This is a sobering article to read but it certainly exemplifies the sepsis that has settled into our nation's will to work together and achieve great things.
I find it very troubling to see how much effort is expended to prop up mediocrity. Examples of this are everywhere, starting in classrooms where teachers unions fight tooth and nail (and abetted in their efforts by progressive activists) to avoid testing students to determine national outcomes of learning. How the hell are we supposed to determine if our very expensive public education system is delivering results for children if we don't investigate learning outcomes and compare it with data accrued over time? Our children are our future leaders and should be seen as an infrastructure investment that will underpin a buoyant economy going forward.
Another example of mediocre expectations is the Liberals flaunting of their spending prowess and austerity because Canada ranks _____ (you can fill in the blank) in the G7, G20 or ____ for debt against GDP. Oh great. Measuring our own fiscal mess against WORSE basket cases is a fantasy world of ineptitude. Canada should strive to be the BEST country with the cleanest balance sheet that is developed by prudent, targeted spending and a vibrant economy that everyone participates in.
Finally, all levels of government spend too much time directing human capital and spending in areas outside of their jurisdictions. Ottawa has no business being in a national school lunch program, and municipalities have no business being involved in "affordable housing" when sewage and clean water upgrades languish and the tax base withers on the vine.
2025 has been described as the year that Canadians rediscovered nationalism. Perhaps, but there is still a long way to go as long as we are still prepared to tolerate mediocre leadership and outcomes.
We only have to look at our own city, Ottawa, to see the incompetence and worse that holds us behind. The question is why do set the bar so low for our politicians and for their bureaucracies who are frightened of collecting data to know what is working and what isn't?
After nearly one year of Carney, for 99% of Canadian and foreign investors, all of Trudeau's build absolutely nothing anywhere ever laws and regulations are still in place, except for a handful or two of insider Laurentian projects that get designated to be major projects, that get to ignore the laws and rules everyone else has to follow.
A few major projects cannot have the impact of thousands of smaller projects that get blocked by laws, regulatory overload and bloat.
Instead of clear laws, rules, and regulations, Carney has implemented a crony corporatist overlay for a chosen few who get to ignore and avoid the Trudeau's (and now Carney's) build absolutely nothing anywhere ever laws and regulations, and likely get taxpayer subsidization.
This is Carney supposedly moving faster than we have ever seen in Canada.
I think there is a deep civilizational malaise here, more than in any other country, that shows up as what I call Dark Green environmentalism. The idea that we shouldn’t grow, shouldn’t extract, shouldn’t conquer nature anymore, that environmental limits are not engineering problems to overcome (like using decarbonized power to reduce emissions), but rather we should live smaller, more constrained lives.
In reality nobody actually wants this for their own lives — it shows up as skyrocketing beef prices and failing infrastructure — but they vote for it in the abstract.
And then, here more than anywhere else (even New Zealand), Indigenous co-sovereignty creates the legal basis by which Dark Green forces can basically block every project from going ahead.
I don’t think we fix this unless Canadians start to want growth and industrial capitalism again. And they won’t want that until the pain of degrowth cuts to the bone. (Maybe we’re already there. I am not convinced yet.)
Excellent article Paul. It's amazing how often politicians trumpet how much money they are spending but can't identify any positive results from the spending. As we have lurched farther left one only needs to look at the myriad of social programs that have been introduced in the past ten years to understand why our infrastructure problems can't be addressed. So much money has been spent shoring up support and buying votes there is simply nothing left over, in fact we are in deficit and raising taxes is not an option as we are already overtaxed. And of course spending over a billion dollars a week in interest on our bloated national debt isn't helpful either.
The money that has been wasted on the net zero scheme alone would take another article by you as the Liberals introduced new spending, and programs, and tax credits, and subsidies, and rebates, and mandates. There were so many programs, and so much spending, that the government can't even quantify the total amount. And the results of all that spending are less than dismal, it is a catastrophic waste of money, money that should have been spent on infrastructure, not some green pipe dream.
And of course when you bring this to our attention you are seen as being intelligent, and insightful, and thought provoking, but when Mr. Poilievre brings it up in parliament or in media scrums he is labelled as simplistic, abrasive and heartless, even though the message is the very same.
Thanks again for a great article and Happy New Year.
Poilievre needs to be simplistic, abrasive, and heartless. The money HAS been stolen, nothing useful has been done with it, and people need to be imprisoned without mercy. 54% of the population know Canada is rigged: that's a majority government.
The problem is that, to win it, Poilievre will need to terrify many Toronto matrons who are or are married to people who need to be imprisoned. Some of those people vote or donate conservative now. They need to be repudiated.
Thank you, Paul, for this compelling lament. In 2014, a monograph entitled "Paradigm Freeze" was published that presented a long series of case studies on how and why reform of Canadian healthcare had repeatedly failed. Fast forward and we have a national crisis in healthcare. In like fashion, analyses going back to the time of Harold Innis have flagged vulnerabilities in Canada's economic position and attempted to explain why nothing changes decade after decade. Now, what should be the world's wealthiest nation is an economic laggard. In both cases, there were solutions that made sense and were proposed repeatedly. Here's hoping we have finally reached a turning point.
We won't reach a turning point by just nibbling at the fringe, we need wholesale changes. We need to completely revamp a lot of our systems. Unfortunately I don't believe Canadians are ready, or willing, to accept any discomfort so it will literally take the bankruptcy of Canada to change their thought processes.
We aren't cheap. Toronto has spent $10 billion so far on the crosstown LRT. The problem is that the money is going to client groups, not actual transit.
The reason Canada doesn't build isn't that we are lazy or unambitious. It's that, for decades, our Liberal (and liberal) rulers have viewed building efforts as an opportunity to siphon off money to their clients, be they ethnic groups, NGOs, consultants, political donors, or government employees. They have gone from being mosquitoes to vampire bats, and Canadian builders can easily build elsewhere.
The reason they can get away with this is that Canadians still defer to "experts": academics, officials, journalists, all of whom are on the government payroll. Until a dollar of government money received comes to be seen as disqualifying for discussion of policy, there will be no improvement.
We nominate and elect the wrong people. They have demoralized us without even thinking they are doing so. Using reconciliation and environmentalism and other excuses “NOT” to do anything. Because “anything” might run afoul of our newly-minted, carefully-cultivated, intimidated, fluffy national persona. It started getting fluffy with the Pearson govt, then Pierre Trudeau ratcheted that up swiftly and it has not really backed off especially under the latest Trudeau where things went from fluffy to mushy.
To the point that building bicycle lanes seems the only safe bet. Oh yes, and perhaps some detox centres.
Lots of work to do to turn Cdns into builders again.
And we wouldn't need so many detox centres if the Liberals and the BC NDP hadn't been in such a rush to "de-stigmatize" drug use and rushed to give out free needles and drugs. Good grief!
Respectfully, it’s not accurate to say "all of us allowed it". Many of us opposed it at the ballot box. Now we’re all stuck dealing with the consequences.
Noted. The decriminalization of hard drugs was not on the ballot. Eby did this after getting elected or appointed — a standard thing for many pols who promise many things — -and then add in a few more things for good measure.
100% this! By golly, when I look at the monstrous projects in (of course) China, I get feeling annoyed. My city of Hamilton has been discussing a new light rail transit system for two decades. The slowness is painful times 1000.
Glen….the proposed LRT for Hamilton is a pathetic waste of time and money…the BeeLine bus works fine. As mayor I convinced the Premier in 2011 to build the West Harbour GO station in time for the PanAm games. Unlike Hunter street GO centre which has NO parking there are 300 parking spots at West Harbour which has been providing excellent service for 10 years and provided a gateway for Niagara GO service. Similarly we got a new stadium built after the previous council screwed up. We got Randle Reef containment structure approved, now built. We also implemented a lead pipe loan program which enables home owners of modest means to replace their lead service pipe with a small monthly payment over several years. Literally thousands of lead pipes have been replaced.
I remember you suggested that they rebuild a rail line on the old TH&B Rail Trail up the escarpment and out to Binbrook. I also remembered that you pointed out just how underdeveloped our lakefront area is in Hamilton-Stoney Creek. I'm convinced this is a feature not a bug. It would be nice if we could have more nice things and not be so reliant on our cars. But, alas, I'm 20 years behind in my thinking. Thanks for your reply Bob; all the best in the new year.
Thanks Glen. I was in Qingdao China when they opened the longest bridge in the world over water-26 miles. The mayor told me it was concieved, designed and built in 4 years! Happy Nee Year.
Anecdotally, most of the constraints you mention are less onerous (better?) in Alberta but the ROC can’t follow its lead because “something, something, too American”
So tired of virtue signalling from SOME Albertans - Alberta's debt and deficit have risen significantly since the United Conservative Party (UCP) took power in 2019. Key metrics show net debt increasing from $62.7 billion in 2019 to $93 billion forecasted for 2025 - a 48% increase in six years! This despite the province's incredible good fortune, sitting atop a colossal pool of black gold! Oil based government revenue increased by roughly 150% over the past decade as the province racked-up record debt. So, the last place Canadians should look to as a paragon of good management is Alberta which continues to squander its fortune on vote-buying give aways. ...and Canadians are rightly skeptical of the the American example you allude to. Their government is spending like drunken sailors with expenditures far exceeding tax revenues and a debt that now stands at more than $34 TRILLION. The United States has a far worse fiscal situation relative to GDP. When comparing combined federal and subnational (state/provincial) debt burdens, US total public debt exceeds 124% of GDP, while Canada's combined federal-provincial net debt stands at around 75% of GDP. So, yes, many suggestions coming from the Maple MAGA crowd are definitely too American.
Four years of NDP government in Alberta (May 2015 to April 2019) did not help the debt situation which reached 98 billion in 2022 but has decreased to about 89 billion today. Once deficit spending is introduced it takes a while to roll back without huge voter backlash.
On a per person basis Alberta has the lowest debt in Canada and is a net contributor to the federation receiving no equalization payments, whereas Quebec for instance received 13 billion this year. Overall Alberta has contributed over 250 billion to the equalization program through the years, more than enough to offset their 89 billion in debt.
Revenue in Alberta could have been much more if for the past ten years the Liberals hadn't introduced policies to hinder the oil and gas sectors. The no more pipelines act, the emissions cap and the tanker ban have encouraged oil and gas companies to reduce capital spending and return money to shareholders rather than increase production to the benefit of all of Canada.
Canada's federal and provincial debt totals are actually about 95% of GDP. Total combined debt is about 2.414 trillion and GDP about 2.560 trillion. If you add in household debt of about 2.7 trillion you get to a real house-of-cards scenario.
US debt is indeed unbelievably high, but they do have the strongest economy in the world and their dollar is the reserve currency of the planet, so although they have a lot of work to do they aren't any worse off than us. And as has been documented a lot recently, their GDP per person is much, much higher than Canada's.
Thanks for your considered response Tom. I take your points regarding the reserve currency and the dynamism of the US market. You neglected to mention the added impact of US household debt which according to recent reports is sky rocketing. WRT GDP per capita, it is a poor indicator of general prosperity. There is an anecdote about 100 guys in a bar. Each earns about $70K per year. GDP per capita is $70K. Four guys join them - Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Larry Ellison and Mark Zukerburg. These guys are collectively worth more than $1 trillion which would yield about $165 billion per annum invested at average stock market returns in the US. Suddenly the GDP per capita is no longer $70K but $1.57 Billion. Who is better off?
To put some additional facts on the table. Alberta's oil production has increased substantially since 2015, driven largely by oilsands expansions. Recent data indicates a roughly 42% growth overall from 2015 levels thanks in part to liberal built infrastructure such as the Trans Mountain pipeline. LNG exports also became reality under a Liberal federal government and are set to double under a Liberal federal administration. It isn't at all clear that Liberal policies slowed oil and gas production expansion or that a conservative federal government, which built no pipelines after more than 10 years in office, would have yielded a better result. It is more likely that a conservative government would have ended up in endless court battles as a consequence of circumventing legal obligations. The American government cancelled the KXL pipe.
With regard to Alberta's contribution to Canada, there is no doubt that Alberta is a valued member of confederation. However, it is also noteworthy that Ontario has contributed approximately $700 billion to the equalization program since its inception in 1957. That is what we do as Canadians when one part of the country is more prosperous than others, and generally don't pound our chests about it. I won't comment on Quebec grievances except to say that perhaps two wrongs (people threatening separation) don't make a right.
Thank you. I was beginning to think that the old Reform party members were the only ones reading Paul's article. It seems that our corporate leaders have no responsibility for any failure of our country's progress and that we will only prosper when we return to the good old days of the 1930s and be guided by the goodwill of the rich business owners and the removal of all controls on their actions..
You’ve just made my point. Google how long it takes to get a building permit in Edmonton or Calgary compared to the rest of the country. We can learn from this. If we can look past calling 5 million Canadians Maple MAGA
Thanks Sean - If you read carefully you will note that I did say SOME in caps so that it would be clear I wasn't referring to all Albertans - several of whom are close friends and a few of which are close relatives. Just tired of those who seem to believe that there is something virtuous or innovative or praise-worthy about living atop a highly lucrative resource developed mostly by foreign interests. Maybe that's not you! Alberta is in most respects, no better managed, no more innovative and no more entreprenurial than most other provinces despite the river of money it has at its disposal. Indeed, the greatest clusters of 21st century tech and innovation are not centred in Alberta. These are to be found in Vancouver, the GTA and Montreal. Good on Alberta if its building permit process is faster than some. Maybe the Alberta government took note of problems in other jurisdictions!
One reads frequently regarding the incubus known as 'regulation' as the obstacle to accomplishing anything.
What regulations specifically?
It seems to me, if we wish to reduce red tape, is that we need to identify specifically what red tape and then ditch it (them).
Problem is, of course, is much red tape was created to deal with a 'problem' be it pollution, labour standards, consultation requirements, safety, health and on it goes. Eliminating such things will create losers who hitherto benefited from the regulation in question. Or, it will mean an increase in 'preventable' incidents of varying consequences.
This is by no means unique to Canada. It is a commonplace in Western societies.
I would think, as a start, each Federal department needs to review their volumes of regulations that it is responsible for and determine what can be ditched via a third party analysis (you need externals to make this remotely useful). This is not five minutes worth of work, but something like this is required to deal with the problem. That conceded, it is essential we attempt to rationalise this aspect of our polity as compliance costs in terms of time and dollars is ridiculous.
Defence can start with its procurement monstrosity that is a byword for ineptitude, delays, cost overruns, and failure.
I would start at the municipal level where regulations governing the building of homes seem more appropriate to building a nuclear plant (as another commenter here aptly puts it).
This needs to be said on repeat and loudly until everyone gets the memo and gets on-side. Enough with the lethargy and petty jurisdictional and political rivalries that slow us down. Time for urgency and inspiration and progress!
Terrific piece (and not just because I am a member of the Cdn Infra Council). I didn't immediately appreciate the cultural link to a nation unable to build- thanks for pointing that out. More work for us! And the Paul Wells show was a great event- really well done- thank you for putting that on.
The only time the government acts energetically is to protect a 19th century industry: dairy. That sums up Canada. This is all part of a greater malaise. When the truckers went to Ottawa to protest restrictions that prevented them from working, there were no assaults, torched cars or store windows broken, yet the PM called them bigots and declared them enemies of the state.
This is a sobering article to read but it certainly exemplifies the sepsis that has settled into our nation's will to work together and achieve great things.
I find it very troubling to see how much effort is expended to prop up mediocrity. Examples of this are everywhere, starting in classrooms where teachers unions fight tooth and nail (and abetted in their efforts by progressive activists) to avoid testing students to determine national outcomes of learning. How the hell are we supposed to determine if our very expensive public education system is delivering results for children if we don't investigate learning outcomes and compare it with data accrued over time? Our children are our future leaders and should be seen as an infrastructure investment that will underpin a buoyant economy going forward.
Another example of mediocre expectations is the Liberals flaunting of their spending prowess and austerity because Canada ranks _____ (you can fill in the blank) in the G7, G20 or ____ for debt against GDP. Oh great. Measuring our own fiscal mess against WORSE basket cases is a fantasy world of ineptitude. Canada should strive to be the BEST country with the cleanest balance sheet that is developed by prudent, targeted spending and a vibrant economy that everyone participates in.
Finally, all levels of government spend too much time directing human capital and spending in areas outside of their jurisdictions. Ottawa has no business being in a national school lunch program, and municipalities have no business being involved in "affordable housing" when sewage and clean water upgrades languish and the tax base withers on the vine.
2025 has been described as the year that Canadians rediscovered nationalism. Perhaps, but there is still a long way to go as long as we are still prepared to tolerate mediocre leadership and outcomes.
Not mediocre. Crooked. All of those programs, upon examination, end up giving vast amounts of money to client groups. Which is what they are for.
Big projects, including those done by Govts, start with committees: Canada is good at committees....
Of course, committees are where projects go to die. Big projects start with visionary individuals who make them happen.
We are good at convening, according to a former Trudeau Minister. She meant it as a compliment...
When the captain is missing the ship is uncontrollable.
Are you hinting that CAN Force 1 spends too much time in the air? Flitting off to another conference and agreements to agree are signed?
Tee hee...
Among other things, so many more.
We only have to look at our own city, Ottawa, to see the incompetence and worse that holds us behind. The question is why do set the bar so low for our politicians and for their bureaucracies who are frightened of collecting data to know what is working and what isn't?
They know what's working. For themselves.
After nearly one year of Carney, for 99% of Canadian and foreign investors, all of Trudeau's build absolutely nothing anywhere ever laws and regulations are still in place, except for a handful or two of insider Laurentian projects that get designated to be major projects, that get to ignore the laws and rules everyone else has to follow.
A few major projects cannot have the impact of thousands of smaller projects that get blocked by laws, regulatory overload and bloat.
Instead of clear laws, rules, and regulations, Carney has implemented a crony corporatist overlay for a chosen few who get to ignore and avoid the Trudeau's (and now Carney's) build absolutely nothing anywhere ever laws and regulations, and likely get taxpayer subsidization.
This is Carney supposedly moving faster than we have ever seen in Canada.
Carney is the great pretender.
I think there is a deep civilizational malaise here, more than in any other country, that shows up as what I call Dark Green environmentalism. The idea that we shouldn’t grow, shouldn’t extract, shouldn’t conquer nature anymore, that environmental limits are not engineering problems to overcome (like using decarbonized power to reduce emissions), but rather we should live smaller, more constrained lives.
In reality nobody actually wants this for their own lives — it shows up as skyrocketing beef prices and failing infrastructure — but they vote for it in the abstract.
And then, here more than anywhere else (even New Zealand), Indigenous co-sovereignty creates the legal basis by which Dark Green forces can basically block every project from going ahead.
I don’t think we fix this unless Canadians start to want growth and industrial capitalism again. And they won’t want that until the pain of degrowth cuts to the bone. (Maybe we’re already there. I am not convinced yet.)
Excellent article Paul. It's amazing how often politicians trumpet how much money they are spending but can't identify any positive results from the spending. As we have lurched farther left one only needs to look at the myriad of social programs that have been introduced in the past ten years to understand why our infrastructure problems can't be addressed. So much money has been spent shoring up support and buying votes there is simply nothing left over, in fact we are in deficit and raising taxes is not an option as we are already overtaxed. And of course spending over a billion dollars a week in interest on our bloated national debt isn't helpful either.
The money that has been wasted on the net zero scheme alone would take another article by you as the Liberals introduced new spending, and programs, and tax credits, and subsidies, and rebates, and mandates. There were so many programs, and so much spending, that the government can't even quantify the total amount. And the results of all that spending are less than dismal, it is a catastrophic waste of money, money that should have been spent on infrastructure, not some green pipe dream.
And of course when you bring this to our attention you are seen as being intelligent, and insightful, and thought provoking, but when Mr. Poilievre brings it up in parliament or in media scrums he is labelled as simplistic, abrasive and heartless, even though the message is the very same.
Thanks again for a great article and Happy New Year.
Poilievre needs to be simplistic, abrasive, and heartless. The money HAS been stolen, nothing useful has been done with it, and people need to be imprisoned without mercy. 54% of the population know Canada is rigged: that's a majority government.
The problem is that, to win it, Poilievre will need to terrify many Toronto matrons who are or are married to people who need to be imprisoned. Some of those people vote or donate conservative now. They need to be repudiated.
Thank you, Paul, for this compelling lament. In 2014, a monograph entitled "Paradigm Freeze" was published that presented a long series of case studies on how and why reform of Canadian healthcare had repeatedly failed. Fast forward and we have a national crisis in healthcare. In like fashion, analyses going back to the time of Harold Innis have flagged vulnerabilities in Canada's economic position and attempted to explain why nothing changes decade after decade. Now, what should be the world's wealthiest nation is an economic laggard. In both cases, there were solutions that made sense and were proposed repeatedly. Here's hoping we have finally reached a turning point.
We won't reach a turning point by just nibbling at the fringe, we need wholesale changes. We need to completely revamp a lot of our systems. Unfortunately I don't believe Canadians are ready, or willing, to accept any discomfort so it will literally take the bankruptcy of Canada to change their thought processes.
Canadians are cheap. I used to think we were frugal but we're far worse.
We aren't cheap. Toronto has spent $10 billion so far on the crosstown LRT. The problem is that the money is going to client groups, not actual transit.
Well yeah, I mean Toronto is the center of the Canadian universe so that makes perfect sense. Meantime, we can't get clean water to FNs.
Nobody's trying to get clean water to FNs. The purpose of the system is to get money to clients. That is working very well.
Honest question: FN get billions of dollars, right? Is that supposed to help get the clean water there?
No. It's supposed to keep the Liberals and their clients/patrons in power.
I think we need a nation building project on the scale of building the trans-Canada. Clean water would qualify.
Step 1: actually enforce FNFTA
Accountability and transparency for FN not going to happen under Carney.
What's the difference between a Canadian and a canoe ? A canoe tips.
Good one!
Bingo. We pinch pennies while rain pours through the leaky roof.
The reason Canada doesn't build isn't that we are lazy or unambitious. It's that, for decades, our Liberal (and liberal) rulers have viewed building efforts as an opportunity to siphon off money to their clients, be they ethnic groups, NGOs, consultants, political donors, or government employees. They have gone from being mosquitoes to vampire bats, and Canadian builders can easily build elsewhere.
The reason they can get away with this is that Canadians still defer to "experts": academics, officials, journalists, all of whom are on the government payroll. Until a dollar of government money received comes to be seen as disqualifying for discussion of policy, there will be no improvement.
Good article.
We nominate and elect the wrong people. They have demoralized us without even thinking they are doing so. Using reconciliation and environmentalism and other excuses “NOT” to do anything. Because “anything” might run afoul of our newly-minted, carefully-cultivated, intimidated, fluffy national persona. It started getting fluffy with the Pearson govt, then Pierre Trudeau ratcheted that up swiftly and it has not really backed off especially under the latest Trudeau where things went from fluffy to mushy.
To the point that building bicycle lanes seems the only safe bet. Oh yes, and perhaps some detox centres.
Lots of work to do to turn Cdns into builders again.
I say again: “Good article.”
And we wouldn't need so many detox centres if the Liberals and the BC NDP hadn't been in such a rush to "de-stigmatize" drug use and rushed to give out free needles and drugs. Good grief!
Indeed a "Bad Move."
All of us knew that and yet we allowed it go ahead with predictable results, making us think "who the heck did we elect and from what planet?"
Respectfully, it’s not accurate to say "all of us allowed it". Many of us opposed it at the ballot box. Now we’re all stuck dealing with the consequences.
Noted. The decriminalization of hard drugs was not on the ballot. Eby did this after getting elected or appointed — a standard thing for many pols who promise many things — -and then add in a few more things for good measure.
100% this! By golly, when I look at the monstrous projects in (of course) China, I get feeling annoyed. My city of Hamilton has been discussing a new light rail transit system for two decades. The slowness is painful times 1000.
Glen….the proposed LRT for Hamilton is a pathetic waste of time and money…the BeeLine bus works fine. As mayor I convinced the Premier in 2011 to build the West Harbour GO station in time for the PanAm games. Unlike Hunter street GO centre which has NO parking there are 300 parking spots at West Harbour which has been providing excellent service for 10 years and provided a gateway for Niagara GO service. Similarly we got a new stadium built after the previous council screwed up. We got Randle Reef containment structure approved, now built. We also implemented a lead pipe loan program which enables home owners of modest means to replace their lead service pipe with a small monthly payment over several years. Literally thousands of lead pipes have been replaced.
I remember you suggested that they rebuild a rail line on the old TH&B Rail Trail up the escarpment and out to Binbrook. I also remembered that you pointed out just how underdeveloped our lakefront area is in Hamilton-Stoney Creek. I'm convinced this is a feature not a bug. It would be nice if we could have more nice things and not be so reliant on our cars. But, alas, I'm 20 years behind in my thinking. Thanks for your reply Bob; all the best in the new year.
Thanks Glen. I was in Qingdao China when they opened the longest bridge in the world over water-26 miles. The mayor told me it was concieved, designed and built in 4 years! Happy Nee Year.
Anecdotally, most of the constraints you mention are less onerous (better?) in Alberta but the ROC can’t follow its lead because “something, something, too American”
So tired of virtue signalling from SOME Albertans - Alberta's debt and deficit have risen significantly since the United Conservative Party (UCP) took power in 2019. Key metrics show net debt increasing from $62.7 billion in 2019 to $93 billion forecasted for 2025 - a 48% increase in six years! This despite the province's incredible good fortune, sitting atop a colossal pool of black gold! Oil based government revenue increased by roughly 150% over the past decade as the province racked-up record debt. So, the last place Canadians should look to as a paragon of good management is Alberta which continues to squander its fortune on vote-buying give aways. ...and Canadians are rightly skeptical of the the American example you allude to. Their government is spending like drunken sailors with expenditures far exceeding tax revenues and a debt that now stands at more than $34 TRILLION. The United States has a far worse fiscal situation relative to GDP. When comparing combined federal and subnational (state/provincial) debt burdens, US total public debt exceeds 124% of GDP, while Canada's combined federal-provincial net debt stands at around 75% of GDP. So, yes, many suggestions coming from the Maple MAGA crowd are definitely too American.
Four years of NDP government in Alberta (May 2015 to April 2019) did not help the debt situation which reached 98 billion in 2022 but has decreased to about 89 billion today. Once deficit spending is introduced it takes a while to roll back without huge voter backlash.
On a per person basis Alberta has the lowest debt in Canada and is a net contributor to the federation receiving no equalization payments, whereas Quebec for instance received 13 billion this year. Overall Alberta has contributed over 250 billion to the equalization program through the years, more than enough to offset their 89 billion in debt.
Revenue in Alberta could have been much more if for the past ten years the Liberals hadn't introduced policies to hinder the oil and gas sectors. The no more pipelines act, the emissions cap and the tanker ban have encouraged oil and gas companies to reduce capital spending and return money to shareholders rather than increase production to the benefit of all of Canada.
Canada's federal and provincial debt totals are actually about 95% of GDP. Total combined debt is about 2.414 trillion and GDP about 2.560 trillion. If you add in household debt of about 2.7 trillion you get to a real house-of-cards scenario.
US debt is indeed unbelievably high, but they do have the strongest economy in the world and their dollar is the reserve currency of the planet, so although they have a lot of work to do they aren't any worse off than us. And as has been documented a lot recently, their GDP per person is much, much higher than Canada's.
Thanks for your considered response Tom. I take your points regarding the reserve currency and the dynamism of the US market. You neglected to mention the added impact of US household debt which according to recent reports is sky rocketing. WRT GDP per capita, it is a poor indicator of general prosperity. There is an anecdote about 100 guys in a bar. Each earns about $70K per year. GDP per capita is $70K. Four guys join them - Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Larry Ellison and Mark Zukerburg. These guys are collectively worth more than $1 trillion which would yield about $165 billion per annum invested at average stock market returns in the US. Suddenly the GDP per capita is no longer $70K but $1.57 Billion. Who is better off?
To put some additional facts on the table. Alberta's oil production has increased substantially since 2015, driven largely by oilsands expansions. Recent data indicates a roughly 42% growth overall from 2015 levels thanks in part to liberal built infrastructure such as the Trans Mountain pipeline. LNG exports also became reality under a Liberal federal government and are set to double under a Liberal federal administration. It isn't at all clear that Liberal policies slowed oil and gas production expansion or that a conservative federal government, which built no pipelines after more than 10 years in office, would have yielded a better result. It is more likely that a conservative government would have ended up in endless court battles as a consequence of circumventing legal obligations. The American government cancelled the KXL pipe.
With regard to Alberta's contribution to Canada, there is no doubt that Alberta is a valued member of confederation. However, it is also noteworthy that Ontario has contributed approximately $700 billion to the equalization program since its inception in 1957. That is what we do as Canadians when one part of the country is more prosperous than others, and generally don't pound our chests about it. I won't comment on Quebec grievances except to say that perhaps two wrongs (people threatening separation) don't make a right.
Equalization is a strictly political. Robbing Peter to pay Paul, nothing less.
Thank you. I was beginning to think that the old Reform party members were the only ones reading Paul's article. It seems that our corporate leaders have no responsibility for any failure of our country's progress and that we will only prosper when we return to the good old days of the 1930s and be guided by the goodwill of the rich business owners and the removal of all controls on their actions..
You’ve just made my point. Google how long it takes to get a building permit in Edmonton or Calgary compared to the rest of the country. We can learn from this. If we can look past calling 5 million Canadians Maple MAGA
Thanks Sean - If you read carefully you will note that I did say SOME in caps so that it would be clear I wasn't referring to all Albertans - several of whom are close friends and a few of which are close relatives. Just tired of those who seem to believe that there is something virtuous or innovative or praise-worthy about living atop a highly lucrative resource developed mostly by foreign interests. Maybe that's not you! Alberta is in most respects, no better managed, no more innovative and no more entreprenurial than most other provinces despite the river of money it has at its disposal. Indeed, the greatest clusters of 21st century tech and innovation are not centred in Alberta. These are to be found in Vancouver, the GTA and Montreal. Good on Alberta if its building permit process is faster than some. Maybe the Alberta government took note of problems in other jurisdictions!
One reads frequently regarding the incubus known as 'regulation' as the obstacle to accomplishing anything.
What regulations specifically?
It seems to me, if we wish to reduce red tape, is that we need to identify specifically what red tape and then ditch it (them).
Problem is, of course, is much red tape was created to deal with a 'problem' be it pollution, labour standards, consultation requirements, safety, health and on it goes. Eliminating such things will create losers who hitherto benefited from the regulation in question. Or, it will mean an increase in 'preventable' incidents of varying consequences.
This is by no means unique to Canada. It is a commonplace in Western societies.
I would think, as a start, each Federal department needs to review their volumes of regulations that it is responsible for and determine what can be ditched via a third party analysis (you need externals to make this remotely useful). This is not five minutes worth of work, but something like this is required to deal with the problem. That conceded, it is essential we attempt to rationalise this aspect of our polity as compliance costs in terms of time and dollars is ridiculous.
Defence can start with its procurement monstrosity that is a byword for ineptitude, delays, cost overruns, and failure.
I would start at the municipal level where regulations governing the building of homes seem more appropriate to building a nuclear plant (as another commenter here aptly puts it).
This needs to be said on repeat and loudly until everyone gets the memo and gets on-side. Enough with the lethargy and petty jurisdictional and political rivalries that slow us down. Time for urgency and inspiration and progress!
Terrific piece (and not just because I am a member of the Cdn Infra Council). I didn't immediately appreciate the cultural link to a nation unable to build- thanks for pointing that out. More work for us! And the Paul Wells show was a great event- really well done- thank you for putting that on.
The only time the government acts energetically is to protect a 19th century industry: dairy. That sums up Canada. This is all part of a greater malaise. When the truckers went to Ottawa to protest restrictions that prevented them from working, there were no assaults, torched cars or store windows broken, yet the PM called them bigots and declared them enemies of the state.
Bravo Paul. From your pen to Carney’s ears…I hope. Happy new year!