With only nine legislative days left before Kinder Morgan’s May 31st deadline, the Liberal government has run out of time to pass legislation to remove roadblocks and delays for the approved expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline.
A month ago, the Prime Minister explicitly promised to introduce legislation to ensure that this important project would be able to proceed. Now, after failing to take action for a year and a half, he is claiming that the only option may be to force taxpayers to foot the bill.
Kinder Morgan never asked for taxpayer money or a federal backstop. They simply want certainty, clarity, and a solution to the ongoing challenges and delays. But instead of championing the Trans Mountain Expansion, the Prime Minister has failed Canadian workers and our energy sector once again.
This isn’t just about Trans Mountain. It’s about investor and economic confidence in Canada, about certainty in Canada’s regulatory system and the rule of law; it’s damaging Canada’s international reputation. More energy investment has left Canada under the current Liberal government than in any other comparable time period in half a century. Worse still, after next year, no new energy investment is expected in Canada as a result of Prime Minister Trudeau’s policies.
It’s absolutely unacceptable that the Prime Minister, the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Natural Resources can’t tell Canadians how they plan to get the Trans Mountain Expansion built. This crisis is serious, will impact the whole country, and risks thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in energy investment and government revenue. Energy is the number one private sector investment in the Canadian economy, and is Canada’s second biggest export.
The Prime Minister’s failure to act is clearly undermining the national interest. Canada’s Conservatives will continue to hold him and his government to account, and we will continue to champion Canadian energy.