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Alberta

Alberta Justice Minister says Feds planning to use RCMP to confiscate firearms starting in PEI

Published

1 year ago

7 minute read

Federal confiscation program: Minister Shandro

Minister of Justice Tyler Shandro issued the following statement on the federal firearms confiscation program:

“Last week, Minister Mendicino admitted that the federal government has still not figured out how to implement their firearms confiscation program.

“This admission comes shortly after the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police called on the federal government to not to use police services to confiscate firearms.

“Now, media reports have drawn attention to a federal government memo that outlines Minister Mendicino’s plans to confiscate firearms across Canada.

“The memo admits that efforts to find private sector companies to implement the federal firearms confiscation program failed this summer.

“With no private sector companies willing to participate, the memo outlines how the RCMP will first be deployed to Prince Edward Island (PEI), which has been deemed to be an easy ‘low-risk’ target.

“The federal government is treating PEI as a ‘pilot’ that will help them learn on the job as they implement their confiscation plan through trial and error.

“This ‘program’ is expected to cost a billion dollars or more and has supposedly been in the works for three years.

“Despite a mountain of money and years worth of lead time, Ottawa appears to be lost – especially given their latest attack on hunting rifles and shotguns – at minimum, they should proactively extend the amnesty that is currently scheduled to end in October 2023.

“Such a decision, however, would involve showing Canadian firearms owners a measure of decency, something that Minister Mendicino and this federal government is seemingly incapable of.”

—–

Public Safety Canada’s Buyback Program

Overview

The Government of Canada committed to implementing a mandatory buyback program so that the assault-style firearms that became prohibited on May 1, 2020 are safely removed from our communities. Public Services and Procurement Canada’s role is to provide procurement services to Public Safety Canada (PS) to support their implementation of the buyback program.

Mandate

As of May 1, 2020, the Government of Canada has prohibited over 1,500 models of assault-style firearms (ASFs) and certain components of some newly-prohibited firearms. New maximum thresholds for muzzle energy and bore diameter are also in place. Any firearm that exceeds these is now prohibited. A Criminal Code amnesty period is currently in effect to October 30, 2023. The amnesty is designed to protect individuals or businesses who, at the time the prohibition came into force, were in lawful possession of a newly prohibited firearm from criminal liability while they take steps to comply with the law.

The primary intent of the buyback program would be to safely buyback these now prohibited firearms from society, while offering fair compensation to businesses and lawful owners impacted by the prohibition. PSPC is currently examining options for implementation of the buyback program, including the potential of contracting out specific activities.

Key activities

The program approach currently being considered by PS senior management envisages 2 phases, with a pilot in the first phase that would inform the national roll-out of the program:

  • phase 1: commence in December 2022 and conclude at the end of the amnesty period. Primarily led by Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) with support from PS and other government departments. Prince Edward Island (PE) will be used as a pilot and will be the first point of collection based on the smaller number of firearms. As a result, lessons learned, gaps analysis and risk assessment would inform the phase 2 national roll-out
  • phase 2: national roll-out is planned for spring 2023 once an information management/information technology (IM/IT) case management system is in place. It will be implemented in collaboration with other government departments, provincial, municipal and territorial governments and potential Industry partners

Public Services and Procurement posted a request for information on July 14, 2022 seeking feedback from industry on potential capacities to support delivery of the buyback program. It closed on August 31, 2022 and with very limited interest from the industry.

Partners and stakeholders

The program owner is Public Safety Canada. They are responsible for the buyback planning and oversight.

Public Services and Procurement Canada has been supporting PS with the buyback program since August 2021 supporting the development of procurement strategies for the delivery of the various potential requirements such as:

  • collection and transportation
  • professional services
  • tracking
  • storage solutions
  • package inspection
  • destruction
  • post-destruction recycling

Shared Services Canada will assist with procurement of information technology (IT) solutions and other required IT support, based on its mandate.

The RCMP will start collection of ASFs in December 2022. They are also supporting the buyback program by providing a high level process map or written description of the programmatic phases.

Employment and Social Development Canada may support the buyback program with call-centres and payment solutions for the compensation.

Provincial, municipal and territorial governments are also being engaged to support the implementation and program delivery.

Key considerations

The prohibition applies to all current and future firearm variants that meet the criteria—now, over 1,800 firearms. These firearms can no longer be legally used, sold, or imported.

Currently owners have the option to dispose of their firearm by surrendering it to police, deactivating through an approved business or exporting the firearm with a valid export permit, all without government compensation. The buyback program aims to offer fair compensation to affected owners and businesses.

Work at the officials level is ongoing to develop, design and engage on the program. This includes public consultations on the government’s price list, which was posted on July 28, 2022 on Public Safety’s website and would be used to establish compensation levels for affected firearms.

Related Topics:

This is a news release from the Government of Alberta.

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Game changer: Trans Mountain pipeline expansion complete and starting to flow Canada’s oil to the world

Published on May 6, 2024

By

Workers complete the “golden weld” of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion on April 11, 2024 in the Fraser Valley between Hope and Chilliwack, B.C. The project saw mechanical completion on April 30, 2024. Photo courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation

From the Canadian Energy Centre

By Will Gibson

‘We’re going to be moving into a market where buyers are going to be competing to buy Canadian oil’

It is a game changer for Canada that will have ripple effects around the world.  

The Trans Mountain pipeline expansion is now complete. And for the first time, global customers can access large volumes of Canadian oil, with the benefits flowing to Canada’s economy and Indigenous communities.  

“We’re going to be moving into a market where buyers are going to be competing to buy Canadian oil,” BMO Capital Markets director Randy Ollenberger said recently, adding this is expected to result in a better price for Canadian oil relative to other global benchmarks. 

The long-awaited expansion nearly triples capacity on the Trans Mountain system from Edmonton to the West Coast to approximately 890,000 barrels per day. Customers for the first shipments include refiners in China,  California and India, according to media reports.  

Shippers include all six members of the Pathways Alliance, a group of companies representing 95 per cent of oil sands production that together plan to reduce emissions from operations by 22 megatonnes by 2030 on the way to net zero by 2050.  

The first tanker shipment from Trans Mountain’s expanded Westridge Marine Terminal is expected later in May.

Photo courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation

 The new capacity on the Trans Mountain system comes as demand for Canadian oil from markets outside the United States is on the rise.  

According to the Canada Energy Regulator, exports to destinations beyond the U.S. have averaged a record 267,000 barrels per day so far this year, up from about 130,000 barrels per day in 2020 and 33,000 barrels per day in 2017. 

“Oil demand globally continues to go up,” said Phil Skolnick, New York-based oil market analyst with Eight Capital.  

“Both India and China are looking to add millions of barrels a day of refining capacity through 2030.” 

In India, refining demand will increase mainly for so-called medium and heavy oil like what is produced in Canada, he said. 

“That’s where TMX is the opportunity for Canada, because that’s the route to get to India.”  

Led by India and China, oil demand in the Asia-Pacific region is projected to increase from 36 million barrels per day in 2022 to 52 million barrels per day in 2050, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. 

More oil coming from Canada will shake up markets for similar world oil streams including from Russia, Ecuador, and Iraq, according to analysts with Rystad Energy and Argus Media. 

Expanded exports are expected to improve pricing for Canadian heavy oil, which “have been depressed for many years” in part due to pipeline shortages, according to TD Economics.  

Photo courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation

 In recent years, the price for oil benchmark Western Canadian Select (WCS) has hovered between $18-$20 lower than West Texas Intermediate (WTI) “to reflect these hurdles,” analyst Marc Ercolao wrote in March.  

“That spread should narrow as a result of the Trans Mountain completion,” he wrote. 

“Looking forward, WCS prices could conservatively close the spread by $3–4/barrel later this year, which will incentivize production and support industry profitability.”  

Canada’s Parliamentary Budget Office has said that an increase of US$5 per barrel for Canadian heavy oil would add $6 billion to Canada’s economy over the course of one year. 

The Trans Mountain Expansion will leave a lasting economic legacy, according to an impact assessment conducted by Ernst & Young in March 2023.  

In addition to $4.9 billion in contracts with Indigenous businesses during construction, the project leaves behind more than $650 million in benefit agreements and $1.2 billion in skills training with Indigenous communities.   

Ernst & Young found that between 2024 and 2043, the expanded Trans Mountain system will pay $3.7 billion in wages, generate $9.2 billion in GDP, and pay $2.8 billion in government taxes. 

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Alberta

Alberta government should eliminate corporate welfare to generate benefits for Albertans

Published on May 2, 2024

By

From the Fraser Institute

By Spencer Gudewill and Tegan Hill

Last November, Premier Danielle Smith announced that her government will give up to $1.8 billion in subsidies to Dow Chemicals, which plans to expand a petrochemical project northeast of Edmonton. In other words, $1.8 billion in corporate welfare.

And this is just one example of corporate welfare paid for by Albertans.

According to a recent study published by the Fraser Institute, from 2007 to 2021, the latest year of available data, the Alberta government spent $31.0 billion (inflation-adjusted) on subsidies (a.k.a. corporate welfare) to select firms and businesses, purportedly to help Albertans. And this number excludes other forms of government handouts such as loan guarantees, direct investment and regulatory or tax privileges for particular firms and industries. So the total cost of corporate welfare in Alberta is likely much higher.

Why should Albertans care?

First off, there’s little evidence that corporate welfare generates widespread economic growth or jobs. In fact, evidence suggests the contrary—that subsidies result in a net loss to the economy by shifting resources to less productive sectors or locations (what economists call the “substitution effect”) and/or by keeping businesses alive that are otherwise economically unviable (i.e. “zombie companies”). This misallocation of resources leads to a less efficient, less productive and less prosperous Alberta.
And there are other costs to corporate welfare.

For example, between 2007 and 2019 (the latest year of pre-COVID data), every year on average the Alberta government spent 35 cents (out of every dollar of business income tax revenue it collected) on corporate welfare. Given that workers bear the burden of more than half of any business income tax indirectly through lower wages, if the government reduced business income taxes rather than spend money on corporate welfare, workers could benefit.

Moreover, Premier Smith failed in last month’s provincial budget to provide promised personal income tax relief and create a lower tax bracket for incomes below $60,000 to provide $760 in annual savings for Albertans (on average). But in 2019, after adjusting for inflation, the Alberta government spent $2.4 billion on corporate welfare—equivalent to $1,034 per tax filer. Clearly, instead of subsidizing select businesses, the Smith government could have kept its promise to lower personal income taxes.

Finally, there’s the Heritage Fund, which the Alberta government created almost 50 years ago to save a share of the province’s resource wealth for the future.

In her 2024 budget, Premier Smith earmarked $2.0 billion for the Heritage Fund this fiscal year—almost the exact amount spent on corporate welfare each year (on average) between 2007 and 2019. Put another way, the Alberta government could save twice as much in the Heritage Fund in 2024/25 if it ended corporate welfare, which would help Premier Smith keep her promise to build up the Heritage Fund to between $250 billion and $400 billion by 2050.

By eliminating corporate welfare, the Smith government can create fiscal room to reduce personal and business income taxes, or save more in the Heritage Fund. Any of these options will benefit Albertans far more than wasteful billion-dollar subsidies to favoured firms.

Authors:

Spencer Gudewill
Policy Analyst, Fraser Institute
and
Tegan Hill
Associate Director, Alberta Policy, Fraser Institute
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