Re: “Notley and the failure of leadership,” p. 28, Sept. Gazette.
Warren Buffett is perhaps the world's most successful investor. I seem to recall him questioning the wisdom of a nation selling off its energy resources. Canada, the perpetual hewer of wood and drawer of water, seems to have no such concerns.
Alberta, under decades of Conservative government, has largely exported energy resources in their least value added form (crude oil and bitumin) for others, like the United States, to refine into gasoline and other high value products. Those other countries reap the benefits in terms of jobs and profits. And while Alberta's oilpatch was laying off workers by the thousands several years ago, some American refineries were expanding capacity and hiring workers.
Mr. Cooper, and the United Conservative Party (UCP), apparently want to see this trend continue. Hence his disappointment with the recent Federal Court's disapproval of the proposed new Trans Mountain pipeline, a conduit that would ship raw or semi-refined oil out of country, for others to profit from.
It's interesting that he blames the Trudeau government for this disapproval. The predecessor, the Conservative Harper federal government was in office for multiple terms and failed to get a single pipeline built to tidewater. How quickly Mr. Cooper forgets, and shifts blame elsewhere.
Nowhere in his Sept. 4 commentary in the Gazette does Mr. Cooper suggest increasing refining capacity in Alberta, to create value added petroleum products that would create jobs and profits for Albertans, and which might be more easily marketed and transported, than the gooey crude and bitumin the province is currently exporting, along with some refined products.
It seems to be the same old same old solution for him, even though the same old same old doesn't seem to be working very well.
Mr. Cooper makes unspecific mention of a "multi-billion- dollar boondoggle." I take it he is meaning the federal government's $4.5-billion purchase of the existing Kinder Morgan pipeline. Referring again to successful world class investor Warren Buffett, pipelines are typically a good investment. Mr. Buffett has invested in some.
Pipelines are simple, toll bridge operations, cash cows if you like, that generate gobs of revenue for doing the same, simple thing over and over again. That is moving oil through a pipe to a destination. As such, the purchase of the Kinder Morgan operation by Canada may be a good investment.
Whether it is or not depends on whether the price paid for it was fair market value. The Canadian finance minister, Bill Morneau, who has considerable business training and experience, has indicated the price paid was a fair one.
Mr. Cooper's member of the legislative assembly biography does not list any business experience or training, with the possible exception of involvement in 4-H.
As for Mr. Cooper's criticism of the current Alberta government for its carbon tax, I have to agree that the tax seems extreme, considering the circumstances. Although there seems to be an overwhelming consensus among those scientists whose specialty is the study of climate, that the cause of global warming is human activity, the cures that are implemented have to be balanced and restrained in terms of the economic hardship they cause to citizens of various jurisdictions.
Terry Storey
Olds
