“Yesterday, in my discussions with Prime Minister Mark Carney, I made it clear Alberta will no longer tolerate an emissions cap on oil and gas – which absolutely works like a production cap that scares away billions in investment and thousands of jobs, makes us more dependent on the United States, and has been found by Ottawa’s own Parliamentary Budget Office to be greatly destructive to the Canadian economy.
“The Prime Minister told me in yesterday’s meeting – and then later in his press conference with the media that same day – that he was not in favour of hard caps like that. He said he was interested in results – in getting projects like pipelines in the ground. That was good to hear because we all know you can’t fill new pipelines and cap oil production at the same time.
“The Prime Minister’s words sounded kind of nice yesterday – until I found out that his new environment minister had just told media on the other side of the country that the federal Liberals would be keeping the emissions cap in place.
“This has been the same story for the last 10 years. Liberals come to Alberta – smile for the cameras – tell everyone how much they are going to work with Alberta and support the energy sector. Then they leave, go home, and proceed to do everything in their power to roadblock and scare away investment from the energy sector.
“Now they are doing it when Canadians are literally demanding that we build new pipelines and production to become more independent from the United States. So, it’s time for the Prime Minister to be clear with Canadians – is he prepared to lift this job killing, destructive and unconstitutional production cap law that his predecessor attacked us with – or not?
“Albertans and Canadians want the answer before they go to the polls – not after. In fact, we want the answer today. Who wasn’t telling the truth yesterday – the Prime Minister or his environment minister? We all deserve to know.”