John Ivison: Premiers seem delighted just to finally be meeting with a grown-up prime minister
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The parade of premiers complimenting Mark Carney before and after the first ministers meeting in Saskatoon made for a curious spectacle.
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These events have tended to leave prime ministers looking like Oliver Twist handing over stolen goods to a roomful of Fagins and Artful Dodgers.
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Yet this time the mood reflected what one senior Alberta official called 'a special moment': more about seizing a potentially transformative opportunity than squeezing the federal government for the maximum number of taxpayers' dollars.
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The gathering did not produce a definitive list of projects that will receive fast-track federal approval, but the Ontario premier said there was no expectation that it would.
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Manitoba's Premier Wab Kinew said he will remain positive, even if his province's proposals do not appear on the list of national projects to be fast-tracked.
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'This is Team Canada. It doesn't matter if you're there for the puck drop or if you're killing penalties. At the end of the day, everyone's going to have their time on the ice and everyone is going to have a role in building up this great country,' he said.
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Scott Moe, the Saskatchewan premier, said he is in agreement with Carney's aspirational targets — making Canada the strongest economy in the G7 and building the country into a global energy superpower — but that words will have to be matched with action. He called the project-selection process 'a generational opportunity for Canadians.'
That would require a regulatory shift to remove barriers to investment, but Moe acknowledged that the federal government is talking about introducing legislation that would circumvent the Impact Assessment Act (the former Bill C-69) that many blame for blocking projects.
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Even Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, often an outlier among first ministers, said there seems to be an appetite for building pipelines to get oil to markets other than the United States. She said she was 'encouraged by the change of tone' evident in Saskatoon.
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