Not all is rancour between Ottawa, Saskatchewan
Despite ire over carbon tax, co-operation is apparent in infrastructure and trade
SASKATOON The federal minister responsible for managing relations with the provinces is downplaying the effects of a major disagreement over carbon pricing between Ottawa and the Saskatchewan government, less than three months before it comes into force.
In an interview this week, Dominic Leblanc said he is neither surprised nor rattled by both levels of government engaging in “political positioning ” and “partisan comments” about the plan, which is set to roll out nationwide on Jan. 1.
“I think that it’s pretty clear that we’re not going to come to an agreement on what are the best measures to tackle climate change. There are fundamental differences in the views of the provincial and federal governments on that issue,” Leblanc said.
“But that doesn’t stop us from working together on increased trade with China or removing trade barriers between provinces and territories and infrastructure that’s good for the people of Saskatchewan,” he said, echoing the new federal line on boosting trade with China.
Leblanc’s comments appear to be borne out by multiple major joint federal-provincial agreements, including millions for agriculture and highways, a $32.1-million waste water treatment plant upgrade and a multi-year infrastructure deal pegged at almost $1 billion.
While anti- Ottawa and anti-carbon pricing rhetoric is understood to play well with the Saskatchewan Party ’s base, government ministers have not stopped meeting with their federal counterparts — or posing for photos that are then splashed online and in the press.
Saskatchewan Environment Minister Dustin Duncan on Friday characterized the federal-provincial relationship as “fine,” but his cabinet colleague Jeremy Harrison used much stronger language, saying it is “very difficult” and laying the blame for that on Ottawa.
It’s pretty clear that we’re not going to come to an agreement on what are the best measures to tackle climate change.
Collaboration at the bureaucratic level continues apace, but the federal Liberals have broken with convention by “linking” every file at the political level back to its twinned climate change and economic strategy, Harrison said in an interview this week.
“They link everything to the carbon tax and they say, ‘If you’re not doing what we want you to do on the carbon tax then we’re going to punish you on all this other stuff, and be unwilling to be reasonable and be unwilling to work with you,’ ” Harrison said.
Pointing to the $896-million bilateral infrastructure funding agreement signed this month in Regina — the last such deal to be inked by Ottawa and the provinces — Harrison said Ottawa displayed a “complete unwillingness to be reasonable.”
Leblanc, meanwhile, said the 11-year deal was signed after Saskatchewan’s “understandable and reasonable” concerns were resolved.
Harrison also took issue with the federal minister’s comments on partisanship, saying he believes disagreeing with Ottawa’s climate change strategy is about policy rather than politics.
“We fundamentally disagree with the policy,” he added.
Leblanc’s comments come just over a month after Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe emerged from a meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Saskatoon to tell reporters that his government’s relationship with Ottawa on economic matters was “frosty.”
Moe has made opposition to the so-called carbon tax a central plank of his premiership, and his cabinet has been increasingly critical of Ottawa on climate change, as well as the stalled Trans Mountain Expansion Project and a general lack of pipeline capacity.
The Saskatchewan government has asked the province’s court of appeal to rule on the constitutionality of Ottawa’s plan to impose a $20-per-tonne price on carbon emitted by provinces that do not have their own climate change plan beginning next year.
The court is expected to hear the case next year. The prime minister and federal environment minister have said repeatedly that the price on carbon — which Moe and others have derided as a job killer — is coming whether the provinces like it or not.
Leblanc acknowledged the spat but said it’s less “dramatic” and “confrontational” than fights between the provinces and the federal governments of Brian Mulroney and Pierre Elliott Trudeau.
Asked last week about the provincial government taking potshots at Ottawa on issues such as climate change and pipelines, Saskatchewan NDP Leader Ryan Meili said that political strategy “puts the people of Saskatchewan in a difficult position.”
Pointing to sluggish job growth numbers and poor health outcomes, Meili said picking fights with Ottawa is “ineffective” and Moe should “focus on what’s actually happening here at home, because that’s where the real issues are.”