The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.
OTTAWA— The Harper government is putting new muscle to its ambitious natural resource strategy, clearing away regulatory hurdles to drive Canada’s energy and mineral development and expand exports to Asia.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty’s budget Thursday included an announcement that the government is speeding up environmental reviews of major resource projects, including the controversial Northern Gateway pipeline that will bring oil sands bitumen to Kitimat, B.C., for export to Asia.
Ottawa is also stepping up its battle with oil industry opponents by ordering the Canada Revenue Agency to increase monitoring of environmental charities that engage in political advocacy, a move critics say is an attempt to cow activists into silence.
Mr. Flaherty said the government was responding to complaints that environmental groups may be abusing their charitable status, in part by accepting foreign donations for campaigns that oppose pipeline construction and oil sands development.