Can Ottawa suddenly ban oil and gas exports to the U.S.?
Alberta government officials were locked on that crucial question Monday.
This country sells $146 billion worth of oil and gas to the U.S. each year. Most of it ships from Alberta.
Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly said on the weekend that cutting shipments by federal order is “on the table” for the looming Trump tariff war.
The Canadian Energy Regulator, a federal body, does have legislative authority over exports and could refuse to authorize shipments. Alberta would take that to court in a flash.
Suddenly, many Albertans might wonder who’s the worse problem — president-elect Donald Trump, or the tattered federal Liberals in their dying days.
And maybe not just them. Even Ontario PC Premier Doug Ford says he wants to keep the option of an export cut on energy and critical minerals.
Premier Danielle Smith was fierce about this during a news conference Monday.
“First of all, it’s oil and gas,” she said.
“It’s owned by the provinces, principally Alberta, and we won’t stand for that.”
She said shipping cuts are a ludicrous idea because that would also deprive Ontario and Quebec.
“I would encourage the minister to look at a map of where Line 5 goes.
“Line 5 comes down through Michigan to get to Sarnia, and then that feeds the bulk of the supply needed for Ontario, and connects with Line 9, which feeds the bulk of the product needed for Quebec.
“And so if you cut off that line, you are cutting off Ontario and Quebec.”
She called Joly’s notion an “empty threat.”
But there’s no telling how the desperate Liberals might use the industry as both weapon and scapegoat. It’s hardly their favourite sector.
The Liberals, Smith said, “will have a national unity crisis on their hands at the same time as having a crisis with our U.S. trade partners.
“We just won’t stand for that. And I don’t think Ontario and Quebec should stand for that.”
She stressed how “irritating” a ban on shipping to the U.S. would be after “eastern” politicians blocked both the Energy East and Northern Gateway projects, denying Alberta access to key markets in Europe and Asia.
On the larger issue of U.S. tariffs, it’s clear that a hard day for Canada is in store next Monday when Trump is inaugurated.
“I think we need to be prepared that tariffs are coming,” Smith said. “No, I’m not expecting any exemptions.”
The best she got from the president-elect at Mar-a-Lago, it seems, was a polite listen to her plea for more tariff-free oil and gas exports to the U.S.
The premier looked tired and a bit discouraged during a virtual news conference.
She did not hear anything to indicate Trump was backing away from his pledge of 25 per cent tariffs.
President Joe Biden’s inauguration day in 2021 brought instant cancellation of the Keystone pipeline project.
That was a blow to Alberta but had little effect elsewhere.
Today, all signs are that Trump’s Day 1 will be much worse for this entire country.
Smith has tried to take Alberta’s and Canada’s no-tariff message to the U.S. She’s become a fixture on TV news shows. She realizes that in a crisis, the best strategy is to make friends, not enemies.
She went to Mar-a-Lago with economic union booster Kevin O’Leary and had personal talks with Trump.
She may have as much access to senior people in the States as any Canadian leader.
But her diplomatic offensive could get risky. NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi hit the point Monday when he praised Smith’s efforts but added “the danger in freelancing is that Alberta becomes isolated, irrelevant or, worse, used as a pawn in a bigger game.”
Maybe the best advice regarding Mar-a-Lago is the famous line from the poet Dante: “Abandon hope all ye who enter here.”
He was talking about the gates of hell. Mar-a-Lago starts to look like purgatory for a Canadian politician.
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald