Alberta Environment Minister Rebecca Schulz has threatened to take the Liberals to court over their plastics ban, arguing that it will devastate the economy and kill thousands of jobs for no good reason.
In an article posted on X, Schulz called the ban a “slap in the face to Alberta and our province’s petrochemical industry and the thousands of Albertans who work in it.”
She added that everything from surgical gloves to iPhones contains plastic and that any limit on plastics production would be entirely fruitless environmentally because China would just step in to fill the void.
“Minister Guilbeault’s proposal would throw all of [Alberta’s projected production capacity and prosperity] into jeopardy and risk billions of dollars in investments. This includes projects like Dow Chemical’s net-zero petrochemical plant in Fort Saskatchewan, a $9-billion dollar project that will create thousands of jobs,” Schulz writes.
“His proposal will also fail to reduce plastic production. If the federal government limits plastic production in Canada, other countries like China will just produce more. The only outcome that this federal government will achieve will be fewer jobs in Canada.”
Schulz has had to take the Trudeau government to court over plastics before
This isn’t the first time Schulz and the province of Alberta have faced off against the federal government to stop their crusade against plastics.
Last year, the federal court overturned the Liberals’ single-use plastics ban for being “unreasonable and unconstitutional”. But that hasn’t stopped the feds.
Unable to outright ban plastics, the Trudeau government is now pushing for a cap on production within the country and a mandatory federal plastics registry, which will require companies to track all plastics associated with their products throughout their lifetimes or potentially face fines—an impossible task, which will have the same effect as a ban.
“Instead of wasting everyone’s time, the federal government would be better served by taking a page out of Alberta’s plan, which diverts plastics from landfills and turns used plastics into new products,” Schulz said.
“… If the federal government refuses to abide by the constitution, we will take them to court again to defend our jurisdiction and the thousands of Albertans who work in the petrochemical sector.”
