Alberta Premier Rachel Notley will meet with business leaders in Toronto and New York City next week as part of her push to get the Trans Mountain pipeline built to the West Coast.
“Economic leaders in this country must speak up with resolve and purpose,” Notley told her caucus at a meeting before question period on Tuesday. “It’s time.”
Notley also plans to make her case at the North American Governors and Premiers Summit in Arizona from May 4 to May 6.
She currently chairs the Council of the Federation, which is made up of Canada’s provincial and territorial premiers.
Notley intends to counter Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a Democrat, who recently affirmed his opposition to the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion in a news conference with B.C. Premier John Horgan.
Inslee said the project poses a potential threat to coastal waters. Notley reminded NDP MLAs and the media in the room that Inslee’s state “welcomes hundreds of tankers” from Alaska each year.
“I will make sure that he and his fellow governors know that Canada backs Alberta,” she said.
Notley said a bill to give Alberta the power to limit oil shipments to B.C. should be passed in the legislature this spring.