Sharan Kaur: Why the 14 Liberal MPs need to own their dissent on the Carney-Smith deal

CTV’s Political Analyst Sharan Kaur on what the major projects announcement signifies and why she believes the national budget will pass.

After a historic agreement between Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney, one that ended years of federal-provincial animosity and sent a clear signal to industry that Canada is open for business, 14 MPs appeared to choose ideology over nation building.

As CBC News reported Friday, 14 Liberal MPs sent a letter to the prime minister at the end of April, objecting to the deal and the concessions being given to Alberta. “We remain deeply concerned; the government’s credibility will be seriously compromised,” reads the letter, according to CBC News.

Sources confirmed to me the existence of this letter, which was leaked to Radio-Canada by Liberal MPs – elected representatives who were sent to Ottawa by their communities to make decisions, take positions, and be accountable.

And yet, faced with one of the most consequential economic agreements in a generation, they whispered objections into the prime minister’s ear. The MPs signed their names at the bottom of the letter, reported CBC News, but “do not want to be publicly identified, stating that their approach is intended to be constructive and respectful.”

But if you want to be constructive, you have to own it. Anonymity isn’t dialogue.

What Carney and Smith have done is genuinely significant. The Canada-Alberta MOU lays out a clear path to a West Coast pipeline moving over one million barrels of Canadian oil per day to markets in Japan, South Korea, China, and India. For the first time in years, Canada is speaking the language of economic sovereignty without apologizing for our resources.

That shift matters because the world has changed. Supply chains are fracturing. Energy security is now a matter of national survival. Countries that can get their resources to market will define the next century. Liberal MP and former environment minister Steven Guilbeault understood the stakes well enough to resign last November. You may disagree with him, but he was accountable. The same cannot be said for the 14 who wish to operate in the shadows.

This MOU is not the agenda of oil and gas companies. It is the agenda of Canadian workers, Canadian communities, and a government finally willing to say we will not leave our resources in the ground to satisfy the politics of another era.

Carney ran on economic pragmatism over ideology. So did the voters who returned his government. The MPs who signed that letter were elected under the same banner.

The stakes are high

And the stakes of getting this wrong extend beyond economics. Alberta separatist sentiment is not an abstraction. It is a live political force, and it grows when Albertans feel that Ottawa sees their province as a problem to be managed rather than a partner to be respected.

The Carney-Smith agreement was a direct answer to that grievance. It was a signal that the federation can work, that Ottawa can listen, and that building together is possible. Every politician in this country, regardless of party or province, has a responsibility to comport themselves in ways that strengthen that signal, not drown it out.

Anonymous letters that undermine a federally brokered agreement do not just damage a pipeline deal. They hand ammunition to those who argue that Ottawa will never come through, that the only answer is separation. That is too high a price to pay for ideological comfort.

The country we want to hand to the next generation is hopeful, united, and built on shared prosperity. That future is available to us. The resources are there. The deal is there. The political will, at least at the top, is there. What we need now are politicians at every level willing to do the harder, less glamorous work of holding that coalition together, even when it’s uncomfortable, even when it means putting their name to an unpopular position.

Dissent is legitimate. Dissent is healthy. But anonymous dissent covered up as concern is neither constructive nor courageous. If you have objections, say them. Put your name to them. Your constituents deserve to know where you stand, and frankly, so do Canadians.