Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is sending an official delegation to the upcoming COP27 Climate Change Conference in Egypt — but one seemingly less focused on battling global warming than on waging war against the federal government.
Alberta Environment Minister Sonya Savage says she is absolutely not going with the intention of disrupting work of Canada’s delegation, headed by federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault.
“We’re over there to represent the interests of Albertans and the views of Albertans and not to be in a fight with the federal government,” Savage said in an interview for this column.
However, the Alberta premier was less diplomatic in explaining her reasons for sending Savage.
“The reason why we are sending our own delegation is I don’t believe that we’re being properly represented by Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault. He clearly is hostile to our oil and gas sector, he’s clearly trying to step into areas he’s got no business regulating,” Smith said Monday.
The federal government shot back, with a spokesman saying, “It is unfortunate when politicians seem more interested in picking a fight than getting on with the job.”
Savage says she’ll be taking part in panel discussions, roundtables and meeting with other delegations. She’ll be talking about the need to reduce emissions from, among other things, Alberta’s oilsands, but in the context of making sure the federal government is not writing emission-reduction cheques that the oilsands can’t pay.
Ottawa has yet to announce its hard cap on greenhouse gas emissions, but Savage, like Smith, sees this as the federal government ignoring the Constitution, which “gives exclusive jurisdiction for the development and management of natural resources and electricity to the provinces.”
YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN...
That’s why Savage will be in Egypt, to make sure Ottawa, as Smith says repeatedly, “stays in its lane.”
As far as they are concerned, a cap on emissions from the oilsands is really a cap on production.
While it’s true provinces have exclusive jurisdiction over exploiting their natural resources, protecting the environment is a shared responsibility between the provinces and the federal government. They share the lane.
Alberta should indeed be consulted on any emission-reduction plans, and that’s part of Savage’s argument for going to Egypt.
She is not arriving with an olive branch but with a chip on her shoulder the size of a Rocky Mountain Douglas Fir — ready to poke Guilbeault in the face if he dares make any grand announcements that would hurt Alberta.
Savage is no pushover. A lawyer by profession, she was a strong proponent for Alberta’s energy industry even before entering politics, including working as a lobbyist for the pipeline company, Enbridge. Upon entering politics in 2019, she became Alberta’s energy minister.
During her time in that portfolio, she was put in the awkward position of creating and defending Jason Kenney’s plans for a silly “war room” that was supposed to fight back against anti-oil propaganda but gained notoriety instead for going to war with a children’s cartoon; and a public inquiry into environmental groups that held no public hearings, found no wrongdoing and led to a lawsuit by the groups against Kenney.
Savage also tried and failed to defend coal mining in the Rocky Mountains.
She has handled many political hot potatoes, and proved herself a stoic soldier ready to follow orders.
That has critics questioning why a devoted energy minister has recently been named environment minister.
Savage is certainly smart, articulate and knows all about the struggle by Alberta’s energy industry to reduce its emissions. She is also often an apologist for the energy industry, and Smith is signalling to her Conservative base and the energy industry that when it comes to energy versus the environment, Alberta’s United Conservative government clearly stands with oil and gas.
Smith has said she is in favour of reducing emissions and getting to net-zero, but on her timeline, not Ottawa’s.
At least Smith is not ignoring COP27, as Kenney did last year, dismissing COP26 in Scotland as nothing more than a “gabfest in Glasgow (that) is not going to make any meaningful difference.”
Smith, on the other hand, is taking a different tack. In fact, two tacks: one pragmatic; the other Machiavellian.
By sending Savage to Egypt, Smith wisely wants someone in the room speaking up for Alberta but also listening to what world leaders are saying.
She can tell Albertans who take climate change seriously that she has sent a delegation to COP27 — while she can also tell Albertans who think climate change is as much of a hoax as COVID-19 that she sent a delegation to COP to stand up to Ottawa.
It is just one more tightrope Smith is unsteadily trying to walk as she transitions from UCP leadership candidate to premier of Alberta.