Under the influence of radical environmental activists and American left-wing foundations, the Trudeau government has done everything it can to stifle the growth of Canada’s oil industry by preventing it from transporting and selling its products.

With Bill C-48, the Liberals imposed a ban on oil tanker traffic on the north coast of British Columbia, which brought the cancellation of the Northern Gateway and Eagle Spirit pipeline projects. After years of legal uncertainty, investors pulled out of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project and sold it to the federal government for $4.5 billion.

Unrealistic environmental requirements from the National Energy Board also killed the Energy East pipeline. Bill C-69 makes the process of building pipelines and other major energy projects so complex and difficult that it could prevent any new investment. Among other things, that bill requires projects to be analyzed based on “the intersection of sex and gender with other identity factors.” Almost all natural gas transportation and export projects proposed in recent years have been abandoned.

Finally, the Biden administration cancelled the Keystone XL pipeline project and the Michigan Governor has been trying to shut down the crucially important Line 5 that carries oil and natural gas liquids from Western Canada to Ontario and Quebec.

Because of these constraints, capital investments in the oil and gas industry collapsed. Our overdependence on the American market for exports also costs the Canadians economy billions of dollars in foregone revenues every year. Alberta’s economy suffered a major setback for several years, with tens of thousands of jobs disappearing in the oil patch and many more in local communities that depend on this industry.