The Director General of ATCO Ltd. says that discussions on secession in Alberta already harm the investment climate.
Nancy Southern said the Asian partners of a large hydrogen project said they are not making final investment decisions unless there is a certainty around the question of the separatism of Alberta.
“There are simply too many questions for them to be convinced that they can go ahead with large-scale investment decisions, and I therefore think that the separatist discussion is very useless and not constructive for Alberta,” she said in an interview on Wednesday after the annual meeting of ATCO shareholders in Calgary.
The questions understand how an independent Alberta would bring its products to coastal ports, what type of commercial transactions it would have with its neighbors, what a currency it would use and how stable the economy would be.
Southern says that she understands the frustration of the Albertans towards the federal government.
“We had the end of the stick several times following new regulations and new laws and the rule of law,” said Southern.
“I am a big believer that this Prime Minister wants to change things and I think we have to sit and work together.”
Talking about Alberta who goes alone or joining the United States has reached ease since the Federal Liberals won a fourth term last month.
In the province, where all seats except a few seats have become in conservative blue, there is generalized dissatisfaction with federal environmental policies affecting the key oil industry.
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The Prime Minister of Alberta, Danielle Smith, has introduced a bill which, if adopted, would facilitate the Albertans a lot to launch referendums on various subjects – including the separation of Canada.
Smith said she wanted to see the province stay in Canada, but she is ready to ask the Albertains the question next year if the petitioners bring together the 177,000 signatures required to trigger a referendum.
Smith underlined an increasing alienation in his province and his frustration with Ottawa, saying that those who wanted to separate “are not marginal voices”.
Also Wednesday, Southern highlighted potential opportunities for the defense branch of the company based in Calgary in an increasingly unstable geopolitical climate.
Last month, Ottawa awarded a contract to a joint venture between Atco Frontec and in the development of Inuvialuit Corp. For a new radar defense system in the Northwest Territories.
The two -year contract is $ 48.4 million. It covers the design, construction, installation and operation of the polar radar system to the one.
“The opportunities in Canada are really very astounding, especially since Canada moves to modernize the Norad system and strengthen our North Defense,” Southern told Reunion.
She said that the system is “very necessary in the north of today” and that it can detect targets with long ranges – hundreds of thousands of kilometers.
Southern underlined the need for the North-South corridors to obtain goods and resources on the market, but a large part of the discussion was on East-West infrastructure projects.
This could mean drawing from the port of Churchill, man., Where there is access to Europe via Hudson bay.
“The north-south corridor is too often forgotten. But I think that now, given the security problems around Arctic and Arctic sovereignty, they are probably more important than ever,” she said in the interview.
“And I think that, as Canadians, it is our opportunity and our privilege and our duty, in fact, to bring economic development in our Arctic regions.”
Southern told shareholders said that she had encouraged Carney to act on housing, defense and energy.
“While we hold at a fairly critical moment in the future of our country, our province and our company, and we sail through these very turbulent times, the uncertainty that we have confronted in recent years is likely to persist and potentially intensify,” said Southern.
“Trade tensions, the supply chain, inflationary pressures, geopolitical conflicts and the rate of acceleration of technological changes all converge to create an obstinately complex and unpredictable environment.”
ATCO, with some 21,000 employees and a global imprint, has subsidiaries in a diverse range of sectors, including defense, modular construction of buildings, distribution and transmission of electricity, etc.
& Copy 2025 the Canadian press
