A pro-pipeline convoy with thousands of truckers blared their way through an Alberta town Wednesday with a message for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: âWe donât need handouts.â
Two days after Trudeau announced a boost of $1.6 billion for the provinceâs struggling energy sector, oil and gas workers asked for action on the halted Trans Mountain pipeline -- not loans.
âThatâs posturing by our federal government,â said Murray Schur, founder and president of Schur Trucking Ltd., which transports drilling rigs. âSimply, what we need is pipelines in the ground to move the oil.â
The Liberalâs $4.5 billion purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline was announced this year, but hit a major snag when the Federal Court of Appeal decided there had not been enough consultation with Indigenous and environmental groups. Alberta is making less per barrel of oil because of a dearth of pipelines that would allow the province to sell higher priced product to overseas markets. Alberta estimates that it is losing $80 million per day.
âThey need to be able to restore investment back into Canada, because itâs the investors that arenât willing to put their dollars into Canada and theyâre going elsewhere,â said Schur. His trucks were in the rally to âdemonstrate the sense of urgencyâ to Trudeau, whose $1.6 billion in loans is ânot enough,â he said. Schur has been in the business for 25 years and told ŰÎŰ´ŤĂ˝ Channel on Wednesday that the current crisis is the worst heâs ever seen in the industry.
âAnd thereâs no end in sight,â he said, adding there are âsimply not enoughâ oil rigs operating in Canada anymore. âOil companies are shutting down their fields because theyâve got no room to move the oil, which ⌠puts thousands of people out of work.â
Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer joined the chorus of truck horns Wednesday for a town hall meeting in the town and criticized Trudeauâs announcement of the assistance package.
âIn typical Alberta fashion, the message sent back to Ottawa loud and clear: We donât need handouts, we just want to get back to work,â he said to applause. âGive a province $1.6 billion you might feed them for a couple of weeks, but let them build a pipeline to get our energy to market and you can feed them for a generation.â
Scheer encouraged the town hall audience, noting that they have âhad slumps before,â and characterized Trudeauâs government as having âpulled the rug out from underâ Albertans.
âThere are politicians across the country that donât believe in our energy sector, that donât want to see it developed or expanded,â he said. âBut conservatives are joining common cause with those across the country that do want to support this sector.â