Alberta Does Not Have Grievances. It Has Issues

Alberta doesn’t need a new constitutional deal or separation. It needs competent politicians.

Alberta politics is soaked in populist grievance culture. Ottawa is hostile. The Liberals want to kill the Alberta oil and gas industry. Alberta is the “engine of the national economy,” but gets no respect. The province writes cheques to pay for equalization payments to less hardworking parts of the country. The story is repeated so often that the grievances have become part of the provincial political culture: accepted unconditionally with no thought to their accuracy. The truth is that most of the so-called grievances are nonsense.

But grievance is not a neutral description of political disagreement. It is a moral claim. It asserts injustice, not tension. It alleges bad faith, not conflict. And once you examine Alberta’s case closely, that claim does not hold.

Alberta has no—none, zero, nada—grievances that justify seceding from Canada. The province does not suffer from structural oppression within the Canadian confederation.

It suffers from the same thing every province does: friction between local interests and national priorities, between economic specialization and collective obligation, between electoral strategy and political influence.

Those are not grievances. They are issues. And issues can be negotiated and managed if the Alberta politicians actually tried to resolve them instead of using them as a political club against the rest of Canada.

Alberta doesn’t need a new constitutional deal or separation. It needs competent politicians.

The Grievance Frame Is the First Error

To call Alberta’s complaints “grievances” is already to misdiagnose the problem.

A grievance implies that the rules themselves are unjust, that the federation is operating outside its own constitutional or moral logic. But most of Alberta’s disputes with Ottawa arise precisely because the system is functioning as designed: redistributing fiscal capacity, managing shared jurisdictions, internalizing external costs, and balancing regional interests in a diverse democracy.

Political disagreement does not become injustice simply because it is persistent. Nor does frustration become exploitation because it is sincerely felt. The grievance frame hardens disagreement into identity and turns negotiation into moral combat. That may be emotionally satisfying to some and politically advantageous to others, but it is strategically disastrous.

For an Industry Under Attack, Alberta Oil and Gas Has Done Remarkably Well

Ottawa is not trying to kill Alberta’s oil and gas industry. The simplest way to see that is to look at outcomes rather than rhetoric.

Over the past two decades, Alberta oil production has roughly doubled, driven overwhelmingly by growth in the oil sands under successive Liberal and Conservative governments alike. That expansion did not happen despite federal policy; it happened alongside it, through federal approvals, federal-provincial regulatory coordination, and sometimes through significant federal financial support.

An industry that has doubled in scale is not an industry under covert assault. Governments trying to eliminate a sector do not preside over its largest period of absolute growth.

The Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline makes the point even more starkly. When American pipeline company Kinder Morgan threatened to walk away, the federal government did not quietly celebrate. It stepped in, bought the pipeline, assumed construction risk, defended it through years of litigation, and built it as a Crown-owned project at a cost of roughly $34 billion.

That decision was politically costly, fiscally risky, and environmentally controversial. Ottawa did it anyway because market access mattered to Alberta and to the country. States trying to “kill” industries do not nationalize their critical infrastructure to keep it alive.

They let it fail.

The same pattern holds for liquefied natural gas. The $40 billion Canada LNG project in British Columbia—the largest private-sector investment in Canadian history—was approved and built under a Liberal government supposedly hostile to fossil fuels. It required federal environmental approvals, Indigenous agreements, export licences, and sustained political backing. It went ahead because Ottawa distinguished between managing emissions over time and prohibiting production outright. That distinction matters.

The claim that Ottawa is trying to destroy Alberta oil and gas survives only if you ignore the evidence in plain sight.

The Impact Assessment Act Is Not a Veto

No piece of legislation has been more mythologized in Alberta politics than the Impact Assessment Act, also known as Bill C-69. It is routinely described as a project-killing veto disguised as process.

But the evidence tells a different story.

Most projects never trigger federal review. Most that do are approved with conditions. Courts have upheld the Act precisely because it is procedural, not prohibitive. Investment uncertainty in Alberta tracks oil prices, capital discipline, and long-term decarbonization risk far more closely than regulatory timelines in Ottawa, despite what oil CEOs and Premier Danielle Smith say in public.

Due diligence is not a veto. It is governance.

Pipelines Failed for A Variety of Reasons. Malice Was Not One of Them

Ottawa’s supposed failure on pipelines also ignores a harder truth: pipelines that cross jurisdictions are inherently controversial and slow everywhere, and especially so in Canada’s constitutional order. Interprovincial pipelines must navigate not only provincial politics and court challenges, but a constitutional duty to consult Indigenous communities whose rights are legally entrenched in a way they are not in the United States.

A 2018 study by the Canadian Energy Research Institute found that, on average, interprovincial pipelines in Canada took about 19 months longer to build than comparable interstate pipelines in the U.S., with most of the additional time attributable to Indigenous consultation, accommodation, and litigation risk—not federal foot-dragging.

That delay is not a policy choice designed to punish Alberta; it is the consequence of a rights-based constitutional framework that treats Indigenous consent as a legal requirement rather than a procedural courtesy. Countries that take Indigenous rights seriously build infrastructure more slowly. That is not sabotage. It is governance under the rule of law.

As for the three emblematic pipeline failures of the past decade, none collapsed because Ottawa secretly pulled the plug.

Keystone XL ultimately failed because it crossed an international border and became hostage to U.S. domestic politics, where it was cancelled by President Joe Biden after years of regulatory whiplash and investor uncertainty.

Energy East died because the economics no longer worked once global oil prices fell, costs rose, and TransCanada (now TC Energy) concluded the project could not meet its internal return thresholds.

Northern Gateway was rejected after courts found that proponent Enbridge had failed to adequately consult affected Indigenous communities, a fatal legal flaw in a project that already faced overwhelming Indigenous opposition along its route.

In each case, markets, courts, and constitutional constraints mattered more than federal intent. None of that adds up to a deliberate campaign to kill Alberta oil and gas.

Carbon Pricing Reveals Costs, It Does Not Create Them

Until recently, there were two kinds of carbon pricing in Canada, consumer and the industrial emitters carbon tax. The former was eliminated last year by Prime Minister Mark Carney.

The second is a much more complex story, especially in Alberta. A decade ago, the big oil sands companies support carbon pricing. Now they’ve changed their tune, calling for its abolition with ever acknowledging their previous endorsement.

Rather than repeat a long, complex story here, please watch the video below with carbon pricing expert, economist Dave Sawyer. If you’d like more detail, search for “carbon” or “carbon pricing” on Energi Media’s YouTube channel.

Equalization Is Not Exploitation

The most emotionally powerful grievance is equalization, and the most misleading. Alberta has never received equalization, even during downturns, and many Albertans read that as proof the system is rigged against them. But equalization is not a return-on-contribution program. It is a fiscal-capacity insurance mechanism.

The program asks one narrow question: can a province raise comparable revenue at comparable tax rates? Alberta has always answered yes. Even during oil price crashes. Even during recessions. That is not a judgment about effort or virtue. It is a reflection of structural wealth.

Albertans do not send equalization cheques to Quebec. They pay federal taxes under national rules, just like everyone else. Ottawa then redistributes based on capacity, not contribution.

The sense of unfairness may be real, but the claim of injustice is not.

Fiscal Imbalance Is a Category Error

Closely related is the idea that Ottawa “takes Alberta’s money” and spends it elsewhere. This grievance collapses once you distinguish provinces from people. Ottawa does not tax Alberta. It taxes individuals and firms. Alberta contributes more because incomes and profits are higher.

That is how progressive taxation works.

Federal spending, meanwhile, is overwhelmingly formula-driven. Pensions, employment insurance, health transfers, infrastructure programs. These flows respond automatically to need. Alberta has received massive federal support during downturns, from employment insurance adjustments to pandemic transfers to wage subsidies.

What it has not received, as a rule, are discretionary bailouts for a dominant private industry. There have been exceptions, such as the $1 billion during the Covid-19 pandemic that was earmarked for cleanup of oil and gas wells.

That is not fiscal imbalance. That is policy choice.

Jurisdictional Overreach Is Called “Cooperative Federalism” in Canada

Alberta often frames federal involvement in energy, land use, and electricity as constitutional intrusion. But regulation has never been an exclusively provincial domain. It sits at the intersection of environmental protection, criminal law, trade, Indigenous rights, fisheries, navigation, and international commitments.

All federal responsibilities.

The Supreme Court of Canada has been unambiguous on this point. Overlap is not a violation of federalism. It is its operating condition. Where jurisdiction and authority overlap, a province and Ottawa should cooperate for the best public interest outcome.

Provinces do not get veto power over national standards simply because their economies are more exposed to them.

The tension is real. The overreach narrative is not.

Political Marginalization Is a Strategic Choice

Alberta’s underrepresentation in federal cabinets is often framed as exclusion. It is better understood as arithmetic. In a parliamentary system, influence flows from competitive seats. Alberta has chosen ideological consistency over bargaining power for decades.

When Alberta elects members of the governing party, it gets senior ministers. When it does not, it gets opposition. That is not marginalization. It is democracy operating without sentimentality.

Ottawa is not indifferent to Alberta. It is responsive to incentives. Something supposedly “free market” conservative Albertans conveniently ignore.

Narrative Conflict Is Not Cultural Contempt

Many Albertans feel disrespected by national discourse. That feeling should be taken seriously. But it should not be confused with cultural hostility. Federal criticism of emissions or climate policy is not an indictment of Albertans as people. It is a judgment about outcomes with national consequences.

Every province experiences this friction when its core economic model collides with broader priorities. Alberta is not singled out. It is simply exposed.

Alienation is real. Contempt is overstated.

Quebec Is Not Favoured. It Is Strategic.

Comparisons with Quebec reveal more about Alberta’s approach than Ottawa’s bias. Quebec secures flexibility through persistent institutional negotiation, incremental gains, and credible leverage. Alberta has often preferred episodic confrontation and maximalist rhetoric.

Asymmetry in Canadian federalism is not charity. It is earned through strategy. Alberta has tools available to it. It has simply underused them.

Alberta Needs Better Politicians, Not Separation from Canada

What Alberta needs is not louder grievance politics but better politicians. United Conservative premiers Jason Kenney and Danielle Smith have behaved less like statesmen than grievance culture warriors, mistaking rhetorical escalation for leverage and moral outrage for strategy. They have treated Ottawa as an adversary to be denounced rather than a political arena to be navigated, and in doing so have weakened Alberta’s actual influence.

Coalition-building is slow, unglamorous work. It requires compromise, persistence, and an understanding of how federal power is assembled and exercised.

Kenney and Smith instead chose performative conflict aimed at a domestic audience, a style that may energize a base but delivers little in concrete gains. Provinces advance their interests in Ottawa by building alliances across regions, cabinets, and parties. Alberta under these premiers has largely opted out of the hard work—and paid the predictable price.

Peter Lougheed understood this better than anyone.

As premier, he fought Ottawa hard, especially Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, but he did so with strategic discipline rather than reflexive hostility. Lougheed built alliances with other premiers, understood the levers of federal power, and knew when to escalate and when to negotiate.

He secured constitutional recognition of provincial control over natural resources, helped shape the modern energy royalty regime, and positioned Alberta as a confident actor within Confederation rather than a permanent aggrieved outsider. Lougheed disagreed with Ottawa without defining Alberta against Canada. That distinction mattered. He accomplished more in a decade-plus of hard, strategic federalism than Kenney and Smith are likely to achieve through years of performative defiance.

Alberta’s problem is not Ottawa. It is the decline of serious provincial leadership.