Pumpjack in Drayton Valley, Alberta. (By Achim Raschka/ Licensed under CC-by-SA-4.0)
The forming of a Liberal-NDP alliance to support Liberals on confidence votes until 2025 is raising concerns from prairie premiers over the partnership’s potential threat to Canada’s oil and gas industry.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the agreement on March 22, after his government secured the support of the NDP in exchange for progress on issues such as an increase in health care spending, establishing national pharma care and dental plans, and climate change policies–including to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney said the coalition is “terrible news” for Albertans, particularly those working in the oil and gas sector, due to the NDP’s anti-pipeline stance.
“[The] agreement to keep Justin Trudeau in power through 2025 being backstopped by the anti-oil and gas NDP—this is bad news for Alberta, there’s no sugarcoating it,” he said in a video posted on Twitter on March 22.
“A party that is committed to shutting down Canada’s largest industry, to put hundreds of thousands of working Canadians out of work in that sector.”
Adding to the Liberal government’s upcoming carbon tax hike on April 1–which will increase the price of gas, groceries, and other household essentials–the Liberal-NDP coalition would worsen already skyrocketing inflation rates due to the combined influence of both parties’ energy policies, Kenney said.
His remarks were echoed by Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe, who also voiced concerns about the alliance’s impact on Canada’s pipeline projects.
“Canadians can’t afford three more years of a federal government focused on ending pipeline projects, destroying jobs and raising the carbon tax,” Moe wrote in a Twitter post on March 22.
Last June, the Liberal government passed legislation Bill C-12, which set a target for Canada to reach net-zero carbon emissions by the year 2050.
However, the NDP says that policy isn’t bold enough, and it would rather set a target of reducing emissions by at least 50 percent from 2005 levels by 2030. The party is also committed to establishing a multi-year national and sectoral carbon budget to reach that goal while creating a Climate Accountability Office to provide oversight on federal progress.
Kenney also noted that the new coalition would impede Alberta’s ability to promote its energy industry around the world.
“That is now more important than ever with the outrageous invasion of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin demonstrating the need for a sane global energy policy that displaces dictator and conflict oil from responsibly produced energy from right here in Alberta,” he said.
“We’ll be redoubling our efforts to work with allies in the United States and across the Canadian provinces to defend our economy, to defend consumers, from this out-of-control inflation and to stand up to the Liberal-NDP coalition in Ottawa.”
