Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says the prime minister has "wasted an entire year" deliberating a potential new oil pipeline out of Alberta — criticism that comes after Mark Carney said a new pipeline is "more probable than possible."
"He's been prime minister for a year and he still hasn't even made up his mind whether he supports a pipeline," Poilievre told reporters at a news conference in Toronto on Sunday morning. "He's wasted an entire year" ...
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To me, this looks like the Leader of the Opposition doing what he often does politically. The Prime Minister, by contrast, has taken off the table the idea that Ottawa is categorically opposed to pipelines and, through the MOU, effectively put the ball in Alberta’s court with defined parameters.
ReplyDeleteThat said, there’s a broader disconnect between political rhetoric and corporate reality.
Pipelines make the most sense in a high‑growth environment where production is scaling rapidly. But if companies are prioritizing cash flow over expansion, incremental egress may be sufficient for a long‑lived, stable production base.
After the 2014–16 collapse and the 2020 shock, the industry shifted. Windfalls today are largely used to pay down debt, strengthen balance sheets, and fund dividends and buybacks — not to launch new mega‑projects.
Yet many conservative politicians, including Smith and Poilievre, still talk as if we’re one pipeline away from another 2006‑style boom. The industry itself is behaving like a mature sector: disciplined capex, long‑lived assets, cash returns.