It has been two months since Mark Carney survived a non-confidence vote and went on to sign an MOU in which he agreed to support a new bitumen pipeline across British Columbia. In this morning’s interview, Jennifer Lash, the Liberal candidate for our North Island Powell River riding in the last election, explains why she still thinks Mark Carney is the right Prime Minister for Canada.
Chinese oil inports have gone through a hundred fold increase, to 300,000 barrels per day, since the TransMountain pipeline expansion opened and China expressed a strong interest in further oil and LNG imports during Carney’s visit. Canada will now allow up to 49,000 Chinese EVs to enter our automotive market every year (after paying a tariff of 6.1%). In five years, the quota will rise to 70,000. In return, China is reducing tariffs on Canadian canola seeds (from 84% to 15%) and lifting duties on other farm products like canola meal, lobsters, crabs, and peas.
The President of the Global Automakers of Canada said his organization should have been consulted before Carney signed the deal.
Aaron Gunn, the Conservative MP for our North Island-Powell River riding called the preliminary agreement ‘shortsighted’ and warns Carney is opening the door for ‘state-subsidized industries and state-owned companies in China’ to undercut Canadian workers.
There may also be a shift towards more low carbon energy ahead. A spokesperson for Energy and Natural Resources told the National Observer that later this year Canada will unveil a plan harnassing clean energy” and ‘to drive down greenhouse gas emissions down by decarbonizing transportation, buildings and heavy industry.’
On the world stage, NATO’s Secretary General praised Canada’s support of the Ukraine and Greenland, saying that since Carney became Prime Minister, Canada ‘is really back in NATO, back in defending the transatlantic alliance. And I think that’s great news.’
In the wake of these events, Cortes Currents asked Jenifer Lash if she still supports Mark carney. This is what she says:
Many of your listeners may know this, I’m not sure, but I have spent most of my professional career as an environmentalist working to protect the coast of BC from offshore oil and gas development, from oil tankers, and then later as a climate activist. So these issues are very near and dear to my heart. As a result of the MOU that Mark Carney signed with Premier Smith in Alberta, and a commitment around a pipeline, I’ve been asked many times if I still support this government. In fact, I’ve been asked if I dodged a bullet in not being elected in the 2025 election. I don’t think I dodged a bullet. I do still support this Prime Minister.
Before I jump into those reasons, I just want to reiterate I still don’t want to see a pipeline to this coast, even though the Prime Minister has indicated that he would support one. I don’t think that’s a reason to abandon Mark Carney and the Liberal government. In fact, I feel even more strongly that he is the right Prime Minister to be leading this country.
First of all, when I was an activist—I still consider myself an activist to some degree—but when I was working professionally in the environmental movement, I had the luxury of being what I would call a single-issue person. So I was very committed to the environment and climate, which I know are very big issues, but I paid less attention to our international trade; I paid less attention to global security. I had the luxury of doing that because we had a partner in the United States that provided us with a strong trading relationship and provided U.S. security, both in terms of being a neighbour with a very large military and also the relationship with NATO.
I didn’t realize, and I don’t think many Canadians realized, how much that was a luxury. We are really feeling how scary and uncertain it is not having that, both in terms of the health of our economy and global security. So I feel right now that even though those issues of environmental protection and climate are still so critically important, we really need to be thinking about how we are building an economy for the future and how we are ensuring we have global stability.
I really like what Mark Carney is doing in terms of developing new trade relationships so that we’re lessening our dependency on the United States, as well as his diplomacy with other countries in terms of really trying to figure out what to do about Greenland.
What do we do about living right next door to this major power that is slightly unhinged at this moment? How do we deal with the Arctic and the protection of our country there? How do we ensure that our allies in NATO are continuing to support us even if the United States is not?
When I look at those issues, I realize that I really need to look beyond just the ones that are the closest to my heart and think more about the country in general and not just for me. I have two 25-year-old kids. I want them to be able to afford homes. I want them to live in a country of safety and security. And I want them to live in a place with beautiful places to go and a healthy climate. So I really look at the full package now, and that’s really made me understand the value of having leadership from someone like Mark Carney and the Liberal government.
The second reason I still support this government is that there is no alternative. If we look at what Pierre Poilievre is saying and also what our own Member of Parliament for North Island-Powell River, Aaron Gunn, is saying, if they were in power, we would be working closer with Donald Trump, which is scary.
We would not be supporting our allies in Greenland because Aaron Gunn just came out saying that Mark Carney’s decision to do that is wrong. We would not be supplying Canadians with electric vehicles that are cheaper, affordable, and better for the environment. We would not be in a better place under Conservative leadership.
It is a little bit harder to critique the NDP because, of course, they don’t have a leader right now. But a quick scan of what some of the leaders are suggesting shows they are basically saying reduce the investment in the military—as if you have to choose between support for the military and the climate.
So they’re saying reduce that. They’re also not talking about some of the core climate policies that are really critical to a climate plan. They’re saying, “we’ll make jobs,” but they’re not really talking about the policies that reduce our emissions, as if those are not important. So I don’t see any leadership from the NDP either. So that takes me back to supporting the Liberal government.
Thirdly, I would say that Mark Carney and the Liberal government still have the best climate plan out there. They have doubled down on their commitment around industrial carbon pricing, which I know is not a sexy or fun topic to talk about except for people like me who love to talk about industrial carbon pricing, but it is responsible for reducing about 25% of our emissions. It is the most important policy we can ever put in place.
The system that was originally put in place under Trudeau had some problems with it. I won’t get into the details around it, but there were some challenges in how the provinces were implementing it. Mark Carney has committed to improving and fixing those problems so that we have an even more effective industrial carbon price.
We’ve already passed regulations that strengthen our commitments around methane. We have to work with the provinces now on equivalency agreements, but we’re doing that. That’s a requirement. That’s always been a requirement. And in his recent announcement from China, he said electric vehicles are the future.
So I have confidence that he’s committed to not only ensuring that all Canadians have access to electric vehicles but building an electric vehicle industry in Canada. So it’s helping our economy as well. So he’s really still leaning into the core principles that are required for Canada to reduce our emissions.
Conservatives would be getting rid of industrial carbon pricing, and as I mentioned earlier, the NDP don’t even talk about these principles or these policies; they don’t even mention their commitment to them.
Right now, in a world where we have to step out of being single-issue and look at the broader economy, culture, and security of Canada as a whole, I’m not getting everything I want.
I don’t want to see a pipeline to this coast, but I think Canada is getting what it needs, and I think that is something we really need to hold on to and learn to live in. That discomfort of not being able to be single-issue, not being able to say, “if you put a pipeline to this coast, I’m not going to vote for you.” Because if we start to say things like that, we lose the critical pieces of security that we need for this country.
This doesn’t mean we sit back and go, “Okay Liberals, you just go at it,” and “I’m not going to complain about anything you do.” I think we can be voicing a lot of really great things to the Prime Minister and to the Liberal government. For example, some projects that are happening in this riding or close to this riding.
So there’s the Yə̓yus Wind Farm that the Wei Wai Kum nation has majority ownership in. We should be shouting that from the rooftops. That is just fantastic clean energy coming from the North Island. Major ownership by First Nations, which is great economic development for them. That is super exciting, and I really hope this project gets right through and gets set up. I know they’ve got a long-term deal with BC Hydro. Fantastic.
There’s the Northisle copper mine up near Port Hardy, which will produce the copper that we need so badly for batteries for electric vehicles, and they have really strong commitments to the principles of UNDRIP and sustainability. How do we ensure that they remain committed to those as they seek approval for their mine? That would be great economic development and a supply of the critical minerals we need for the energy transition.
Nationally, we still need to be talking about projects that we need. We need more clean energy projects. There’s a major wind farm on the East Coast. What are we doing about more clean energy here on the West Coast? We need interties between provinces so we’re helping other provinces get off natural gas and coal. We need the new commitment to the EV mandate because the Prime Minister is reviewing that, and we need to see that come back.
We need it to be strong. We need to make sure that when you go to a car dealership, there’s an electric vehicle for you to test drive. I’ve been to several, and they never have one on the lot. So we need that mandate back again so that we can actually have some choice. So there are lots of great things we can still do to foster a conversation around climate change and other environmental protection, but I think we are in a time right now where we have to live with this discomfort of not having a Prime Minister who’s giving us everything but is giving us the most of any of the leaders we have and putting us on the right path for the overall health of the country.
Links of Interest:
- Trump backs down on Greenland threats– Cortes Currents
- Articles about, or mentioning, Prime Minister Mark Carney
- Politics Untangled (Jennifer Lash’s political posts)
Top image credit: Prime Minister Mark Carney at work – courtesy the Office of the Prime Minister
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