https://business.financialpost.com/
‘We’re into our fifth year of a downturn and people are angry. Not just angry but scared’
CALGARY — The Liberals’ total rout in Alberta and Saskatchewan and the unceremonious unseating of Natural Resources Minster Amarjeet Sohi has posed another headache for the re-elected ruling party — finding a minister who can engage with the country’s biggest oil and gas producing provinces.
The Liberals lost their seats in Calgary, Edmonton and Regina during Monday’s federal election, resulting in a Liberal minority government without representation in the country’s two largest oil and gas producing provinces.
A minority government, potentially aided by parties hostile to the oilpatch, has already cast a gloom over downtown Calgary. The mood was further darkened after Husky Energy Inc. announced Tuesday it was laying off an undisclosed number of employees, adding to Alberta’s high unemployment rate, which stands at 6.6 per cent — a full point above the national average.
Without a voice from Alberta and Saskatchewan among its ranks, the Liberals are ill-prepared to deal with the challenges facing the oil and gas sector, which produces Canada’s largest export product, analysts say.
Both Trudeau and Bill Morneau, who was finance minister prior to the election, had said the government would reach out to the two provinces but analysts say that effort will be fraught with challenges, including picking a natural resources minister that can navigate the minefield that’s the oil and gas sector in a country that handed 70 per cent of the seats to parties supportive of tackling climate change.
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