

00:11:52.020 That has not changed.

00:11:53.400 He laid it out in his book, Values.

00:11:55.200 And although he says, well, yes, we can do the pipelines, they have to contain decarbonized oil, which is oil for which there has been a compensating amount of carbon dioxide buried in the ground.

00:12:11.340 They literally pump it underground.

00:12:12.760 So that's not a good business model.

00:12:17.500 It's extremely costly to do that.

00:12:20.040 And oil is not so expensive that the producers can absorb that cost.

00:12:25.900 So really saying, well, you can do it, but you've got to do it with one hand tied behind your back.

00:12:29.820 And then, of course, other people are going to have a competitive advantage, and you're not going to be able to sell any.

00:12:34.780 So he makes it sound as if he's all for development, but actually it has to be done in such a way that it's unprofitable, and therefore he's not in favor of development.

00:12:46.440 Meanwhile, you pile people in.

00:12:48.940 Let's face it.

00:12:49.640 This is a federal policy that's driving immigration.

00:12:52.640 And I know the premier is talking about it right now.

00:12:56.400 So if you expand the population that much, don't let them make money.

00:13:01.020 You've got a prime minister who's actively working against you, and you're saying he's, well, just am I misunderstanding the man here?

00:13:13.820 No, I think that's a good point on intent versus malice.

00:13:18.500 And I would say, you know, I feel like he's not giving a to our face FU to Alberta like Justin Trudeau did, but he might be actually then worse based on what you're saying is that he's doing it, you know, when we turn around and he's doing it behind our backs.

00:13:36.280 And so I hope that's not the case, but I'm seeing that even you saw this MOU, which I felt was a good symbolic, not, you know, all the tactics and rollout or true progress of moving the needle.

00:13:50.700 I saw the MOU as a great first step, but what we've seen now is actually kind of a pivot in some of his economic or energy policies.

00:14:03.020 I mean, he just got back from China where he's now agreed to significant EV investment.

00:14:11.420 And we've seen then, like, what does that mean?

00:14:13.420 Does he think that that can replace part of the energy mandate that he's been talking about?

00:14:18.940 And I fear that that's the case, that they're going to invest more in the production of EVs and the use of lithium, which we have in Alberta, over the oil and gas sector.

00:14:32.500 And so I think he's a little bit, he's a little bit sneakier, maybe.

00:14:38.300 And I don't know if it's ignorance or corporate strategy that he's used in the past.

00:14:44.900 But it does look like he says more of the things that Alberta wants to hear, but is actually doing as little as Justin Trudeau to move that needle.

00:14:57.220 Example, I mean, he said that they would provide consent, not just consultation to the First Nation coastal tribes that are standing in the way of a new pipeline.

00:15:07.180 And they're looking at, you know, trying to pivot away and look at focus down here where the TMX is, as opposed to up north, where we already have other pipelines that are not oil and gas that we could run along the line.

00:15:22.320 So it seems like he's over-promising and under-delivering, where Justin Trudeau's commitment was just like, I don't like you and I don't care.

00:15:29.700 And I don't know which is worse for Alberta. 0.62

00:15:33.260 Well, I guess I would argue that Mr. Carney's pose is a little worse because he is personable.

00:15:43.340 He comes across well.

00:15:45.080 He seems, as Mr. Trudeau seemed like a teenager who'd stolen the keys of the Ferrari and was doing damage.

00:15:55.600 Mr. Carney does seem like the adult in the room.

00:15:58.880 Can't believe I'm saying this, but he does, you see.

00:16:01.100 But when you are the adult in the room and you lean forward and assure people that we're doing the right thing, there's a tendency for them to believe it, where it was very easy under Mr. Trudeau to realize what the problem was.

00:16:13.140 And it wasn't us, it was him.

00:16:14.720 So now you mentioned the immigration thing really makes it incredibly difficult.

00:16:25.820 We were supposed to have a net neutral grid by 2035.

00:16:31.820 That was Mr. Trudeau's plan.

00:16:33.960 We said it was impossible, which it was.

00:16:36.060 And they probably helped our argument that we had some very cold days when we began to, on the very edge of brownouts.

00:16:45.900 Well, that's when there were 3 million people in Alberta.

00:16:49.040 Now there are 5 million.

00:16:50.740 And although they've been working on building new capacity, they haven't built the new capacity for an extra 2 million people.

00:16:59.480 That takes time.

00:17:01.080 They're working on it.

00:17:02.000 It will happen.

00:17:03.000 But what's the population going to be by then?

00:17:05.320 You keep piling people in.

00:17:07.700 So, you know, we constantly have these weights on our ankles as we try to go jogging.

00:17:14.640 And it is incredibly hard for the government of Alberta.

00:17:20.120 It's incredibly hard for Danielle Smith.

00:17:22.120 But it could be the same with whoever the premier was.

00:17:26.840 You keep getting more piled on you as you're trying to catch up.

00:17:30.680 Now, Mr. Carney has a way of expressing the challenge, which makes you think that perhaps it's all perfectly reasonable in just one of those things.

00:17:41.380 But he has the power to stop it.

00:17:44.460 He can reduce the immigration. 0.99

00:17:47.840 He can, given the challenges that it presents in Alberta, he can forward more money to Alberta.

00:17:55.860 Or he can simply change the rules so that Alberta itself can make more money.

00:18:05.560 But I don't see him doing any of those things.

00:18:07.560 So to your point, perhaps he's the more dangerous character than Mr. Trudeau.

00:18:11.880 And the more I see Mark Carney, the more I feel that way.

00:18:17.080 I wanted to give him a lot of grace in the first several months.

00:18:20.000 He's approaching a year.

00:18:21.200 His training wheels can no longer be used as an excuse.

00:18:25.080 Because I do think he's more strategic.

00:18:28.640 And I think that he's now, like I said, over-promising, under-delivering.

00:18:32.760 To immigration, he acknowledged the problem that I think Justin Trudeau wasn't willing to acknowledge.

00:18:38.580 That we do have basically an open-door immigration policy that needs to be reformed.

00:18:44.080 But when you look at the immigration website under the Government of Canada, their targets that they set for themselves under Mark Carney are being destroyed in Q1 or Q2.

00:18:56.760 Like they're already surpassed what they're saying their levels are.

00:19:00.680 And so it's one thing to say we're going to fix this problem and then really do nothing about it when you have stated you acknowledge the problem and that reform is required.

00:19:10.500 But they're exceeding these numbers.

00:19:12.660 It doesn't seem like they're slowing anything down.

00:19:15.320 I would say Alberta can be a proof point that, you know, 250,000, almost 300,000 new individuals in a year means that since Mark Carney took office and right before at the end of Prime Minister Trudeau's tenure, that they weren't doing anything to fix it.

00:19:31.960 And we were seeing a flood of the individuals that were here having their family members come over and getting quickly processed because there was someone here to vouch for them.

00:19:41.100 And to me, that's even more concerning as the one quick process and to the speed in which that number can grow.

00:19:49.160 So quickly because one person has a family and they're bringing them over and that can go from one individual here to 10 with no safeguards, no guarantee of employment.

00:20:00.780 I think that's the other challenge where a lot of individuals that want to come here want to be able to contribute to the economy.

00:20:07.000 But at this volume and at this lax of policy, we're actually getting people that are using and leaning on the system more than we have people contributing.

00:20:17.300 And absolutely, someone needs to take leadership and drastically reverse this because it's only going to get worse before it can get better.

00:20:25.000 Well, I'm going to just say what I wish Janiel Smith could say, but probably dare not because people would just tell her she was trying to excuse something that wasn't very well performed.

00:20:38.100 But the reforms that she has made in healthcare and in education would, I think, have met her objectives if our population was that three to three and a half million that it was when she took office. 0.73

00:20:54.800 But if you have another million and a half people piled in on top, of course, you're going to find that all the improvements you've made in the way health is administered, the way education is done, are just going to be swallowed up by all the new people here.

00:21:13.340 Do you think she's able to use that reasoning?

00:21:15.900 It's a tough one because I know as she, you know, gives a address to Albertans and we'll talk about the significant influx of population that has crippled some of these systems.

00:21:30.880 I mean, look at some of her policies. I think she's doing it indirectly and I applaud it where she has put putting citizenship on license plates, aligning it with your health card because there's more health card numbers or health numbers out there than there is population.

00:21:49.540 And then that means to me that there's individuals abusing the system or that there's administrative errors that we need to correct.

00:21:56.060 Either way, it's a problem that needs to be addressed. And so by really understanding the impact of what immigration and emigration or migration has on our population is proof points that I think she could use.

00:22:11.940 Just right now, I think that as I sit here and say, yeah, we should prioritize Canadians for employment, we should prioritize Albertans first, we should look at giving our support services to people that are Canadian citizens over people that just moved here.

00:22:28.640 In many circles, you get called a racist for that.

00:22:31.040 It's almost like it's almost like we forget that every color can be an immigrant, but that the left labels it as this is ignorance and tries to compare us or pit us similar to the U.S.

00:22:45.240 And I think that unfortunately that's working, that makes it more difficult for Peter Smith to call a spade a spade.

00:22:51.760 I agree with you. Look, we're almost out of time.

00:22:54.400 Last question. I noticed that in the press, we are still referring to this government led by Mr. Carney as a new government.

00:23:06.040 Now, in actual fact, it's the same government 10 years old who's had a new leader for a year.

00:23:11.320 But even if you say it's a new government, is it still a new government after only a year with Mr. Carney at the helm?

00:23:20.660 How long before we make Mr. Carney accountable for what has happened on his watch or not happened?

00:23:28.520 Well, first off, that's all BS.

00:23:30.660 You didn't see Danielle Smith getting that out and saying it was a new government. 0.94

00:23:34.720 She had to wear everything that happened under the UCP from 2019 onwards.

00:23:39.000 And so I say that that is a media spin by a party that funds you and the CBC driving a narrative that is completely unfair.

00:23:52.400 A year when you have a minority government is like dog years, right?

00:23:57.920 You've got to prove to keep things moving.

00:24:00.040 And in our system, it's legislated that it must happen constitutionally by five years, likely by four for a federal election.

00:24:07.840 Do we really leave training wheels on for one fourth of someone's lifespan?

00:24:12.120 No. So I think it's, you know, since his first budget, I think the newbie card is it should be eliminated.

00:24:21.100 I also think that it should be even faster than that, given that everyone surrounding Mark Carney was part of the previous administration, with the exception of Deebo leaving and Trudeau, right?

00:24:33.380 Patricia Freeland is still getting job offers and finally removing herself.

00:24:39.300 Like all the same actors were there.

00:24:41.480 So I think it's a cop out.

00:24:42.660 I think that it's media spin to give the grace that maybe some of us that even will never agree with Mark Carney gave him in hopes that he could fix Western alienation.

00:24:54.720 But now I just think he courted Alberta in a way that he was never planning to make us go steady with them.

00:25:03.480 Very well.

00:25:04.620 That's an excellent note to end on.

00:25:06.520 Never meant to go steady with Alberta.

00:25:09.020 We'll lead on that.

00:25:10.580 Maybe I'll write an op-ed about it for you guys.

00:25:13.800 Yes.

00:25:14.800 Erica Marute is always a good source on Alberta politics.

00:25:18.680 Thank you for being with us.

00:25:20.360 And for the Western Standard, I'm Nigel Hannaford.

00:25:23.360 Thank you.

00:25:40.580 Thank you.

00:25:40.760 Thank you.

00:25:51.260 Thank you.

Western Standard - February 24, 2026

HANNAFORD： Carney comes a-courting Alberta but it's all flirt, no commitment

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