Alison Redford is driving the agenda for a national energy strategy with a sense of purpose that suggests she intends to succeed.
That’s a good thing (unless the ghost of Pierre Trudeau steers it awry).
The proposal by Alberta’s premier has far-reaching implications for Canadians, both in terms of energy consumption and environmental impact.
At the heart of the initiative is the fact that provinces control decision-making over energy extraction and generation.
And Redford, whose province is the most powerful player in the game, wants a unified front among the provincial and territorial leaders of the country.
“I don’t believe that any province anymore can do its work in isolation,” she told the Edmonton Journal, “because we’re all affected by what other provinces are doing.”
She also wants environmental groups to be part of the process. How much they are willing to play remains to be seen, but they certainly don’t serve themselves or the general public by sniping at the process from the sidelines. The more that environmental groups are involved, the better. They will not succeed in bringing the energy industry to its knees, so they better serve us all if they took every opportunity to influence how resources are both extracted and consumed.
This not a simple undertaking for Redford and her provincial counterparts.
Finding common ground among government, industry and environmental expectations will take more than a little diplomacy, badgering, compromise and trust. And plenty of time.
But if and when that unified front is established, it could provide a remarkable framework for future development and environmental protection across the country.
Any national strategy should include consistent and sustainable infrastructure, environmental standards that are both reasonable and built to graduate over time, and a marketing plan that is fair to all parties (including a royalty standard that is consistent across the country and neither punitive nor too generous to industry).
Ultimately, Redford realizes, if the homegrown regulatory standards aren’t rigorous, Canada will increasingly find it difficult to market its energy resources abroad. The acute international interest in both the Northern Gateway and Keystone pipeline projects, and the extraction of oilsands bitumen, shows how important gaining international favour can be.
It’s a great deal to ask of a political group that often is at odds. But Redford already has allies among some premiers (including Quebec’s Jean Charest, Saskatchewan’s Brad Wall and B.C.’s Christy Clark). And she intends to press the remainder of the provincial and territorial leaders at this week’s Council of the Federation meetings in Victoria.
Almost two weeks ago, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he has questions about what Redford proposes. But he isn’t dismissing the idea — although he is not in favour of a return to a strategy that mirrors Pierre Trudeau’s restrictive National Energy Program, which handcuffed Alberta in the 1980s.
That’s a fair caveat. No reasonable Canadian should want an energy strategy that does what the NEP did, bringing exploration to a halt, throwing the country into recession and creating bitter regional resentment.
If Redford and her cohorts can get it right, a Canadian energy strategy could be the framework for decades of economic prosperity and stability.
John Stewart is the Advocate’s managing editor.