Critics saw the government’s decision to allow exploration activities to continue during the Coal Committee’s consultations as a sign of bad faith. Recall Rachel Notley’s argument that “If the UCP wanted a good faith consultation, all of these activities would be halted until Albertans told the government if they wanted coal mining or not.” Continued exploration was surely anomalous if a ban on coal mining really was a possible outcome of public consultation. “Absent a moratorium on new development work,” argued my friend Kevin Van Tighem, “consultation will be a sham because that exploration work signals that the government has already decided the outcome: more strip mines.”

In the previous post, we saw the Committee on Private Members’ Bills unanimously (and surprisingly) recommending that Rachel Notley’s Eastern Slopes Protection Act proceed to the full assembly. But the spring sitting of the 2nd session of Alberta’s 30th legislature would soon end, and bills not passed by then would “die on the order paper” with the new legislative session expected in the fall. Normal legislative procedure takes time, and the NDP worried that even the second-reading debate they coveted might not occur before the session ended. Legislative debate can be expedited, however, if the assembly unanimously agrees to bypass normal procedure. On April 19, Notley introduced a motion requesting unanimous consent to give her bill second reading that very evening (see pp. 4613 and 4615-16 of the Alberta Hansard for the afternoon of April 19, 2021).

The previous post featured my letter urging UCP members of Alberta’s Committee on Private Members’ Bills to recommend that Rachel Notley’s Eastern Slopes Protection Bill proceed to full legislative debate. The committee met to decide this issue on April 13. Its deliberations can be watched here or read in transcript version here.

The odds seemed stacked against the bill. Private members bills from the opposition benches rarely get a positive recommendation from this committee, and none had thus far during the UCP regime. The expected political posturing from both sides for most of the meeting led me to think Notley’s bill would meet the same fate.

The title of this post was the subject line of the email I sent on April 11 to various UCP politicians and officials, and especially to all UCP members of the Alberta’s Standing Committee on Private Bills and Private Members’ Public Bills. The committee was slated to consider Rachel Notley’s proposed Eastern Slopes Protection Act. My emailed letter argued that it was in the UCP’s partisan interest to give the bill full legislative debate.

Originally published at The Line on April 6, 2021. Based on a longer piece published at the School of Public Policy on April 1 and on this site on April 3.

Alberta’s coal-fired political conflagration has revealed a broad and deep anti-coal animus. Polling tells us that about 70 per cent of Albertans oppose the Kenney government’s efforts to increase coal mining in the eastern slopes. Contributing to this alliance are those who want Oil and Gas but Not Coal (OGNC) to help drive Alberta’s economy.

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Originally published at the School of Public Policy on Apri 1, 2021.

Alberta’s coal-fired political conflagration has revealed a broad and deep anti-coal animus. Polling tells us that about 70 percent of Albertans oppose the Kenney government’s efforts to increase coal mining in the eastern slopes. Contributing to this alliance are those who dislike oil and gas as much as coal. More interesting are those who want Oil and Gas but Not Coal (OGNC) to help drive Alberta’s economy. From the OGNC viewpoint, it’s a matter of cost-benefit analysis: coal mining simply yields fewer economic benefits at higher environmental cost than oil-and-gas production.