Getting the government they voted for;
Alberta will try to spend its way out of an economic downturn with a provincial budget that projects a $6.1-billion deficit, hikes sin taxes and calls for billions in new debt.
Good and hard.
Related: Shell is among the first companies to publicly cancel a project as a result of pipeline constraints.
Based on the federal election campaign, the CPC was the slightly less progressive of the alternatives. They did little to differentiate themselves from the Liberals other than the flacid slogan of the Spawn’s “not being ready”. A true conservative party would come out and state that the state has gone too far and needs to be rolled back. The CPC did no such thing while in power and went to great lengths to hide any such thoughts.
As for the demise of the Socreds, Alberta was no rural outpost in 1972 (the Oil Sands were being developed by GCOS) and all Lougheed accomplished was to pass the progressive litmus test of going in blue and turning pink. He was a thorn in the side of the Spawn’s father, a decent guy, but he was no “conservative”. Nor were any of his successors including the former Liberal and popular populist, Klein.
“As for the demise of the Socreds, Alberta was no rural outpost in 1972 (the Oil Sands were being developed by GCOS)”
It sure wasn’t. That’s why the Socreds got clobbered.
As Premier, Strom undertook a number of initiatives, especially in education and youth-related fields, but was politically ineffective. He lacked both charisma and an overriding sense of purpose, and his government gradually lost popularity. In the 1971 election, his government was handily defeated by Lougheed’s Progressive Conservatives. Strom served as opposition leader for two years, but soon relinquished the position and did not seek re-election in 1975. After leaving politics, Strom returned to farming.
Where he should have never left. The end.
Pretty simple, really…..as a large international company, they invest around the world where they see the best returns with the lowest risk. Shell pulling out is a much more devastating move than it appears on the surface. It implies that Alberta is now a high risk, low return province……NDP provincially, Liberals federally, envirofascists at every turn and a royalty review, etc. Pretty simple equation. And you can bet some of the other big players are considering exactly the same thing.
Public Unions are a curse for any Democracy & should be outlawed.
What other organization besides a government forces a tax on people every pay check for political mean?
Weather they agree or not.
ah yes, Newfberta, the hot bed of conservatism. It was your hero preston manning ( the bible banger) who convinced hubcaps and the other 7 to cross the floor, and that religious idiot was also pushing for “green policies”. At the rate your pols are going left you will not only equal OntarIowe’s decline, you will surpass us befor Nolty is voted out. As to RDS pulling out of Alberta, that’s pretty funny, as they are nothing but wind farming lefties themselves. So things must look pretty bad to them:-)))
Completely incorrect, JJM. The REAL problem in Alberta is governments that have forgotten how to control spending starting with Stelmach, then Redford and now her clone, Notley. THAT is the problem!
See, it’s like this.
Unfortunately, it seems as though the previous election the populace chickened out of voting Wild Rose.
So they chose socialists light, the progressive…..
In the last election they got so angry at the socialists light they voted by default the actual socialists.
Now pay attention to this. The Wild Rose and the progressives……together actually got more votes then the agent orange.
Now to speak of uniting the two is a complete nonsense. This is the same set of “experts” that came with the silly “he is not ready”.
Some strategy.
There needs to be a leader that inspire people to vote for Wild Rose, not sure that the current one is up to it right now. He may get better.
Let’s say he gets 2 years probation, if he does not pick up the pace there is will need to be change.
The bad syntax above is the fault of the “artificial intelligence”
The blackberry.
“The REAL problem in Alberta is governments that have forgotten how to control spending starting with Stelmach, then Redford and now her clone, Notley. THAT is the problem!”
A problem compounded by: Crude Oil USD 45.94 bbl 29 October 2015.
More on Shell:
http://www.theweek.co.uk/oil-price/60838/oil-price-impact-leaves-shell-with-74bn-loss
“Crude Oil USD 47.25 bbl 28 October 2015: this is why Shell is calling it quits.” Obviously not. The announcement came just a few hours after the NDP budget was announced.
Yes, the oil industry can put up with socialism; can, does, and has. And once the Notley government have discovered that they have no money and their credit is shot, it may be possible to do business with them. But they will have to half-ruin Alberta before they realize they are in that situation.
.
The NDP better plan to hire every Albertan as a government worker because after four years of this nobody who is having to pay for this will vote NDP again but they will get only one chance to throw the socialists out. After two terms the Alberta socialists will be as well intrenched as they are in Quebec & Ontario. Look how long it took Saskatchewan voters to finally wake up to what our commies were doing to us.
It is foolish to assume that government policy has no effect on resource development decisions. “Developing in Alberta is too risky now” is true enough, but the government is a considerable part of that. Shell will have had serious conversations with the Alberta government, and will have formed conclusions about government policy in the near and in the more distant future. In short, they know things that we don’t.
Remember also that if the NDP is thrown out in 2019 (and that is by no means certain) it can take years to turn a radicalised bureaucracy and judiciary around.
From Ezra Levant: ‘Moody’s declares Alberta “credit negative” after NDP budget — and Notley is “fudging the accounting”)
Moody’s, the international credit rating agency, has issued a warning about Alberta’s budget.
So far I’ve emphasized the anti-oil and gas aspects of the budget — the demonization of the industry.
But Moody’s is more concerned about creditworthiness. It’s their job to warn the world’s bankers about lending money to Rachel Notley and her NDP extremists.
Their headline says it all: “Moody’s: Alberta’s planned steep debt increase is credit negative”.’
Sounds like a great place to do business.
Ezra Levant reports that the cost of renovating 24 Sussex Drive – a fine old house that should last forever if its roof is kept in repair – has miraculously risen from $10 million to $150 million in a couple of days.
Also this from Ezra: Cenovus Energy joins list of companies cutting jobs, spending after Alberta NDP budget
Cenovus Energy says it will be laying off more Alberta workers — 700 people in addition to the 800 it had already laid off. It is also cutting spending by $400M.
As I reported earlier, the day before, it was MEG Energy, and the day before that, it was Shell.’