Malign Neglect: What Calgary’s Water-Main Break Reveals about the Failure of City Government

The rupture of Calgary’s biggest water main revealed more than the problems of aging infrastructure. It showed a civic bureaucracy unable to provide basic services or fix things when they break, and a mayor eager to blame others and scold citizens for their selfishness in wanting city services in return for their tax dollars. Above all, it laid bare the increasing tendency of governments to neglect their core responsibilities in favour of social policy fetishes, and to sidestep accountability when things go wrong. Clear, competent, mission-focused public servants are a vanishing breed, writes George Koch, and governing a city is now mainly about keeping city workers, senior officials and elected politicians happy.

As the enormous task forces of the U.S. Navy steamed westward across the Pacific Ocean in the final year of the Second World War, aiming ultimately for Japan but with some of the most vicious fighting still to come on islands like Okinawa and Iwo Jima, commanding admirals issued orders that any man who fell overboard would be left behind. No ship was to slow down for search-and-rescue; nothing was to get in the way of the mission. Several weeks ago, during one of the Stanley Cup semi-final games, a player was hit hard, fell to the ice, got up with difficulty, hobbled towards the bench and disappeared down the “tunnel”. The game went on, uninterrupted. Here too, the mission – entertaining millions – took precedence.

But when two municipal workers on a crew attempting to repair a catastrophic infrastructure failure in a major North American city are injured, the work immediately halts. Although the broken item serves a function vital to civilization and life itself, the mission of restoring water supply as quickly as possible becomes secondary. This happened 10 days ago, a week after the rupture of a high-pressure water main in Calgary had sent water shooting up out of busy 16^th Avenue, triggering frantic 911 calls and initiating a “one week” repair saga that as of this writing is still weeks from completion.

Mission failure: The rupture of Calgary’s high-pressure water main on June 5 flooded 16th Avenue and threatened the city’s water supply; repairs were halted for a day after two workers were injured, an excess of caution that led to anger and frustration over the city’s basic competence. (Sources of photos: (top) Acton Clarkin/CBC; (bottom) CTV News)

The two injured workers were taken to hospital (thankfully, with non-life-threatening injuries) and the repair work eventually resumed the next day. But the interruption, piled atop days of confusing, contradictory, self-serving and at times seemingly false explanations and promises from senior city officials and embattled mayor Jyoti Gondek, generated further mistrust and anger among Calgarians over their city bureaucracy’s inability to operate the basics and get things fixed when something breaks down. The safety stand-down came on the very day the city had originally promised to restore water service, a time when every hour was precious, when the sacrifices by city residents and businesses were still bearable, when a return to normality seemed imminent. So why imperil the mission with nearly 24 hours of navel-gazing?

Though soon forgotten as new problems arose, the decision is emblematic of governments’ misplaced priorities, subordination of their core mission to their social policy fetishes and confusion over whose interests they exist to serve. Governing a city appears to have become primarily about keeping city workers, senior officials and elected politicians happy. Above all, to shield them against real accountability. Residents and businesses – the people who vote and pay the bills – are basically problems to be managed.

Built in 1975, the Bearspaw South feeder main draws from the Bearspaw Water Treatment Facility on the Bow River (bottom) and supplies 60 percent of Calgary’s drinking water. (Sources of photos: (top) The City of Calgary Newsroom; (bottom) Environmental Science & Engineering)

A few key facts for readers distant from Calgary. The 2-metre-diameter Bearspaw South feeder main burst its concrete casing on the afternoon of June 5. Installed in 1975, it draws from the Bearspaw Water Treatment Facility on the Bow River in the city’s northwest, and normally supplies up to 60 percent of the city’s drinking water. The break required the city to rely on a much older but very reliable plant drawing on the Glenmore Reservoir, which dams the Elbow River in the city’s southwest. The rupture prompted Stage 4 water restrictions with various bans and recommendations (more on that below), including a call for Calgarians to collectively cut the city’s water consumption by 25 percent, to 480 million litres per day. People immediately responded and, within several days, the city was reporting a water surplus. (For those seeking more details, the Calgary Herald has logged the key daily events.)

From the beginning, the city’s attempts to explain things did not quite add up. The water main had been inspected and tested regularly, officials said, or at least once for sure, and had received “maintenance” as recently as April. Most people probably assumed this involved physically examining it from the inside, then subjecting it to excessive pressure to see if it would hold, and patching up any weak areas. But all that would require first draining a pipe that, after all, 1.6 million people depend on every minute of every day. Later it came out that the line had last been drained and inspected in 2007.

For a few days it seemed as if water service would be restored within the promised one week. But on June 15 it was announced that line inspections (which apparently had occurred in the physical world and not merely in city officials’ media narrative) had found five more ‘hot spots’ – i.e., potentially calamitous weaknesses.

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So then it was explained that sophisticated external sensors had not detected any leaks in the most recent inspection. But then someone pointed out that catastrophic failures of an entire multi-layered structure of inner concrete core, steel piping, wire tension coils and outer concrete don’t usually begin with small leaks. And then someone else let slip that the line’s robustness had been confirmed by modelling, i.e., relying on theory.

“This pipe is only at the halfway point in its life cycle,” lamented Sue Henry, Chief of the Calgary Emergency Management Agency. “By all accounts, this should not have happened, but it did.” But others pointed out that the 100-year-lifespan claim was itself bogus. Lines of this type, said Tricia Stadnyk, Canada Research Chair in hydrologic modelling with the University of Calgary’s Schulich School of Engineering, are rated to last 50 years. And the Bearspaw South line was built…49 years ago. (The lifespan issue gets even worse – more on that below.)

A story full of holes: City officials said the water main had been inspected and tested regularly, and that no leaks had been found; experts pointed out a catastrophic breakage of the line’s multi-layered structure would not likely begin with small leaks – and it emerged the line had not actually been drained and inspected since 2007. (Sources: (left photo) The City of Calgary Newsroom; (right image) The City of Calgary Newsroom)

Gondek, for her part, extended her track record of blaming anyone but herself by claiming the disaster could have been averted if only Alberta’s UCP government had “paid enough attention” and not denied Calgary the money it desperately needed for preventative maintenance and repair. The implications of her claim didn’t quite gibe with city officials’ assurances that the line was considered just fine. And Alberta Premier Danielle Smith shot back that Gondek “has never asked us for funding to repair their water supply infrastructure,” and that the province is providing the city with $224 million to allocate as it pleases. Others noted it was never a question of money at all, because Calgary has generated successive annual budget surpluses but either spends those funds on more congenial pursuits or carries them over into future years.

Still, for a few days it seemed as if water service would be restored within, or very soon after, the promised one week. But on June 15 it was announced that line inspections (which apparently had occurred in the physical world and not merely in city officials’ media narrative) had found five more “hot spots” – i.e., potentially calamitous weaknesses. The repair timeframe was abruptly extended to three to five weeks, well into July. And with that, the City of Calgary declared a State of Local Emergency.

Pointing fingers: Calgary mayor Jyoti Gondek blamed Alberta’s UCP government for denying Calgary the money for maintenance and repairs; however, Calgary had never asked for such funding, and in any case received $224 million this year to allocate as it pleased. (Source of screenshot: The City of Calgary Newsroom)

There is an emergency in Calgary – and virtually every city across North America and the Western world. At least two types of emergency, actually. The first type is the open, at times almost gleeful refusal to focus on the basic responsibilities of municipal government. Such as paving roads – Calgary’s are notoriously cracked and potholed – instead of removing lanes from busy thoroughfares and lowering speed limits in order to create still more unused bike lanes. Or ensuring that public transit facilities are clean and safe for law-abiding users, as opposed to all-but abandoning buses and C-Trains to drug addicts, while still pushing for funding of the next multi-billion-dollar transit line.

Many Calgarians have grown exasperated at such neglect and indifference, and quite a few are paying close attention. One letter-writer to the Calgary Herald pointed out that aging water infrastructure is a well-known problem in civic government circles, noting that the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association in 2014 set the goal of getting “unaccounted for” water down to 10 percent of total treatment plant outflow. While that figure seems unsettling enough, five years later a third-party engineering report estimated that Calgary was losing 17-28 percent of all its treated water. While some of that was for fighting fires and some was theft, the majority was believed to be leakage. That makes it sound like very few of those “100-year-rated” lines had ever been inspected, tested and confirmed sound.

Core failures: As in many Western cities, Calgary’s leadership refuses to focus on the basic responsibilities of municipal government, like fixing potholes, clearing snow or ensuring public transit is safe and effective; it prefers building bike lanes people don’t use and planning the next multi-billion-dollar transit line. (Sources of photos (clockwise starting top left): Dave Gilson/CBC; Rachel Maclean/CBC; Postmedia; Matt Scace/Postmedia Network; Nick Blakeney/CityNews; Rebecca Kelly/CBC)

The staggering water volume implied by that percentage range – and worse, the toleration of the problem for at least a decade – evokes a deeply disturbing decrepitude analogous to the massive leakage from oil pipelines in the dying years of the Soviet Union or the chronic tapping of oil pipelines by thieves in Nigeria. Neither is a place Calgary should emulate. The 17-28 percent range is also, coincidentally, similar to the amount of water Calgarians are now expected to conserve. If Calgary’s pipes didn’t leak, we’d hardly have to conserve water at all even with the city’s biggest water main down. “It’s time,” declared attentive letter-writer Guy Buchanan, “to rethink projects such as the Green Line LRT project and concentrate the $4-billion of reserves that council is hoarding to fortify life-sustaining infrastructure.”

This fiasco is, unfortunately, just one example of an operating mentality averse to focusing on dreary real-world problems. The City of Calgary also hates clearing roads in winter and, every year, whenever it snows hard, the warming Chinook winds fail to arrive on schedule and streets remain snowbound, chaos erupts and the excuse – every single time – is that the city lacks the money and equipment needed to plough its roads and, in any case, does not have a “bare pavement policy.” These words come out of the city spokesperson’s mouth right about the time that private-sector operators wrap up clearing streets and sidewalks at private condo developments and old folks’ homes, have restored Walmart and Safeway parking lots to pristine expanses of black pavement, and can all head to Timmy’s for a well-deserved round of late-morning dark roasts and crullers.

But the inversion of priorities that sees the city authorize spending on ugly cactus-like plants for roundabout verges or cartoon-like bas-reliefs of leaping trout in dank freeway underpasses, and the extirpation of men with a mindset like Buker are not the kinds of emergency Gondek or other public officials have in mind when they declare one.

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The second type of emergency is what has been termed the “crisis of competence” that is afflicting not only governments but utilities and complex systems in general. Put simply, two generations of experienced technical specialists, managers and tradesmen have been gradually retiring, quitting in disgust or getting purged from organizations that now prioritize adherence to internal process and conformity to progressive ideology over the nuts and bolts of keeping systems running, heeding numbers that don’t lie and respecting unforgiving physical reality. The incoming cohorts, meanwhile, often don’t know what they’re doing and don’t want to learn, hiding their ignorance behind a veil of virtue-signalling arrogance.

Crisis of competence: Experienced technical specialists, managers and tradesman have been leaving or getting purged from organizations that prioritize conformity to progressive causes like ESG and wokism over the nuts and bolts of keeping systems running. At bottom, engineer James Buker, a retired city waterworks employee. (Source of bottom photo: Darren Makowichuk/Postmedia)

The National Post’s Jamie Sarkonak had a good column on this over the past week. “Today’s students can’t read as well as their predecessors; workers are increasingly hired on non-meritocratic bases; medical errors and aviation ‘safety issues’ are on the rise,” Sarkonak wrote. “Meanwhile, decision-makers are often so risk-averse they struggle to decide anything. At small scales, everything still works. But at large scales, the effects can be disastrous.” His piece also references a more detailed description of the phenomenon in the Palladium online journal.

As luck would have it, Calgary’s water main debacle produced an archetype of that vanishing breed. James Buker was an engineer in what used to be called the Waterworks division from 1975 to 2016, serving as head of water transmission and distribution for much of the period. Following the Bearspaw rupture, Buker told journalists that such an event became foreseeable after a similarly catastrophic though less damaging water main rupture in 2004. Excavation revealed that pipe had deteriorated to “talcum powder”, as Buker described it, in barely 20 years. This in turn led to the conclusion that the precast concrete used in an entire generation of city water infrastructure installed between 1950 and 1990 was insufficiently resistant to corrosion from soil. Buker was present for the installation of the Bearspaw South line in 1975. The problem, in other words, was well-understood. By some, at least.

But the inversion of priorities that sees the city authorize spending on ugly cactus-like plants for roundabout verges or cartoon-like bas-reliefs of leaping trout in dank freeway underpasses, and the extirpation of men with a mindset like Buker (or another retired city engineer who revealed that 2007 inspection date mentioned above), are not the kinds of emergency Gondek or other public officials have in mind when they declare one. Their kind of emergency mostly involves increasing their powers to boss the rest of us around. In their minds, the critical task is getting the citizenry good and compliant, in this case focusing us entirely on water conservation, so that we don’t ask too many questions about how the work is going and we blame ourselves when “we” fall short.

Hectoring and lecturing: When the state of emergency was declared, local media focussed increasingly citizens’ compliance with water restrictions; the mayor lectured Calgarians on the need to “dig in and do a little bit more”. Shown at bottom, people filling their water jugs at the city’s emergency supply trailer. (Sources of photos: (top) Helen Pike/CBC; (bottom) The Canadian Press/Jeff Mcintosh)

This is more than a rhetorical flourish. Following the state of emergency declaration, local media coverage shifted emphasis from the situation’s technical aspects to water conservation and more water conservation. Multiple articles were devoted, for example, to showcasing how residents in bedroom communities like Airdrie, which draw their drinking water from the city, were “rallying” to cut their water use.

Gondek has been lecturing Calgarians as if we are schoolchildren or simpletons, noting “how well you’re doing” and “when you need to dig in and do a little bit more.” She urged businesses to ask employees to work from home because this, after all, “would save them the time of having a shower in the morning and no one has to worry what they look or smell like, for that matter.” The mayor, though, always turned up looking good, and there were no reports she didn’t smell good.

Going by the city’s rhetoric, the crisis was largely about our failures. As if a construction company owner worrying he’ll have to shut down the jobsite and lay off his workers because the “Stage 4” water restrictions have forbidden welding, applying hot tar or even using glue due to the purported fire hazard is being narrow-minded. As if the costly disruption to thousands of businesses employing tens of thousands of people can just be shrugged off. As if a retired business owner who laboured for 40 years to afford a decent house in a good neighbourhood and now wants to enjoy gardening – and who, after all, pays many thousands in property taxes and water fees every year – is being selfish in worrying that her plants will die. As if receiving water from the City of Calgary is a gift, a privilege the city has every right to withdraw.

Water, water everywhere: The clampdown was based on a fear the city would not have enough water to fight a single major fire, this in a city posting daily water surpluses of 100 million litres, with two rivers (including the Bow River shown at top), two large reservoirs (including the Glenmore Reservoir shown at bottom) and multiple small water bodies to draw from.

Governments today appear to have only two basic states: immovable indolence and unchecked panic. When the first state trips over to the second, a machinery of absurd over-reaction kicks in, including costly campaigns to eradicate phantom risks. The clamp-down on industrial fire hazards was so severe that a reported 800 Calgary construction jobs were at risk of shutdown. The city feared it would not have enough water to fight even one major fire. This despite posting daily water surpluses as high as 100 million litres and having available two rivers, two large reservoirs and dozens of smaller water bodies to draw upon with pumps. The blanket ban on outdoor fires wasn’t lifted even when it rained four days in a row.

The postmodern world’s inability to rationally assess risks and balance possible risk-reduction measures against foreseeable costs and benefits includes a blindness to the principle that too much caution itself creates danger. Every additional precious hour lost during the water main repair process – such as through that nearly day-long safety stand-down – placed additional weight on the 92-year-old Glenmore facility. It was considered an engineering marvel of its era and its feeder main has proved better-built than anything installed in the last 50 years. But if it failed too, Calgary would be without safe drinking water. People might actually die.

It’s worth noting that the same progressives who now worry about two injured workers more than 1.6 million city residents were happy to destroy anything and anyone who got in their way during Covid-19. Those questioning the narrative were cast aside like used Kleenex or crushed like cockroaches.

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Of course it is great – stirring, in fact – how Calgarians rallied almost as one and did what needed to be done under inconvenient circumstances. Limiting water consumption has been a topic in every conversation; people really do care. The same civic-mindedness was shown during a brutal cold snap last winter, when southern Alberta’s electrical grid became overloaded and the system operator was on the verge of ordering rolling blackouts. People responded within minutes to an urgent request to shut off unneeded lights and electrical devices, and the problem passed. But if a whole city’s population can instantly do the right thing on more than one occasion, why can’t that city’s government also do the right things, like paving roads and inspecting aging water mains?

They don’t make ‘em like they used to: The water main break forced the city to rely on the 92-year-old Glenmore Water Treatment Plant (right), built on the north side of the Glenmore Reservoir (left), an engineering marvel of its era.

In the same spirit, I’m certain there still must be dozens, hundreds, even thousands of earnest and well-meaning city managers, tradespeople and technical specialists who know what they’re doing and would love to focus on just getting the job done, if the internal culture would only let them. The repairs are getting done – even if it’s with the help of a small army of private-sector “partners” – so the entire city payroll can’t be incompetent.

But if the Bearspaw South rupture had been felt and not merely declared to be an emergency, then the repair work wouldn’t stop for two injured workers. As Star Trek’s Mr. Spock liked to intone, “Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” All good progressives used to nod in rhythm to that line; but either the present-day City of Calgary is from a different other planet, or the “many” whose needs must be met aren’t actually the city’s residents.

It’s worth noting that the same progressives who now worry about two injured workers more than 1.6 million city residents were happy to destroy anything and anyone who got in their way during Covid-19. Those questioning the narrative were cast aside like used Kleenex or crushed like cockroaches. The (futile) mission of “stopping the spread” took precedence over everything: the economy, the individual, religion, social relations, common sense, basic rationality.

“Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few,” said Star Trek’s Mr. Spock (left); the same progressives who used to nod in agreement to that line seemed more worried about two injured workers than the mission to repair infrastructure critical to 1.6 million Calgarians. Shown at right, a Japanese kamikaze pilot in a damaged single-engine bomber over the U.S. Aircraft Carrier USS Essex, off the Philippine Islands, November 1944. (Source of right photo: Rare Historical Photos)

But when it comes to civic infrastructure, the mission doesn’t top the priorities list. Unless the real mission is something other than what is stated. If the mission is to avoid accountability, to go back to the way things have been for the past 30 or so years, and to save the faltering political career of a deeply unpopular mayor, then it all makes a kind of sense. Bringing in specialists from the private sector (from the oil and natural gas industry, no less) to help get them out of the mess, as they quietly announced about 10 days into their week-long repair job – “our best and brightest”, as Gondek put it without any apparent self-awareness – should be seen as confirmation of their desperation, not as a hopeful sign they’re about to change their ways.

George Koch is Editor-in-Chief of C2C Journal.

Source of main image: @cityofcalgary/X.

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Alberta

Free Alberta Strategy trying to force Trudeau to release the pension calculation

Published on December 20, 2024

Todayville

Just over a year ago, Alberta Finance Minister Nate Horner unveiled a report exploring the potential risks and benefits of an Alberta Pension Plan.

The report, prepared by pension analytics firm LifeWorks – formerly known as Morneau Shepell, the same firm once headed by former federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau – used the exit formula outlined in the Canada Pension Plan Act to determine that if the province exits, it would be entitled to a large share of CPP assets.

According to LifeWorks, Alberta’s younger, predominantly working-class population, combined with higher-than-average income levels, has resulted in the province contributing disproportionately to the CPP.

The analysis pegged Alberta’s share of the CPP account at $334 billion – 53% of the CPP’s total asset pool.

We’ve explained a few times how, while that number might initially sound farfetched, once you understand that Alberta has contributed more than it’s taken out, almost every single year CPP has existed, while other provinces have consistently taken out more than they put in and technically *owe* money, it starts to make more sense.

But, predictably, the usual suspects were outraged.

Media commentators and policy analysts across the country were quick to dismiss the possibility that Alberta could claim such a significant portion. To them, the idea that Alberta workers had been subsidizing the CPP for decades seemed unthinkable.

The uproar prompted an emergency meeting of Canada’s Finance Ministers, led by now-former federal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland. Alberta pressed for clarity, with Horner requesting a definitive number from the federal government.

Freeland agreed to have the federal Chief Actuary provide an official calculation.

If you think Trudeau should release the pension calculation, click here.

Four months later, the Chief Actuary announced the formation of a panel to “interpret” the CPP’s asset transfer formula – a formula that remains contentious and could drastically impact Alberta’s entitlement.

(Readers will remember that how this formula is interpreted has been the matter of much debate, and could have a significant impact on the amount Alberta is entitled to.)

Once the panel completed its work, the Chief Actuary promised to deliver Alberta’s calculated share by the fall. With December 20th marking the last day of fall, Alberta has finally received a response – but not the one it was waiting for:

“We received their interpretation of the legislation, but it did not contain a number or even a formula for calculating a number,” said Justin Brattinga, Horner’s press secretary.

In other words, the Chief Actuary did the complete opposite of what they were supposed to do.

The Chief Actuary’s job is to calculate each province’s entitlement, based on the formula outlined in the CPP Act.

It is not the Chief Actuary’s job to start making up new interpretations of the formula to suit the federal government’s agenda.

In fact, the idea that the Chief Actuary spent all this time working on the issue, and didn’t even calculate a number is preposterous.

There’s just no way that that’s what happened.

Far more likely is that the Chief Actuary did run the numbers, using the formula in the CPP Act, only for them – and the federal government – to realize that Alberta’s LifeWorks calculation is actually about right.

Cue panic, a rushed attempt to “reinterpret” the formula, and a refusal to provide the number they committed to providing.

In short, we simply don’t believe that the Chief Actuary didn’t, you know, “actuarialize” anything.

For decades, Alberta has contributed disproportionately to the CPP, given its higher incomes and younger population.

Despite all the bluster in the media, this is actually common sense.

A calculation reflecting this reality would not sit well with other provinces, which have benefited from these contributions.

By withholding the actual number, Ottawa confirms the validity of Alberta’s position.

The refusal to release the calculation only adds fuel to the financial firestorm already underway in Ottawa.

Albertans deserve to know the truth about their contributions and entitlements.

We want to see that number.

If you agree, and want to see the federal government’s calculation on what Alberta is owed, sign our petition – Tell Trudeau To Release The Pension Calculation:

SIGN THE PETITION

Once you’ve signed, send this petition to your friends, family, and all Albertans.

Thank you for your support!

Regards,

The Free Alberta Strategy Team

Alberta

Ford and Trudeau are playing checkers. Trump and Smith are playing chess

Published on December 19, 2024

Dan McTeague

By Dan McTeague

Ford’s calls for national unity – “We need to stand united as Canadians!” – in context feels like an endorsement of fellow Electric Vehicle fanatic Trudeau. And you do wonder if that issue has something to do with it. After all, the two have worked together to pump billions in taxpayer dollars into the EV industry.

There’s no doubt about it: Donald Trump’s threat of a blanket 25% tariff on Canadian goods (to be established if the Canadian government fails to take sufficient action to combat drug trafficking and illegal crossings over our southern border) would be catastrophic for our nation’s economy. More than $3 billion in goods move between the U.S. and Canada on a daily basis. If enacted, the Trump tariff would likely result in a full-blown recession.

It falls upon Canada’s leaders to prevent that from happening. That’s why Justin Trudeau flew to Florida two weeks ago to point out to the president-elect that the trade relationship between our countries is mutually beneficial.

This is true, but Trudeau isn’t the best person to make that case to Trump, since he has been trashing the once and future president, and his supporters, both in public and private, for years. He did so again at an appearance just the other day, in which he implied that American voters were sexist for once again failing to elect the nation’s first female president, and said that Trump’s election amounted to an assault on women’s rights.

Consequently, the meeting with Trump didn’t go well.

But Trudeau isn’t Canada’s only politician, and in recent days we’ve seen some contrasting approaches to this serious matter from our provincial leaders.

First up was Doug Ford, who followed up a phone call with Trudeau earlier this week by saying that Canadians have to prepare for a trade war. “Folks, this is coming, it’s not ‘if,’ it is — it’s coming… and we need to be prepared.”

Ford said that he’s working with Liberal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland to put together a retaliatory tariff list. Spokesmen for his government floated the idea of banning the LCBO from buying American alcohol, and restricting the export of critical minerals needed for electric vehicle batteries (I’m sure Trump is terrified about that last one).

But Ford’s most dramatic threat was his announcement that Ontario is prepared to shut down energy exports to the U.S., specifically to Michigan, New York, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, if Trump follows through with his plan. “We’re sending a message to the U.S. You come and attack Ontario, you attack the livelihoods of Ontario and Canadians, we’re going to use every tool in our toolbox to defend Ontarians and Canadians across the border,” Ford said.

Now, unfortunately, all of this chest-thumping rings hollow. Ontario does almost $500 billion per year in trade with the U.S., and the province’s supply chains are highly integrated with America’s. The idea of just cutting off the power, as if you could just flip a switch, is actually impossible. It’s a bluff, and Trump has already called him on it. When told about Ford’s threat by a reporter this week, Trump replied “That’s okay if he does that. That’s fine.”

And Ford’s calls for national unity – “We need to stand united as Canadians!” – in context feels like an endorsement of fellow Electric Vehicle fanatic Trudeau. And you do wonder if that issue has something to do with it. After all, the two have worked together to pump billions in taxpayer dollars into the EV industry. Just over the past year Ford and Trudeau have been seen side by side announcing their $5 billion commitment to Honda, or their $28.2 billion in subsidies for new Stellantis and Volkswagen electric vehicle battery plants.

Their assumption was that the U.S. would be a major market for Canadian EVs. Remember that “vehicles are the second largest Canadian export by value, at $51 billion in 2023 of which 93% was exported to the U.S.,”according to the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers Association, and “Auto is Ontario’s top export at 28.9% of all exports (2023).”

But Trump ran on abolishing the Biden administration’s de facto EV mandate. Now that he’s back in the White House, the market for those EVs that Trudeau and Ford invested in so heavily is going to be much softer. Perhaps they’d like to be able to blame Trump’s tariffs for the coming downturn rather than their own misjudgment.

In any event, Ford’s tactic stands in stark contrast to the response from Alberta, Canada’s true energy superpower. Premier Danielle Smith made it clear that her province “will not support cutting off our Alberta energy exports to the U.S., nor will we support a tariff war with our largest trading partner and closest ally.”

Smith spoke about this topic at length at an event announcing a new $29-million border patrol team charged with combatting drug trafficking, at which said that Trudeau’s criticisms of the president-elect were, “not helpful.” Her deputy premier Mike Ellis was quoted as saying, “The concerns that president-elect Trump has expressed regarding fentanyl are, quite frankly, the same concerns that I and the premier have had.” Smith and Ellis also criticized Ottawa’s progressively lenient approach to drug crimes.

(For what it’s worth, a recent Léger poll found that “Just 29 per cent of [Canadians] believe Trump’s concerns about illegal immigration and drug trafficking from Canada to the U.S. are unwarranted.” Perhaps that’s why some recent polls have found that Trudeau is currently less popular in Canada than Trump at the moment.)

Smith said that Trudeau’s criticisms of the president-elect were, “not helpful.” And on X/Twitter she said, “Now is the time to… reach out to our friends and allies in the U.S. to remind them just how much Americans and Canadians mutually benefit from our trade relationship – and what we can do to grow that partnership further,” adding, “Tariffs just hurt Americans and Canadians on both sides of the border. Let’s make sure they don’t happen.”

This is exactly the right approach. Smith knows there is a lot at stake in this fight, and is not willing to step into the ring in a fight that Canada simply can’t win, and will cause a great deal of hardship for all involved along the way.

While Trudeau indulges in virtue signaling and Ford in sabre rattling, Danielle Smith is engaging in true statesmanship. That’s something that is in short supply in our country these days.

As I’ve written before, Trump is playing chess while Justin Trudeau and Doug Ford are playing checkers. They should take note of Smith’s strategy. Honey will attract more than vinegar, and if the long history of our two countries tell us anything, it’s that diplomacy is more effective than idle threats.

Dan McTeague is President of Canadians for Affordable Energy.