Frontier Centre for Public Policy
ECO Extremism under reported in Canada

From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
How many remember that shortly after the federal government introduced emergency legislation against convoy protesters there was a real terrorist attack on a Coastal GasLink pipeline worksite in British Columbia?
Ottawa and Canadian security agencies are ignoring a threat posed by eco-extremists motivated by self-righteous climate change alarmism.
How many remember that shortly after the federal government introduced emergency legislation against convoy protesters there was a real terrorist attack on a Coastal GasLink pipeline worksite in British Columbia?
About 20 masked assailants wielding axes entered a pipeline worksite and intimidated Coastal GasLink workers and caused millions of dollars of damage to equipment and vehicles.
While politicians and mainstream media were fixated on bouncy castles and hot tubs, armed fanatics were intimidating human beings with weapons and destroying energy infrastructure.
There was bare mention of it in the media. Politicians made cursory mention of it on social media. Unlike the convoy protests, there were no in-depth investigative pieces immediately after the eco-terrorist attacks against Costal GasLink.
Eventually some media picked up on this terror attack, but then downplayed it.
CBC’s Fifth Estate months later aired a program that attempted to disparage an RCMP unit meant to investigate extremist attacks on energy sector infrastructure. In a piece of over 40 minutes, less than a minute was devoted to exploring the February 2022 terror attack.
The CBC wrote more about the attack and did identify the culprits as anarchists but did not explore their ideological motivations. It was almost like they were just anarchists bent on destruction without a coherent ideology.
Perhaps if they would do a deep dive, they would discover that the anarchists believing they are helping an Indigenous resurgence have been raised on a diet of unscientific climate change alarmism.
I recently compiled research for a Frontier Centre study that looked at this looming eco-extremist threat.
Besides the Coastal GasLink attack, there are extremist groups like Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion (in Canada). Traffic disruptions caused by Just Stop Oil have already led to bodily harm and unnecessary deaths in the UK where traffic mayhem ensued over a stunt on a bridge.
Canada has a serious blind spot when it comes to extremism associated with the far left. CSIS and Public Safety Canada are endlessly fixated on extremism associated loosely with the right, like Incels or anyone concerned about forced injections via vaccine mandates.
In Canada, the threat comes from various “Indigeno-anarchists” who believe they are supporting Indigenous people even as they attack energy projects that help First Nation communities. I discovered these extremists teach and recruit at our universities. Many professors are activists who normalize terrorism against the energy sector. Many were involved in the 2019-2020 Wet’suwet’en rail blockades that opposed Coastal GasLink.
Winnipeg activists were certainly involved. During the Wet’suwet’en blockades, they engaged in five major actions in Manitoba, from a demonstration outside an RCMP station to an action where “Indigenous warriors” blocked CN and CP rail tracks for several hours.
Calling themselves anarchists, they engaged in acts that could cause bodily harm and affect people’s ability to travel on passenger trains. Here is a document confirming they intended to commit “railroad sabotage.” Anarchists also make open mention of acts of sabotage and damage to drill sites associated with Coastal GasLink.
Central to the problem is problematic and torqued up climate change rhetoric that is causing unnecessary fear and anxiety within the public and is radicalizing people. If you believe the “earth is on fire” – which is a false belief held by many activists – some become radicalized to commit damage property and threaten lives.
Manitobans and Canadians must address the looming eco-terrorist threat before it’s too late.
Joseph Quesnel is a Senior Research Fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
Business
It Took Trump To Get Canada Serious About Free Trade With Itself

From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
By Lee Harding
Trump’s protectionism has jolted Canada into finally beginning to tear down interprovincial trade barriers
The threat of Donald Trump’s tariffs and the potential collapse of North American free trade have prompted Canada to look inward. With international trade under pressure, the country is—at last—taking meaningful steps to improve trade within its borders.
Canada’s Constitution gives provinces control over many key economic levers. While Ottawa manages international trade, the provinces regulate licensing, certification and procurement rules. These fragmented regulations have long acted as internal trade barriers, forcing companies and professionals to navigate duplicate approval processes when operating across provincial lines.
These restrictions increase costs, delay projects and limit job opportunities for businesses and workers. For consumers, they mean higher prices and fewer choices. Economists estimate that these barriers hold back up to $200 billion of Canada’s economy annually, roughly eight per cent of the country’s GDP.
Ironically, it wasn’t until after Canada signed the North American Free Trade Agreement that it began to address domestic trade restrictions. In 1994, the first ministers signed the Agreement on Internal Trade (AIT), committing to equal treatment of bidders on provincial and municipal contracts. Subsequent regional agreements, such as Alberta and British Columbia’s Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement in 2007, and the New West Partnership that followed, expanded cooperation to include broader credential recognition and enforceable dispute resolution.
In 2017, the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (CFTA) replaced the AIT to streamline trade among provinces and territories. While more ambitious in scope, the CFTA’s effectiveness has been limited by a patchwork of exemptions and slow implementation.
Now, however, Trump’s protectionism has reignited momentum to fix the problem. In recent months, provincial and territorial labour market ministers met with their federal counterpart to strengthen the CFTA. Their goal: to remove longstanding barriers and unlock the full potential of Canada’s internal market.
According to a March 5 CFTA press release, five governments have agreed to eliminate 40 exemptions they previously claimed for themselves. A June 1 deadline has been set to produce an action plan for nationwide mutual recognition of professional credentials. Ministers are also working on the mutual recognition of consumer goods, excluding food, so that if a product is approved for sale in one province, it can be sold anywhere in Canada without added red tape.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has signalled that his province won’t wait for consensus. Ontario is dropping all its CFTA exemptions, allowing medical professionals to begin practising while awaiting registration with provincial regulators.
Ontario has partnered with Nova Scotia and New Brunswick to implement mutual recognition of goods, services and registered workers. These provinces have also enabled direct-to-consumer alcohol sales, letting individuals purchase alcohol directly from producers for personal consumption.
A joint CFTA statement says other provinces intend to follow suit, except Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador.
These developments are long overdue. Confederation happened more than 150 years ago, and prohibition ended more than a century ago, yet Canadians still face barriers when trying to buy a bottle of wine from another province or find work across a provincial line.
Perhaps now, Canada will finally become the economic union it was always meant to be. Few would thank Donald Trump, but without his tariffs, this renewed urgency to break down internal trade barriers might never have emerged.
Lee Harding is a research fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
2025 Federal Election
The Cost of Underselling Canadian Oil and Gas to the USA

From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
Canadians can now track in real time how much revenue the country is forfeiting to the United States by selling its oil at discounted prices, thanks to a new online tracker from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. The tracker shows the billions in revenue lost due to limited access to distribution for Canadian oil.
At a time of economic troubles and commercial tensions with the United States, selling our oil at a discount to U.S. middlemen who then sell it in the open markets at full price will rob Canada of nearly $19 billion this year, said Marco Navarro-Genie, the VP of Research at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
Navarro-Genie led the team that designed the counter.
The gap between world market prices and what Canada receives is due to the lack of Canadian infrastructure.
According to a recent analysis by Ian Madsen, senior policy analyst at the Frontier Centre, the lack of international export options forces Canadian producers to accept prices far below the world average. Each day this continues, the country loses hundreds of millions in potential revenue. This is a problem with a straightforward remedy, said David Leis, the Centre’s President. More pipelines need to be approved and built.
While the Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) pipeline has helped, more is needed. It commenced commercial operations on May 1, 2024, nearly tripling Canada’s oil export capacity westward from 300,000 to 890,000 barrels daily. This expansion gives Canadian oil producers access to broader global markets, including Asia and the U.S. West Coast, potentially reducing the price discount on Canadian crude.
This is more than an oil story. While our oil price differential has long been recognized, there’s growing urgency around our natural gas exports. The global demand for cleaner energy, including Canadian natural gas, is climbing. Canada exports an average of 12.3 million GJ of gas daily. Yet, we can still not get the full value due to infrastructure bottlenecks, with losses of over $7.3 billion (2024). A dedicated counter reflecting these mounting gas losses underscores how critical this issue is.
“The losses are not theoretical numbers,” said Madsen. “This is real money, and Canadians can now see it slipping away, second by second.”
The Frontier Centre urges policymakers and industry leaders to recognize the economic urgency and ensure that infrastructure projects like TMX are fully supported and efficiently utilized to maximize Canada’s oil export potential. The webpage hosting the counter offers several examples of what the lost revenue could buy for Canadians. A similar counter for gas revenue lost through similarly discounted gas exports will be added in the coming days.
What Could Canada Do With $25.6 Billion a Year?
Without greater pipeline capacity, Canada loses an estimated (2025) $25.6 billion by selling our oil and gas to the U.S. at a steep discount. That money could be used in our communities — funding national defence, hiring nurses, supporting seniors, building schools, and improving infrastructure. Here’s what we’re giving up by underselling these natural resources.

342,000 Nurses
The average annual salary for a registered nurse in Canada is about $74,958. These funds could address staffing shortages and improve patient care nationwide.
Source

39,000 New Housing Units
At an estimated $472,000 per unit (excluding land costs, based on Toronto averages), $25.6 billion could fund nearly 94,000 affordable housing units.
Source
About the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
The Frontier Centre for Public Policy is an independent Canadian think-tank that researches and analyzes public policy issues, including energy, economics and governance.
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