Sitting on top of one of the world’s largest and richest natural resource warehouses is turning into quite a disconcerting distraction. While much of Canada’s population – the heavily urban part for whom “rural” means Whistler, Muskoka, or Mont Tremblant – likes to...
Premier Scott Moe thinks the overwhelming mass of federal environmental programs in the name of preventing climate change is getting to be too much. So on Oct. 21, he released a white paper called Drawing the Line: Defending Saskatchewan’s Economic Autonomy. After...
The National Post’s recent profile of Canada Pension Plan’s investment philosophy notes that CPP Investment Board managers have bought into Environmental, Social and Governance, ‘ESG’, scoring in its asset allocation. Having permeated Canada’s institutional investment...
This is Part 6 of a 6-part series on the two heavy oil upgraders built in Saskatchewan is based on the book So Much More We Can Be: Saskatchewan’s Paradigm Shift and the Final Chapter on the Devine Government 1982-1991, by Edward Willett, Gerard Lucyshyn and Joseph...
As we enter the year 2022, most Canadians will have lived their entire lives under the shibboleth that says we have the best health-care system in the world. Our beloved medicare is universal in scope, free of charge and offers equal access to all. What country could...
Calgary has sworn in its first female mayor. A week earlier, less than 24 hours after winning the mayoral race, she gave her first post-election talk-radio interview to Ryan Jespersen, mostly involving a series of softball questions. He asked her the obligatory woke...
The shrill, endless denunciations of the “tar sands” across North America, and indeed around the world, have largely overshadowed any communications efforts by the oil industry to show that the oil sands are benefiting Canadians and being developed in a responsible...
Despite major missteps taken by the Public Utilities Board with respect to Manitoba Hydro, the PUB is worth saving. That said, it needs a major overhaul. The PUB is supposed to balance the interests of monopoly firms and their customers. The agency has been in...
Activists are continuing to work hard in an effort to block the construction of major oil pipelines like the proposed Northern Gateway project. As a result, oil companies have turned to alternatives, like moving crude by rail. But the tragedy at Lac Megantic, Quebec...
Newfoundland's Finance Minister has suddenly resigned. He disagreed with the Premier's risky and increasingly expensive quest to have a Crown Corporation, Nalcor, build and transmit power from Muskrat Falls, Labrador, to export to the eastern seaboard states. Ontario...
Opponents of oil pipelines, such as the Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta to the U.S. Gulf Coast, have arguably caused unnecessary harm to the environment, reduced public safety, and slowed the Canadian economy. They have done this by causing oil to be shipped through...
Recently, Manitoba Conservative MP Steven Fletcher promoted the building of a transmission line from Manitoba Hydro’s northern dams (two new ones are planned to be constructed in the next decade) to carry electricity to Saskatchewan and Alberta. Conceptually,...
The Manitoba Government has now decided that one size fits all does not work well for guiding municipal mergers. That is a small positive step for the know it all people in government. The next step is to understand that local municipalities have been entering into...
If there is anything the Selinger NDP government is 'good at' it is self-promotion. A report commissioned by the provincial government asserts that the ratepayers of Manitoba Hydro, its wholly owned subsidiary, Centra Gas, and Manitoba Public Insurance, all monopolies...
Canadian policy makers should re-think green energy policies because new evidence points to the failure of renewable energy policies in Europe.