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Energy takes backseat in Canada Canada prepares to vote Oct. 14; Stephen Harpers’ Conservatives have lost once-commanding lead as financial crisis takes forefront Gary Park For Petroleum News
Financial mayhem is carving into Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s hopes of forming a majority government on Oct. 14, according to the final public polls which were prohibited five days before voting.
As a result, energy issues have dropped from the radar screen.
Under attack by the four opposition parties for his stand-fast policy on the economy and his delay in unveiling a Conservative party election platform until Oct. 7, Harper has seen a once-commanding lead disappear as fast as voters’ stock market investments.
In power since January 2006, Harper has been forced to build alliances with various combinations of the Liberals, New Democrats and Bloc Quebecois to get legislation through the House of Commons, leaving him to govern on a knife edge. Now the emergent Greens, which have about 10 percent support among decided voters, have complicated that mix.
Harper entered the five-week campaign with a strong lead in the polls and a chance to secure an outright majority, but that prospect has evaporated over the last two weeks, especially in the key battlegrounds of Greater Vancouver, southern Ontario and Quebec.
A 14-point edge over the Liberals at the outset has shrunk in recent polls to the range of 4 to 9 percentage points, with the New Democrats tightening their hold on third place, while the Greens and Bloc Quebecois serve as spoilers for the Big Three by claiming up to 20 percent support.
No time for energy Preoccupation with economic woes has left little desire for serious debate of energy-related matters from greenhouse gas emissions, changed tax rules for income trusts, the future of oil sands expansion and Arctic resource development, led by the Mackenzie Gas Project.
However, Harper has promised that if re-elected he will implement changes to the northern regulatory regime to speed up resource projects by simplifying the hearing process, increasing transparency, achieving greater consistency and reducing administrative costs..
That will include the establishment of a satellite Major Projects Management Office in northern Canada to improve “oversight, accountability and collaboration throughout the stages of federal project review.”
By reducing regulatory and other barriers, the Conservatives believe they can expand the pipeline network in the Far North and deliver oil and gas to markets in Canada and elsewhere.
But that comes too late for the Mackenzie Gas Project, which continues its plodding progress through a regulatory maze, while the proponents wait for the long-promised federal fiscal regime and watch their capital costs climb, while natural gas prices decline.
Greenhouse gas differences On the issue of curbing greenhouse gas emissions, there is clear separation between the Conservatives and their rivals.
Harper has pledged to reduce emissions in absolute terms by 20 percent over 2006 levels by 2020. To achieve that goal, he will work with NAFTA partners in the United States and Mexico, at both national and state levels, to develop and implement, between 2012 and 2015, a North America-wide cap and trade system. But he is emphatic that there will be “no carbon tax” in Canada.
To bolster its environmental credentials, the Conservatives plan to overhaul the Environmental Enforcement Act by establishing a team of prosecutors, increasing inspection and seizure powers and strengthening fines and penalties for violators.
Those changes will require each company convicted of an environmental crime to notify shareholders of its conviction and punishment.
The Liberals are ready to impose a tax on fossil fuels, offset by income and business tax cuts, while the New Democrats have proposed a cap-and-trade system to create incentives for big business to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and to slash emissions by 80 percent by 2050.
The New Democrats are also committed to placing a moratorium on expansion of the oil sands and to requiring oil companies to reclaim land strip mined for petroleum production.
The one unexpected twist, but not enough to affect the election outcome, was Harper’s announcement that a Conservative government would prohibit the export of oil sands bitumen to countries without carbon-emission targets equivalent to Canada’s.
Without consulting the industry — an echo of the bombshell decision two years ago to start taxing trusts in 2011 as if they were corporations — he caught everyone off-guard, especially Enbridge, whose proposed Gateway pipeline targets Asian markets — the only serious current plan to export bitumen outside of the United States.
Enbridge Chief Executive Officer Pat Daniel is still trying to figure out what Harper’s promise means, but for now he does not think it will affect Gateway, which hopes to sell into a broad Asian market, not just China.
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