Madam Speaker, there is a former president of the United States of America whose very telling quote is appropriate for this evening and for this debate. That president was Franklin D. Roosevelt, who said that in politics, nothing happens by accident, and if it happens, one can bet it was planned that way. I think we can see that there were no accidents here, that this terrible incident was the result of the Prime Minister playing politics and refusing to show leadership which resulted in devastating effects.
I am going to talk about these different devastating effects. Those would include missed opportunities, fleeing investments, as well as personal tragedy which I have seen close and up front in my riding of Calgary Midnapore with the people there.
We certainly heard a lot about missed opportunities today. They are too numerous to count, but we will review some of them again.
Petronas LNG, the Malaysian corporation, a $36-billion project evaporated into thin air as a result of not going forward with this project.
Keystone XL is especially dear to my heart. As the former deputy consul general for Dallas, Texas, I spent a lot of my time on the Keystone XL pipeline file. This was in 2010-13, when Obama was in office. It was a pipe dream at that time where it was complete futility that this would possibly happen. However, a new administration has brought forward the possibility of Keystone XL again. It has recently been resurrected and it has the possibility to carry 830,000 barrels of oil a day. It is an $8-billion project, on which again we have seen no action as a result of playing political games and poor leadership by the Prime Minister and the Liberal government.
We have heard about energy east ad nauseam, a $15.7-billion project that many say rests squarely on the National Energy Board's decision to consider direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions. Again, this is another situation of the Liberal government playing political games and the Prime Minister showing a complete lack of leadership.
Finally, the northern gateway was a project that would have provided close to 4,000 jobs and will never come to pass. It is absolutely tragic. I am certainly not exaggerating when I talk about missed opportunities in terms of the delay, the indecision, and the lack of leadership with the Prime Minister and the Liberal government.
I will talk now about fleeing investment because we certainly have seen investments from Canada absolutely exit in droves. For example, we have seen in Calgary a complete decline in investor confidence in a way we have not seen before. I cannot remember the last time we saw this lack of investor confidence in Canada and specifically in Alberta in the natural resources sector.
Companies come to mind such as Royal Dutch Shell. Shell was one of the backbones of the natural resources sector in Calgary. I remember very fondly in 1988, people sporting Shell's Olympic jackets at that time. There was Norway Statoil as well and the list goes on: Marathon Oil, ConocoPhillips, Apache, Harvest. The list is endless. These are all investors that have left Canada and their return will not happen overnight. This is something that will take years to build for their return. This is an absolute tragedy.
I would like to share a story about an event I was at on Wednesday night in Calgary. It was put on by the U.S. consulate. We were very fortunate that Ambassador Craft from our good friend to the south, our closest friend and ally, was there. It was a very lovely event.
The subject of the event was very disturbing to me as an elected official for Alberta and Canada. This event was specifically in regard to Canadian investors looking for the opportunity to invest in the United States of America. This is just another example of the opportunity that exists externally for corporations should they not wish to invest their dollars here, which is a result of this poor environment, the political game playing, and lack of leadership from the Prime Minister and the Liberal government.
The fleeing investment is very tragic indeed. However, the most tragic thing of all is the personal tragedy, the personal situations that have arisen as a result of the political game playing and the lack of leadership from the Prime Minister and the government. We have seen incredible unemployment levels in Alberta and Calgary. There are 40,000 fewer jobs now than at pre-recession levels, with 29,800 of those jobs being directly attributed to the oil and gas sector. That is an absolutely astounding number. I met many of these people face to face when I went door knocking last year in the by-election in Calgary Midnapore. There are so many tragic stories out there.
In fact, I would like to share one that was in the National Post on April 12 of this past week about Erik Nyman, who could very possibly be one of my constituents. It says:
Erik Nyman, an out-of-work journeyman electrician, was a general foreman in his mid-20s at a thermal oilsands project when he was laid off in December 2015.
Since then, he’s gone back to school at Mount Royal University in Calgary to upgrade his skills—obtaining a project management certification and doing courses toward a Blue Seal apprenticeship certification—worked with career coaches and placement agencies, and lost count of how many custom-tailored résumés he’s sent out.
“I’ve been hitting everything that I think I’m qualified for,” he said, but fears that he’s up against candidates with far more experience for the same entry-level positions.
Nyman said he is be willing to work for free in exchange for experience, but it’s a difficult subject to broach with an employer, especially when he’s still hoping—above all else—to get a full-time job and a paycheque.
“Depression has hit really hard,” he said, adding he’s now taking anti-depressants. He said he is trying to stay positive for himself and for his 13-month-old son, and his friends have been a source of support.
Erik really could be one of my many constituents in Calgary Midnapore facing this very sad situation.
In addition, we are seeing a decline in the younger workforce as well. U of C engineering school, one of the top engineering schools in the country with a proud history of post-graduation employment, has seen its post-graduation employment rate decrease to 43% in 2016 from 87% in 2014. That is a rate drop of more than 50%. It very sad at a time when we need to be giving our youth hope for the future.
Calgary's vacancy rates have also been affected dramatically like this. There are secondary and tertiary effects in regard to this. It is the worst of any major Canadian city, having hit 27.4%, which is the highest level in over 30 years, as a result of the lack of leadership from the Liberal government and the Prime Minister. That means 1.1 million square metres of empty downtown space, which is almost 700 hockey rinks, accounting for 40% of the empty downtown office spaces across Canada's 10 largest cities.
I could go on about business owners trying to find efficiencies and hang onto employees as they struggle with these new realities as a result of this lack of leadership.
Make no mistake, none of this happened by accident. It was the political game playing and lack of leadership by the Liberal government and the Prime Minister.