GUNTER: Alberta is going to pay dearly with a Liberal minority – Edmonton Sun

I said before the election that a Liberal minority propped up by the NDP or Greens would be the worst of all possible outcomes for Alberta and I am prepared to stick with that.

But it is probably also the worst of all possible results for the country as a whole.

What this looks like more than anything, is provincial politics in Ontario for the decade before Conservative Doug Ford was elected premier.

The Ontario Liberals were not popular. Voters said they disliked their taxes, their green energy schemes, their huge deficits, their electricity rates.

But Ontario voters are also very cautious. They dont like change. And so they voted Liberal again and again despite the partys scandals and smugness (sound familiar?) because they were frightened into believing the Tories under a succession of weak leaders would be worse.

It seems as though the same pattern has emerged on the federal level in Ontario. Voters are not real keen on Trudeau and his government, but they permitted the Liberal campaign to scare them about a weak Conservative Leader in Andrew Sheer and remain, largely, in the Liberal camp.

And now were all going to pay for it.

A Liberal majority might might have built the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, even if they stopped there. (In the last Parliament they passed a law Bill C-69 that made new pipelines all but impossible.)

But now that Justin Trudeau and his party will need the support of Jagmeet Singh and his party to stay in power, there is a good chance the Liberals will refuse to move forward even with Trans Mountain (TMX).

Singh hasnt made cancelling Trans Mountain an ironclad condition for his support. Two weeks ago he laid out six prerequisites for getting behind the Liberals. Trans Mountain was not one of them.

But Im not holding my breath. Right after the French-language leaders debate, Singh said, Ive been really clear on this. I am very much opposed to this (TMX) project Ill continue to work against that, for sure.

Singh probably refused to say unequivocally that he would demand an end to TMX because he was hoping to win one seat for his party in Edmonton. And now that that concern is out of the way, there is probably no way TMX wont come up in his negotiations with Trudeau.

Besides, the Liberals themselves are not enthusiastic about TMX, either. Never have been. Trudeau will be quite happy to let Singh twist his rubber arm.

I have maintained all along that the Libs bought TMX only so they could control whether it got built. If it helped their re-election, theyd build it. If it hurt their chances, theyd kill it. Their calculus was purely political.

Why would that change now? If the Libs need to axe TMX to retain power, theyll do it. In a heartbeat.

And all of that is bad for Alberta, for sure. But it is bad for the rest of the country, too. Even before this election, the federal Liberals and Alberta NDP scared away at least $100 billion in investment in oil and gas.

That money doesnt get replaced with investment in green energy or in barista supplies. When its lost to the national economy, its lost.

Of course that hits Alberta the hardest: jobs that are lost, houses that are foreclosed, vehicles that arent sold, restaurants that close. But it also means companies in the rest of the country that provide trucks and crew buses suffer, as do companies that manufacture pipe and electrical controls and valves and planes and on and on and on. Workers feel it too with fewer high-paying energy jobs Canada-wide.

Blame a dismal campaign by Scheer, a clever Liberal campaign and the timidity of GTA voters for the results.

Originally posted here:

GUNTER: Alberta is going to pay dearly with a Liberal minority - Edmonton Sun