Bell: Carney gets Bill C-5 win but will Danielle Smith get schooled by the PM?
Question for premier
But a big question remains.
Did Alberta Premier Danielle Smith get what she wanted?
Did Alberta get what it wanted?
Unlike Carney, both Smith and Alberta will have to wait for the big win, if there is one.
Carney is asked the big question after his big win.
Will the first projects to be fast-tracked be in the energy field? Will those projects be considered initially?
The reporter mentions Premier Smith and pipelines. Smith wants a bitumen pipeline to the B.C. port of Prince Rupert.
Smith backed Carney on Bill C-5.
'Well, that's a very good question,' says Carney.
You know when someone says it's a very good question you might not get a very good answer.
'It depends. To be perfectly honest that's the only answer,' continues the prime minister.
Carney says there are transmission line projects and there are a number of possible pipeline projects, gas pipelines or oil pipelines.
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But ….
'At the same time there are major projects that are very attractive. For example, a project in Quebec that's very attractive,' he says, in French.
Sinking feeling
Carney mentions a potential energy corridor at Grays Point in Nunavut. There is a potential project in Manitoba and Saskatchewan as far as Churchill.
'Those are projects that could lead to the development of other projects involving critical minerals.'
If you're experiencing a sinking feeling it's not the pizza you ate last night.
Carney says there are other projects not on the list put forward by the provinces 'in terms of AI infrastructure.'
The prime minister talks about what a project has to have in order to be picked for the express lane of approval.
'It has to be in the national interest,' says Carney.
'There has to be some probability they can actually move forward.
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'We have to have the agreement of the Indigenous peoples.'
Here is a line for you.
'They also have to be consistent with our climate goals in Canada.'
When will the first so-called nation-building projects be picked?
'We'll see,' says Carney.
Premier Smith has already said she wants Carney and the Liberals to be dealing with her demand to scrap nine anti-oil and gas and anti-development Liberal laws by the fall.
You know, getting rid of the oil and gas emissions cap, the tanker ban, rewriting or scrapping the No More Pipelines law, tossing the net-zero power regulations, to name the ones that always come up.
A few days ago, Smith backed Carney in the hopes of getting the pipeline built as a first step.
Then with her pipeline on the prime minister's VIP list, the Very Important Project list, Carney could then take the hatchet to the bad for Alberta laws cooked up in the 10 years of Trudeau.
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But, just saying, what happens if Carney doesn't come through with Smith's bitumen pipeline?
What happens if Carney doesn't deal with most of Smith's demands?
One of the premier's demands is for Carney to scrap the Liberal goal of having no new gas vehicles sold in 10 years.
Carney is not changing course on that one.
Meanwhile, the federal Conservatives also backed Carney.
They also wanted the nasty Liberal laws holding up development to be scrapped. They campaigned on it in the last election campaign.
They voted with Carney on Bill C-5 since something was better than nothing. They didn't want to be seen as standing in the way of something moving forward.
When the vote was over Carney went over and shook some Conservative hands. It is easy to shake hands when you won the game.
Devin Dreeshen, Smith's point man on transportation and economic corridors who is hoping real hard for that bitumen pipeline, weighs in on a worst-case scenario.
'If the kind words from the Carney government ring hollow because there are no projects in Alberta being fast-tracked we are right back to Square 1 where we have a federal government that says it is Team Canada but is doing everything to not help Team Canada win.'
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