I want to trust Carney

I want to trust Carney, quite frankly I like him so far, but his ministers are telling a different story.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s first week in office has already raised red flags. One day, he says he supports building pipelines and is open to revisiting Trudeau-era policies like Bill C-69 and the emissions cap. The next, his own ministers are walking it back, most notably Steven Guilbeault, who still treats Alberta’s energy sector like a threat rather than the economic engine it is.

Carney says the right things, and I’ll give him credit for that. But talk is cheap, especially when the people around you are sending a completely different message. If Carney truly wants to reset the relationship with Alberta and the West, he needs to rein in his ministers. Because when you keep the same crowd that helped Trudeau divide this country, what exactly do you expect?

And it’s not just energy where this government is off to a troubling start. We’ve now learned that no federal budget will be introduced this spring, meaning Canadians will be flying blind on the government’s fiscal plan. At a time when affordability is crushing families, businesses are desperate for clarity, and provinces need certainty on infrastructure and program funding, this lack of transparency is unacceptable.

Adding insult to injury, the new federal Minister of Housing, Gregor Robertson, said this week that housing prices “don’t need to go down.” Tell that to the millions of Canadians, especially young people, who have been locked out of homeownership, priced out of rentals, and left behind in a market that has become a playground for speculators. Robertson’s comment shows just how out of touch this minister remains on the most pressing issue facing working Canadians.

Will Robertson, who was the mayor of Vancouver, follow the path of housing planning which has led to some of the highest housing prices in the world? Vancouver remains the least affordable market in Canada and ranks 92nd out of 94 globally, with a median multiple of 12.3. This makes Vancouver more unaffordable than almost any other market, except Hong Kong and Sydney. For the past 16 years, Vancouver has consistently ranked among the top three least affordable major markets .

Here’s the part that burns: Alberta shoulders a massive share of this country’s economic burden, and we’re constantly treated as second-class partners in Confederation. Since the inception of the equalization program, Alberta taxpayers have contributed an estimated $67 billion to it. In 2021 alone, we paid $2.9 billion, about $650 per person, to a system that actively disadvantages us.

Meanwhile, provinces like Quebec not only collect billions in equalization, they game the system. Quebec receives more than $14 billion a year, while refusing to allow pipeline construction and deliberately excluding Hydro-Québec’s massive revenues from equalization calculations. That’s right, Quebec hides one of its largest revenue sources to keep the cash flowing from Alberta. And our money helps subsidize public programs, including keeping Quebec university tuition among the lowest in the country, while Alberta families struggle with rising costs and underfunded services.

We produce the wealth, but we’re told we don’t get to decide how it moves. We’re taxed, regulated, and lectured by the same government that turns around and hands our money to jurisdictions that actively block the industries that fund it all. And now, even with a new prime minister promising a fresh start, it’s clear that the ideological leftovers from the last administration are still calling the shots.

Carney says he supports building a pipeline if there’s a national consensus, but what does consensus mean when certain provinces take the money but refuse to participate in the projects that generate it? What does it mean when federal ministers undercut their own leader 24 hours after he makes a public commitment? If this is Carney’s idea of “partnership,” it’s off to a rocky, and very familiar, start.

Albertans are not against environmental responsibility. We want a clean, prosperous Canada for future generations. But we also understand that prosperity has always been tied to our natural resources. For every cancelled project, every energy worker laid off, every investor driven away by federal policy, the damage ripples far beyond Alberta’s borders. This isn’t just our fight, it’s a national one.

And I understand why more and more people are talking about separation. They’re frustrated, they’re mad, and they’re tired of being used by the two biggest provinces in the country. Quebec and Ontario decide who our prime ministers are, they take our money, and then they kneecap our prosperity. That’s not partnership. That’s exploitation.

The problem isn’t just that Carney’s statements are being contradicted. It’s that they’re being contradicted by the same entrenched voices Albertans have been battling for years. You can’t reset a relationship by keeping the people who helped destroy it in charge.

We’re tired. We’re angry. And we’re paying more than our fair share, while being told we’re the problem. If Prime Minister Carney wants to build trust, it starts with walking the talk. Get control of your cabinet. Respect Alberta’s role. And stop treating this province like a bottomless ATM.

We want to build Canada’s future, but not if it means being disrespected, discredited, and discarded. The time for lip service is over. Either Ottawa gets serious, because this talk makes Albertans ask if this country still works for us at all.