METOOISM

'Defending Saskatchewan': Moe prepared to take legal actions over pollution laws


Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe says he's prepared to take legal action over federal regulations on pollution.


'Defending Saskatchewan': Moe prepared to take legal actions over pollution laws© Provided by The Canadian Press

Moe says Canadian environmental policies are causing economic harm to his province and creating hardship for farmers, natural resource workers and others.

A cost analysis from Saskatchewan's Ministry of Finance estimates the province could lose $111 billion by 2035 through federal environmental policies. Moe says the province is trying to maintain control over its natural resources, and that includes maintaining emissions from fertilizer and oil and gas production.

Nearly a year after tweeting "Saskatchewan needs to be a nation within a nation," the premier released on Tuesday a policy paper called “Drawing the Line: Defending Saskatchewan’s Economic Autonomy” at a chamber of commerce lunch in North Battleford.

The paper highlights the government’s plan to flex its own autonomy, starting with a bill to be introduced this fall to address federalism.

"We respect the Constitution we have in this nation. But (the bill) will most certainly reassert our provincial jurisdiction that we have and ultimately provide us that opportunity and certainty to move forward and expand some of the most sustainably producing industries on Earth," Moe said.

There will be an opportunity to collaborate with Alberta on the bill, Moe said, as Premier Danielle Smith has promised to table a sovereignty act this fall to assert Alberta's constitutional rights.

Saskatchewan is on the cusp of further investment and opportunity, Moe added, and he doesn’t want to see that disrupted by Ottawa.

The province continues to experience a resource boom in potash, uranium and oil brought on by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and global supply issues. In the first three months of the year, Saskatchewan made nearly $2 billion from potash and oil, enough for the province to balance its budget for the first time since 2014-15.

"All of the moves we are taking from here ... are about Saskatchewan. And they're about the opportunity we have in this province to grow and prosper, to attract investment and to ultimately reinvest back into our communities," Moe said.

Under the Constitution, natural resources mainly fall under provincial jurisdiction, said Dwight Newman, a law professor at the University of Saskatchewan.

"The complication is the federal government has some jurisdiction that can overlap with that. And on some certain types of environmental legislation, that may end up affecting resources," Newman said.

If conflicts between federal and provincial governments can’t be resolved through negotiation, it must be decided by the courts, he said.

That is being done with Canada's Impact Assessment Act, which allows the government to assess environmental impacts of projects on federal lands before they go ahead.

In May, Alberta’s top court gave its opinion that the law is unconstitutional, but the federal government plans to appeal. Saskatchewan had participated in the legal reference in support of its western neighbour, and Moe has said Saskatchewan would intervene should it move to the Supreme Court of Canada.

Moe's announcement Tuesday that he's prepared to take legal action "certainly indicates a possible readiness to pursue constitutional challenges or to support others in pursuing constitutional challenges in respect to federal legislation that creates issues," Newman said.

"Whether it indicates something beyond that, it’s difficult to know."

Saskatchewan previously challenged the federal government on the constitutionality of the price on carbon, but lost after the Supreme Court ruled Ottawa is acting within its jurisdiction.

Moe’s policy paper also includes previously announced initiatives, including pursuing greater control over the province's immigration and developing its own carbon credit program.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 11, 2022.

Mickey Djuric, The Canadian Press

Murray Mandryk: Moe's western grievances sound like what we've heard from Quebec

Opinion by Murray Mandryk - 

There's little doubt that Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe's paper Tuesday will spark heated debate on what the province should or shouldn't be demanding.© Provided by Leader Post

It’s hard to say which is now easier for people in Saskatchewan: To rally behind Premier Scott Moe’s latest nation-within-a-nation sentiments that emerged out of disdain for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government or to simply write it off as political pandering.

Sadly, it likely depends on your politics.

For those trying to live a somewhat reasoned and neutral existence in this ever-polarizing social media age, this one may be especially hard to process.

But maybe we all need to step back a moment and think about how we got here.

No matter whether you’re wildly cheering Scott Moe today or rolling your eyes, these demands do stem from the failure of this nation to have meaningful debate that addressed Quebec’s incessant demand for special considerations, not unlike the ones we heard from Saskatchewan on Tuesday.

Really, is much of what we are hearing from Moe in excess of what we’ve seen demanded by Quebec?

Moe unveiled Tuesday his policy paper to “protect” Saskatchewan against “federal intrusion” into provincial jurisdictions. It included talk of:
“Provincial legislation to clarify and protect constitutional rights belonging to the province;”
“Greater autonomy over immigration policy to ensure Saskatchewan has the people it needs;”
Greater autonomy on tax collection;
“Better recognize Saskatchewan industry contributions to sustainable growth” like the development of a “carbon credit market to support our natural resource industries” and;
Calls to prepare “legal actions, legislative or otherwise, to maintain control of electricity, fertilizer emission/use targets and oil and gas emissions/production.”

While some may find this more tepid than some of the recent rhetoric, these are still rather aggressive measures.

Also, the white paper makes the massively bold claim that federal climate change policies will “cost Saskatchewan’s economy $111 billion between 2023 and 2035.” This will clearly be challenged and debated in the coming days.

It’s clear why Moe has now been emboldened to pursue his grievance list more aggressively — not that he’s ever needed much to be egged on.

After all, he began his leadership as premier in January 2018 by telling people “just watch me” take on Trudeau and the federal government.

For too many politicians in this post-Donald Trump, post-COVID-19 era where feeding anger and validating grievances gets you elected, leadership has become a form of performance art.

There was a time when even the most fervent Western leaders — Allan Blakeney or Grant Devine in Saskatchewan or Peter Lougheed or Don Getty in Alberta — did approach matters with the interests of the nation as a whole in mind.

But there’s no longer much of a political price to be paid for being little more than a regionalist who’s uncompromising or perhaps a little irrational in one’s demands.

Consider Danielle Smith’s selection as leader of Alberta’s United Conservative Party in which she campaigned on an Alberta Sovereignty Act that would ignore federal court rulings.

“No longer will Alberta ask permission from Ottawa to be prosperous and free. We will not have our voices silenced or censored,” Smith said upon winning the UCP leadership and become Alberta’s premier-designate last week.

“We will not have our resources landlocked or our energy phased out of existence by virtue-signalling prime ministers.”

As for Moe’s response? “I look forward to working alongside you as we advance the priorities of Western Canada,” the Saskatchewan premier said.

Smith has retracted slightly in her worldview, saying that she will not breach the Canadian constitution. But what we are likely to see from her — and are now seeing from Moe stemming from his “economic sovereignty” meetings this summer — is an appeasement of this regional anger.

We need to examine this approach for the nation. But as we debate, shouldn’t we ask if it’s really all that much more outrageous than Quebec’s demands on language, prohibiting religious freedoms (possibly in violation of human rights), and, of course, immigration.

One gets the Western politics. But maybe we also need to step back and better understand how we got here.

Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.

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