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2025 Federal Election

Canada’s pipeline builders ready to get to work

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5 minute read

From the Canadian Energy Centre

By Deborah Jaremko

“We’re focusing on the opportunity that Canada has, perhaps even the obligation”

It was not a call he wanted to make.

In October 2017, Kevin O’Donnell, then chief financial officer of Nisku, Alta.-based Banister Pipelines, got final word that the $16-billion Energy East pipeline was cancelled.

It was his job to pass the news down the line to reach workers who were already in the field.

“We had a crew that was working along the current TC Energy line that was ready for conversion up in Thunder Bay,” said O’Donnell, who is now executive director of the Mississauga, Ont.-based Pipe Line Contractors Association of Canada (PLCAC).

“I took the call, and they said abandon right now. Button up and abandon right now.

“It was truly surreal. It’s tough to tell your foreman, who then tells their lead hands and then you inform the unions that those three or four or five million man-hours that you expected are not going to come to fruition,” he said.

Workers guide a piece of pipe along the Trans Mountain expansion route. Photograph courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation

“They’ve got to find lesser-paying jobs where they’re not honing their craft in the pipeline sector. You’re not making the money; you’re not getting the health and dental coverage that you were getting before.”

O’Donnell estimates that PLCAC represents about 500,000 workers across Canada through the unions it works with.

With the recent completion of the Trans Mountain expansion and Coastal GasLink pipelines – and no big projects like them coming on the books – many are once again out of a job, he said.

It’s frustrating given that this could be what he called a “golden age” for building major energy infrastructure in Canada.

Together, more than 62,000 people were hired to build the Trans Mountain expansion and Coastal GasLink projects, according to company reports.

O’Donnell is particularly interested in a project like Energy East, which would link oil produced in Alberta to consumers in Eastern and Atlantic Canada, then international markets in the offshore beyond.

“I think Energy East or something similar has to happen for millions of reasons,” he said.

“The world’s demanding it. We’ve got the craft [workers], we’ve got the iron ore and we’ve got the steel. We’re talking about a nation where the workers in every province could benefit. They’re ready to build it.”

The “Golden Weld” marked mechanical completion of construction of the Trans Mountain Expansion Project on April 11, 2024. Photo courtesy Trans Mountain Corporation

That eagerness is shared by the Progressive Contractors Association of Canada (PCA), which represents about 170 construction and maintenance employers across the country.

The PCA’s newly launched “Let’s Get Building” advocacy campaign urges all parties in the Canadian federal election run to focus on getting major projects built.

“We’re focusing on the opportunity that Canada has, perhaps even the obligation,” said PCA chief executive Paul de Jong.

“Most of the companies are quite busy irrespective of the pipeline issue right now. But looking at the long term, there’s predictability and long-term strategy that they see missing.”

Top of mind is Ottawa’s Impact Assessment Act (IAA), he said, the federal law that assesses major national projects like pipelines and highways.

In 2023, the Supreme Court of Canada found that the IAA broke the rules of the Canadian constitution.

Construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline. Photograph courtesy Coastal GasLink

The court found unconstitutional components including federal overreach into the decision of whether a project requires an impact assessment and whether a project gets final approval to proceed.

Ottawa amended the act in the spring of 2024, but Alberta’s government found the changes didn’t fix the issues and in November launched a new legal challenge against it.

“We’d like to see the next federal administration substantially revisit the Impact Assessment Act,” de Jong said.

“The sooner these nation-building projects get underway, the sooner Canadians reap the rewards through new trading partnerships, good jobs and a more stable economy.”

2025 Federal Election

Carney says Liberals won’t make voting pact with NDP

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Mark Carney says unlike his predecessor Justin Trudeau, the Liberals will not be making a voting pact with the left-wing New Democratic Party.

Prime Minister Mark Carney has said that his Liberal Party, which formed a minority government last week, will not be forming a voting pact with the far-left New Democratic Party.

Speaking to reporters last week, Carney replied “no” when asked by a reporter if he would be “pursuing a formal governing pact of any kind with the NDP.”

The reporter followed up asking, “Why not?” to which Carney replied, “Why?” adding, “That’s my answer.”

Last week’s election saw Liberal leader Carney beat out Conservative rival Pierre Poilievre, who also lost his seat to a Liberal rival. Poilievre’s riding was unusual in that it had 90 candidates named on the ballot, making the voting list in that riding incredibly long.

The Conservatives managed to pick up over 20 new seats, and Poilievre has vowed to stay on as party leader, for now, and will soon run in a by-election to try and regain his seat.

As it stands now, the unofficial results show the Liberals at 169 seats, which is four short of a majority. The Conservatives have 144 seats, the Bloc Québécois have 22 seats, the NDP has 7 and the Green Party has one.

In 2022, while also leading a Liberal minority government, former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau concocted a Supply And Confidence Agreement with former NDP leader Jagmeet Singh. Under the agreement, the NDP would protect the Liberals from being ousted via a vote of non-confidence in exchange for the Liberals supporting certain NDP-led legislation.

Carney’s insistence that he will not make such an agreement means it remains to be seen how his government will garner the votes necessary to pass legislation.

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2025 Federal Election

Mark Carney vows to ‘deepen’ Canada’s ties with the world, usher in ‘new economy’

Published on

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Newly elected Prime Minister Mark Carney used his first post-election press conference to announce his government’s plan to launch a “new economy” in Canada that will involve “deepening” ties to the world.

During the Friday morning press conference, Carney explained his vision for Canada, alleging that the nation is “in a once in a lifetime crisis” and that it is “time to come together, to put on our Team Canada [hockey] sweaters, and win big.”

Part of this plan, said Carney, is to unveil a “new Canadian economy” that will present the biggest shift since the end of the Second World War.

Carney said that his Liberal government would  build houses with “smaller environmental footprints” and would “trust science.”

After his prepared remarks, the majority of the media questions involved Canada’s relationship with U.S. President Donald Trump and the ongoing tariff dispute.

Despite Carney’s globalist, left-wing political viewpoint, Trump reacted to the Liberals election victory by calling the prime minister a “nice gentleman” who “hated” him less than Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Carney also said in the presser that his new cabinet will be sworn in on May 12.

Monday’s election saw Liberal leader Carney beat out Conservative rival Pierre Poilievre, who also lost his seat. The Conservatives managed to pick up over 20 new seats, however, and Poilievre has vowed to stay on as party leader, for now.

Carney has worked as the former governor of the Bank of Canada and Bank of England and spent many years promoting green financial agendas.

The re-election of the Liberals for the fourth consecutive term has also seemed to bolster separatist sentiment in Western Canada, a region which votes overwhelming for the Conservative Party but because of its smaller population, often remains at the mercy of those in eastern Canada when it comes to electing federal leaders.

Just one day after Carne’y election, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said that her province could soon consider taking serious steps toward greater autonomy. Smith also introduced a bill that would make calling referendums, including ones related to Albertan independence from Canada, easier to call.

Under Carney, the Liberals are expected to continue much of what they did under Trudeau, including the party’s zealous push in favor of abortion, euthanasia, radical gender ideologyinternet regulation and so-called “climate change” policies. Indeed, Carney, like Trudeau, seems to have extensive ties to both China and the globalist World Economic Forum, connections which were brought up routinely by conservatives in the lead-up to the election.

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