C’mon, why can’t we just tax Alberta oil on the way out the door? What’s wrong with an export tax?
Why aren’t you on Team Canada?
It’s funny to listen to that reasoning over the past 18 months given that East of Saskatchewan, many Canadians and especially their elected officials, spent the last decade saying they didn’t want oil from Western Canada. Now that Trump has imposed tariffs on steel, aluminium and autos, but not oil, gas, potash or uranium, the folks out East are wondering why we can’t put an export tax on these products.
In this episode of Lilley Unleashed, I interview David Knight Legg a senior advisor to companies in finance, energy and tech and for senior advisor to former Alberta Premier Jason Kenney. We discuss Canada’s energy policies, trade strategies, and the importance of a strategic petroleum reserve.
Enjoy!
Great convo guys, thank you! And hopefully Danielle Smith can help other premiers to grow some brain, even tho it’s late in the game!
Great interview, Brian, but I do have one comment about something that simply wasn't clear.
David Knight Legg was absolutely correct in saying that the resources are owned by the provinces and Ottawa simply has no control over those resources. He also noted, again correctly, that export taxes are a really bad idea. What he didn't say was that export taxes are ILLEGAL. Such taxes are illegal under the Constitution and that position was upheld against Trudeau the elder in the 1980s.
The only, only, only thing that the feds can do is to prohibit exports but, as noted by him, that would be so catastrophic on so many levels that the feds had better not do it. In addition, if the feds did that, you can be sure that support for separatism in Alberta would absolutely skyrocket.
Of course, just because something is a truly, truly, truly awful idea, that doesn't mean that the Laurentians won't find it attractive and do it.