Carson Jerema: How the Liberals turned an alarming number of Albertans into separatists

A separatist supporter holds a flag during a rally near the Elections Alberta headquarters in Edmonton, Canada, on May 4, 2026, as they submit boxes of signatures in the hope of triggering an independence referendum. (Photo by Henry MARKEN / AFP via Getty Images)

Article content

EDMONTON — Instead of expending all his efforts trying to integrate into Europe, perhaps Prime Minister Mark Carney could focus on clearing the tinder that is about to ignite a raging fire of anger in the West. Every time the Liberals dismiss Alberta, bring in new policies to control its resources, or ignore or try to manipulate the constitution against the provinces, it motivates the separatists, who on Monday delivered a petition for an independence referendum with more than 300,000 signatures. We are now very likely to get such a vote this fall.

Article content

Article content

This is the fruit of a decade of Liberal governance that has cracked and divided this country in possibly irreparable ways.

Article content

Article content

Article content

On every economic indicator that matters, things have gotten worse for all of Canada, but specifically for Alberta. Whether standard of living, business investment, bankruptcies, wage growth, all have either worsened or slowed under the Liberals. The crash in oil sector investment may be, as Liberal defenders keep trying to insist, simply the result of market realities, starting with when the price of oil began dropping in 2014, or a reflection of a mature industry that doesn’t need more investment. But if that were true, there is no way to tell, because the government has suppressed market signals through high taxes and endless regulatory burdens and review processes. The same people who say there is no business case for new energy infrastructure are often the most vocal advocates of using regulation to kill any such business case.

Article content

For Albertans, this has meant lower wages and less stability. While the province continues to perform economically better than much of the rest of the country, that is a testament to how much worse things could get, not how good things are.

Article content

Article content

Ottawa’s attempt to reconcile with Alberta is little more than a finger in the eye itself. The memorandum of understanding signed by Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith promised a deal to approve a pipeline, but already blew right past its April 1 deadline. The MOU places onerous burdens on any plan to build a pipeline by tying it to a massive carbon capture and storage project and giving the anti-energy B.C. Premier David Eby an effective veto. Tell me again about how limited private interest in energy infrastructure is merely a business decision.

Article content

Article content

It is, in fact, a political decision to repeatedly target a specific region of the country for economic punishment. Whatever legitimate concerns may exist over the environment, the singling out of the West fits within Canada’s history of being governed largely for the benefit of Ontario and Quebec, with minimal concern for other regions.

Article content

The Liberal regime of the Impact Assessment Act, west coast tanker ban and carbon taxes shares a pedigree with Canada’s long tradition of anti-Western policies. John A. Macdonald’s National Policy protected central Canadian industry, thereby forcing western farmers to buy machinery at inflated costs while competing unprotected on world markets; Alberta and Saskatchewan, given provincehood in 1905, were not granted control over natural resources until 1930, and Pierre Trudeau’s national energy program kept oil prices artificially low, depriving western oil producers profits to benefit oil consumers east of Manitoba.