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Canada does not have a moment to lose in safeguarding its sovereignty

This editorial was written and published by the Globe & Mail on January 5, 2025.

It should have been clear in November, 2024, when Donald Trump won re-election that Canada needed to act with urgency to end the drift of (especially) the past decade, during which the federal government dangerously neglected the basics of safeguarding national sovereignty.

The alarm bells were seemingly heeded last spring, when Mr. Trump launched his trade war and started greedily eyeing Canada as the 51st state. Against the odds, the Liberals won re-election under Mark Carney on the promise of an elbowsup response to Mr. Trump’s provocations.

But that promised response has not materialized, despite other worrying developments. In November, the U.S. administration published a National Security Strategy that would dramatically curtail the sovereignty of any Western Hemisphere country, Canada included.

Then came the U.S. military strike on Venezuela on Saturday. Any thought that Canada could simply wait out Mr. Trump’s term in the White House ended this weekend.

There has been no shortage of rhetoric from Prime Minister Mark Carney about the need to expand Canada’s military capacity and to end economic stagnation. What has been lacking for more than a year is action commensurate to the national emergency in which Canada finds itself.

The conundrum that Canada faces is that there is no immediate fix to today’s emergency. It will take years to build a new pipeline, and years to fully rebuild Canada’s military. Which is why there is not a moment more to lose.

The Liberals have talked about doubling non-U.S. exports over the coming decade. But what will happen this year? This month? The Liberals have talked about increasing Canada’s military spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035. What steps will be taken in 2026? The Liberals have signed a memorandum with Alberta that sets the stage for an oil pipeline to the Pacific. It’s a solid first step, but when will the next one come?

The right answer, the only answer, must be immediately, for the three herculean tasks of diversifying Canada’s exports, revitalizing the domestic economy and rebuilding this country’s military capacity.

The single biggest step that Ottawa can take in diversifying exports is to ensure a new bitumen pipeline to the West Coast is constructed. The economic logic was unassailable before the U.S. seized Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro. Now, the United States is vowing to ramp up Venezuelan crude production, which would swell supplies of heavy oil for U.S. refiners – driving down prices for Alberta producers. The immediate response must be to green-light additional capacity for the Ottawa-owned Trans Mountain pipeline. The company has said it intends to boost capacity over the next five years. That timeline needs to be accelerated to start this year.

More important, Ottawa must work with Alberta to secure a private proponent in the coming months for a new oil pipeline, underpinned by a commitment that all regulatory approvals will be granted in under two years.

There will need to be consultation and accommodation with Indigenous communities to fulfill Ottawa’s constitutional duty. But the Liberal government must make it clear in those talks (and to any obstructionist premier) that the only question to be discussed is how a pipeline will be built.

The same kind of leadership is needed for the forging of a national economy. The promise of internal free trade has devolved, yet again, into inter-provincial squabbling. The federal government needs to step in to ensure that internal trade barriers are dismantled speedily and permanently.

Ottawa already has the only tool it needs, in the form of its very deep pockets. Federal funds should be made contingent on provinces and territories tearing down trade barriers.

On national defence, the Carney government has taken some initial measures to boost military capacity. But the announcements last year of an increase in defence spending and procurement reform are, at most, an overdue first step.

Recruitment needs to quicken, now. Procurement delays need to end, now. Any minister who attempts to detour spending into regional pork-barrelling should be booted from cabinet. Any staff officer who gets in the way of ending the bureaucratic snarls of procurement must be cashiered.

In June, former U.S. ambassador Kelly Craft told a Toronto business audience that if Canada doesn’t like being called a 51st state, it should stop acting like one. Those may be hard words for Canadians to hear, but they underscore the seriousness of the moment, and the urgency of action.

😴 The UK National Emergency Briefing — Still Not Waking Up the World

If the liberal elite won’t take the risks their own warnings demand, the world will remain asleep — and the task of awakening it falls to the small minority willing to act.

Last week, Robert Hunziker wrote in CounterPunch how the “UK National Emergency Briefing Wakes Up World.” The piece reports on the National Emergency Briefing held in Westminster on 27 November, where leading UK scientists warned MPs, peers, business leaders and the media about the existential threat of climate breakdown and the need for a war-time mobilisation.

On the surface, the event looks impressive: a gathering of the establishment, addressed by respected scientists, issuing yet another urgent warning. But underneath, it is simply the same information-led method we have seen for years, and it will clearly not wake the world up. It feels like a ritual rather than a rupture — a familiar performance of concern without any meaningful shift in strategy.

It is madness, defined as repeating the same action even after it is clear the approach fails. In other words, talking to the great and the good (i.e. the liberal elite, also taking us to mass death) about “the science” and the “facts” will not change anything. We have tried this for decades. The emissions curve still rises. The ecosystem still collapses. The political class still looks away.

Sanity requires a plurality of approaches when previous methods have failed. So why not have:

A sociologist who will explain why elites never reform themselves after a certain point of degeneration, and so now revolutions are inevitable.
A Freudian psychologist who will explain why people want to die due to the death wish, because they find life intolerable.
A political scientist who will explain that everyone in the audience will be seen as complicit by the next generation, and it’s a no-brainer that they will be on trial for destroying UK society and the state. Inaction is treason.

These perspectives would at least acknowledge the social, psychological and political realities that actually determine whether mass action occurs. Without them, the briefing becomes yet another polite appeal to reason in a context where reason is no longer decisive.

In summary, in an absolute emergency, if you aim to persuade the entire audience, you will get no one to do what is necessary. If you want effective action, you have to apply the law of collective action, which means alienating the majority of the audience (with the truth of points 1–3) in order to get the minority to do what is necessary.

This is not a moral claim; it is a sociological one. Movements are not built on unanimity. They are built on minorities willing to act while the majority remains paralysed.

What is effective is nonviolent civil disobedience to the point of the carbon state putting you in prison, triggering a backfire response of public uprising. But none of the speakers are willing to do this either for virtue-ethical or utilitarian reasons, which, of course, sends the subliminal message that what they are saying is not a big deal, and so people don’t think it is a big deal.

The public takes its cues from the speaker’s behaviour, not their words. If the scientists speaking will not risk anything — their careers, their freedom, their comfort — why would anyone else believe we are in an emergency?

None of the speakers will go to prison to save our society and state – and that is why there will be revolutions. They have left it way too late for anything else. When the establishment refuses to act proportionately to reality, the only remaining path is rupture.

That is the idiocy of excessive cleverness.

UK National Emergency Briefing Wakes Up World

This article was written by Robert Hunziker and was published in CounterPunch on December 5, 2025.

Image by NOAA.

An impressive display of world class scientists recently (Nov. 27^th) held a UK National Emergency Briefing, informing the world of impending climate change disaster scenarios that can no longer be ignored. A war-time footing is necessary. Ten of the UK’s leading experts briefed politicians, business leaders, faith, sport, and the media in a marathon session.

The British are dead serious about the deleterious impact of climate change and intend to alert the public to this existential threat to civilization. Eighty-one (81) Members of Parliament and fifty-two (52) Peers attended the session headed by the UK’s chief scientific advisor, explaining why the UK must take emergency-level action like a war-time scenario. There were 1,200 invite-only attendees at the session. A 45-minutte documentary of the event is in the production stage.

Opening remarks by Professor Mike Berners Lee, Lancaster University, Sustainability Expert, Chair of the session: “For an understanding of the root causes of the most serious crisis that will ever impact our species we need people. We need to trust them because they are telling us the truth…. The information that we’re going to be looking at is extremely serious, urgent, and it affects us all here in the UK. That is why we’re calling this a National Emergency Briefing…. In the words of James Baldwin: ‘Nothing can be changed until it is faced.’ COP30 recently ended without any progress on fossil fuel emissions, in fact, the words ‘fossil fuel’ were stripped from the proceedings. We desperately need to reset the narrative on climate change and wipe out misinformation.”

The original video of the event d/d November 27th runs 3:05. Herein a sampling of excerpts of the first five speakers suffices to emphasize the critical nature of the subject prompting this emergency briefing. These excerpts are a combination of direct quotes as well as summaries of statements.

Excerpts of First Four Speakers:

Chris Packham, UK Naturalist: We are the only known life forms in the universe, and we’ve got nowhere else to go. This little blue planet is where we will either live in harmony with the environment or we will destroy ourselves and much of other life too… Do we want it on our conscience that we waste everything? Why are we unbelievably pulling back from addressing the greatest crises to ever threaten our species, climate breakdown and biodiversity loss… climate denialism is a mainstream thing again thanks to well-oiled machines of the rich, powerful, and influential lobbyists from the fossil fuel and other industries. A dangerous wave of misinformation and lies fills our lives. But worse, it fills the lives of our decision-makers… the people who shape policy. For example, the petro states said “no” and thrashed COP30 because of the crazed consensus requirement that allows oil to say “no” and abort any movement against CO2 emissions. Fossil fuel companies are some of the biggest contributors to our politicians, especially the less scrupulous. And the media is failing to explain to the public “the gravity of our predicament.” We must listen to the science… if politicians ignore science, billions of lives are at risk. Politicians in the audience today must listen to the scientists and act accordingly.

Nathalie Seddon, Professor of Biodiversity, Oxford Martin School: Nature is not simply nice to have. It’s not a luxury. It’s critical national infrastructure. When we destroy and degrade it, we expose this country to escalating risks, e.g. floods, fires, heat waves, insecurity and economic instability. When we protect and restore it, we can build resilience. The living creatures that support our entire life system are breaking down. We are facing a national emergency not only because the climate is changing but because the living systems that regulate that climate, protect homes and feed our people are breaking down here in one of the most nature depleted nations on Earth. The facts are sobering. Only about ½ of UK biodiversity remains. Only 14% of rivers in England are in good ecological health as the result of chemical pollution, sewage discharge and erosion, and agricultural runoff choking the arteries of the landscape. When rivers fail, so does resilience to droughts, etc.. Only 7% of our woodlands are healthy, only 3% of our lands, and 8% of our waters are effectively protected for nature. Over 5 million properties in England are at risk of flooding. Additional national concerns due to degradation, misuse, and abuse of nature are itemized in this speech skillfully transitioning the errors of society and government to the need to follow public opinion, which strongly supports protecting nature and redirecting public funds from inadvertent harmfulness to positive embracing of nature within government policymaking.

Kevin Anderson, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change: Let me start by framing the problem as I see it. And it’s very much that CO2 concentrations in the environment in the atmosphere that are rising at unprecedented rates… across the last 800,000 years, CO2 varied by 100 parts per million but over the past 10,000 years it only varied by 20 parts per million. This gave civilization a very stable climate. Now, in a blink of geologic time we’ve increased, since 1850 from 280 to 424 ppm or +134 ppm in less than 200 years, burying 9,800 years of the perfect climate system, not too hot, not too cold. That is gone. Therefore, we must eliminate, not cut, fossil fuels or temperatures will continue to go up. We are headed for 2C by midcentury and 3C to 4C by 2100. The planet system cannot handle it. We are looking at systemic collapse of economies within a collapsing climate system. 1.5C is no longer a viable target because of failure to cut emissions, which is a very depressing admission. There is new evidence that we are warming up much faster than science expected, which adds to the urgency of taking action now.

The world needs to cut carbon emission by 13% per year to hold temps down to 2C. We need a profound shift in our social norms to accomplish that, and you can forget carbon capture and storage. After 30 years of promises to do the job, according to the CCS Institute, it’s managed to store less than 0.03% of all fossil fuel emissions after 30 years of promises by the ‘delay technology” groupies, like the oil and gas industry. These are false solutions designed to avoid meaningful legislation to cut back emissions. Timely technologies are required, e.g. retrofitting homes, more public transport, EV charging stations, zero carbon electricity.

It is now too late for nonradical solutions. There is no way other than revolutionary rates of change, and the rich, luxury class of living must give up its overallocation of resources. Remarkably, the top 1% of the population of high income/high emissions people give rise to twice the level of emissions as the bottom half of the world’s population. This statistic makes the case for revolutionary change. Put another way, the top 1% generate twice the greenhouse gas emissions as 4,000,000,000 people.

According to an article in Oxfam (not provided by Anderson but this is a fact-check of his !% statement; the Stockholm Environment Institute also participated in Oxfam’s study, and several other independent studies show variations of the Oxfam study; all similar, some showing less some more but all show vast inequity in carbon polluting by class status) Oxfam (est. 1942) Richest 1% Use Their Entire Annual Carbon Limit in Just 10 Days d/d January 10, 2025: “The richest 1% are responsible for more than twice as much carbon pollution than half of humanity, with devastating consequences… To meet the 1.5°C goal, the richest 1% need to cut their emissions by 97% by 2030… Governments need to stop pandering to the richest. Rich polluters must be made to pay for the havoc they’re wreaking on our planet… Tax them, curb their emissions, and ban their excessive indulgences —private jets, superyachts, and the like. Leaders who fail to act are effectively choosing complicity in a crisis that threatens the lives of billions.”

Kevin Anderson (cont.) We need urgent legislation to drive down energy use within that 1% group. And I would argue that the second prerequisite of Paris is that fair and deep reductions in energy use… This will deliver immediate and substantial cuts in emissions; it gives us critical time to put in place zero carbon technologies that are very important, and it releases the labor, the materials, the finance, and even the political capital we need to drive the clean revolution… affordable low carbon homes, high quality public transport, etc., we need to move the resources and labor that furnish the private luxury of a relative few of us like me and many of us here to the public well-being for all.

Tim Lenten, Global Systems Institute, University of Exeter: Tipping Points.

If we carry on with current trajectory to three or maybe four degrees centigrade, then we will definitely be in a national emergency. We’ll likely be at a tipping point with a climate that’ll make this country a very different uninhabitable place. There is plenty of evidence that we are headed toward several tipping points, which interact, causing widespread climate disruption. We’ve already crossed a tipping point with the world’s coral reefs that support the livelihoods of ½ billion people and protects coastlines from rising sea levels and storm surges.

An upcoming example of the most dangerous tipping point is AMOC, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, which is already showing signs of slowing. Paleoclimate research shows us that AMOC has turned off and on several times over the last ice age.

If we lose the deep-water formation of AMOC, a state-of-the-art scientific model using 2°C of global warming shows what’ll happen with the decadal winter climate extremes, assuming we cross this tipping point, thereby losing the enduring circulation of tropical warm water to the North Atlantic, heretofore warming Europe.

Here are the theoretical consequences of losing AMOC because of a 2°C warming cycle:

(1) Remarkable comeback of Arctic sea ice reaches down to covering most of the North Sea by February each winter

(2) In London it is minus 20°C (-4°F) with three frozen months of the year

(3) Edinburgh minus 30°C (-22°F) with five and a half frozen months per year

(4) But the summers will still be hotter than today because of a 2°C warmer world, well beyond today’s 1.4-1.5C.

(5) The UK will be nearly 100% dependent upon import of food crops and suffer a shortage of potable water.

(6) On a global scale, regions where staple crops are grown will be reduced by 50%.

In closing, a radical acceleration of action towards zero emissions is required. And the only way to convince ourselves that that’s credible is to show positive tipping points achieved via transition from fossil fuels to renewables that can become self-accelerating, and we’ve successfully done that in the UK but only in the power sector. At the peak in 2012, 40% of UK electricity came from black coal. Today it is zero from coal. This was accomplished by a climate change act with cross-party consensus to gradually put a floor price on carbon levied just on the power sector, stepped up over time, enough to incentivize switching to renewables, which, with ever-larger economies of scale, serve as a tipping point to lesser costs and enhanced proficiency. Importantly, in the final analysis, mandates on a global scale are needed to take out fossil fuels, transitioning as soon as possible out of fossil fuels.

The full 3:05 session UK National Emergency Briefing is on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/live/2-PFKT1SNc4

Robert Hunziker lives in Los Angeles and can be reached at rlhunziker@gmail.com.

Don’t fall for claims veganism is fading

This article was written by Jessica Scott-Reid and was published in the Toronto Star on January 4, 2026.

JESSICA SCOTTREID JESSICA SCOTTREID IS A CANADIAN JOURNALIST AND ANIMAL ADVOCATE. SHE IS THE CULTURE AND DISINFORMATION CORRE

You may have heard that veganism is dead, and that eating meat — so much meat — is back.

According to some news outlets and online influencers, the plantbased diet has fallen out of popularity in favour of more meatheavy trends like the carnivore diet. Don’t fall for it, especially this Veganuary: the time when people are encouraged to give animalfree diets a go, for the planet, the animals and public health.

While plantbased brands including Beyond Meat have been facing slumping sales, and Yves Veggie Cuisine is no more, these developments do not reflect genuine consumer rejection, but rather years of coordinated efforts shaped by meat industry influence, political power and online disinformation. And regardless of fleeting food trends, the science remains clear: Western countries eat too much meat, raising risks of heart disease and some cancers, while also killing the planet. Cutting back is crucial to meeting climate goals, no matter what the meat industry claims about the supposed ecobenefits of grassfed beef. Because as hundreds of billions of animals continue to be massbred, confined to factory farms and killed along speeding disassembly lines in Canada each year, the science — and the consequences — haven’t changed.

Animal agriculture groups are among the most active and influential lobbyists in Ottawa and Washington. Organizations like Dairy Farmers of Canada, Chicken Farmers of Canada and the Canadian Cattle Association maintain permanent lobbying operations and frequent contact with federal officials, supported by large budgets and coordinated national strategies. In the U.S., meat industry lobbyists spent an estimated $5.5 million in Washington to influence federal policy. And a 2023 Stanford analysis found that from 2014 to 2020, American meat and dairy interests in the U.S. received roughly 800 times more public funding and wielded 190 times more lobbying power than plantbased and cultivated meat combined. The imbalance of power and influence is stark.

At the same time, the meat industry has worked hard to turn the public off of meat alternatives and plantbased eating. Early 2020 disinformation campaigns portraying plantbased and cultivated meats as “ultraprocessed,” “unnatural” and “synthetic,” planted seeds that would grow and align neatly with narratives pushed today by figures like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Make America Healthy Again movement. That messaging is that animal meat is inherently “natural,” wholesome and healthy.

This has grown into full culturewar rhetoric, with online “meatfluencers” — some funded and trained by the meat industry — portraying plantbased diets as leftist, elitist, radical and “woke,” while promoting meatheavy diets as not only healthy, but an act of defiance, strength and even patriotism.

But casting doubt on alternatives is only part of the strategy; the other is a fullscale effort to greenwash meat itself. Through massive marketing budgets and funded research, meat producers have promoted ideas like “regenerative” or “climatefriendly” meat — claims that are increasingly disputed by climate scientists. This year, mega meat producers JBS and Tyson were both forced to reckon with misleading climate claims, with JBS paying a $1.1million (U.S.) settlement over its “netzero” marketing and Tyson removing “climatesmart” labels from its beef following legal and regulatory pressure. Regardless of whether meat is regenerative, pastureraised or grassfed, its production cannot magically or meaningfully offset emissions produced by largescale animal farming.

The result of all of this manoeuvring is not a natural market correction, but a narrative carefully shaped to protect an industry whose business model depends on keeping meat at the centre of our tables, no matter the cost to health, animals or the climate. This Veganuary, don’t confuse manufactured backlash with scientific fact. Cutting back our consumption of animal products was never a trend, it’s a necessity.

To truly improve transit, we need more subways

In the 2010s, Rob Ford's idea of “subways, subways, subways!” was anathema to progressives, transit advocate Reece Martin writes, but for transit to be rapid, it has to get off the roads.

This article was written by Reece Martin and was published in the Toronto Star on January 3, 2026.

Public transit in Toronto feels slower than it’s ever been.

The streetcars have crawled along since we bought new vehicles without learning any new operational tricks. The subway is still in a state of constant slow zones, including along Allen Road where the tradition of subways zipping past cars has been reversed. And even the notparticularlyfast buses are getting stuck in everworsening congestion.

And then a few weeks ago, Toronto opened the multibilliondollar Finch West light rail line and managed to make it not only slower than the buses it replaced, but also most halfdecent joggers.

Fortunately, the crisis has not gone to waste. The mayor and TTC chair have launched into a blitz of motions and moves to not only try to fix the deficiencies on Finch, but also to capitalize on this moment to fix the same set of issues on the downtown streetcars. It’s been a rare positive moment of political leadership and improvisation.

But at some point, once the dust settles, there’s an uncomfortable truth we’ll need to grapple with: Even with signal priority — as well as things we aren’t likely to do like institute fewer stops — transit running on or next to the street is just never going to be truly rapid.

The choice of what kind of transit to build became highly politicized in the 2010s, particularly with Rob Ford’s mantra of “subways, subways, subways!”

But the reality is that roadbased transit is the equivalent of our local roads, and transit still needs its highways.

I recently was on Bloor at a holiday party, and upon opening Google Maps to see my travel time to get home to Scarborough on transit, my jaw dropped at the hourandahalf travel time. Were we to hop in a car, I could have gotten to Niagara Falls in that time, or just home in half that time. This is ultimately what creates congestion and keeps people off transit: driving is so often dramatically faster than what’s supposed to be “the better way.”

The Transit City plan that birthed Finch West and also envisioned the Eglinton Crosstown wanted to “improve” my trip to Scarborough, making sure that the bus part of my journey was now on a snazzystreetcar like we’ve now opened on Finch. This is still the playbook that’s shaping transit decision making at the city of Toronto, even though the city’s own studies show the Eglinton East LRT would be slower than the express buses running on Eglinton today; and yet the project is one of the city’s top transit priorities.

The reality is that to actually achieve rapid transit, you need to have transit that isn’t chained to the road network.

This not only means never waiting for a traffic light and going through urban areas at 80 kilometres an hour or faster, but maybe even cutting across the street grid in diagonals.

The subways being delivered by the province would actually probably shave 15 to 20 minutes off of my trip and those of tens of thousands of others if they were open today, and they are only being accepted begrudgingly. New GO stations under the “SmartTrack” program are being treated like they are exclusively for the use of rich 905 commuters, but had they all been open, my trip home could have been done in just 30 minutes — a third of the time it actually took.

The subways are coming, and more GO train service and stations are coming, too, but we need to lean into this transitbuilding renaissance. There need to be more GO lines and more trains on them to more places, and additional stations to provide access to more neighbourhoods. The subway network needs to expand further, with branches to other outlying areas, extensions, and more lines in the central city.

Achieving this means changing the way we do things. Toronto currently has among the most expensive transit projects in the world — the Finch LRT has cost more than the Sheppard subway. Tackling these costs isn’t straightforward, but a start would be to stop thinking that trains have to be underground. People rave about the London Underground, but more than half of that system is actually above the ground — viaducts, embankments and cuttings might remind people that transit actually exists, and they also let cities afford transit. If we can change the way we do things, lay out some nationbuilding projects for the nation’s largest city, and get building, we could finally have a transit system to be proud of — and yes, that means subways, subways, subways.

How we could reignite Ingersoll’s CAMI auto plant

The same GM facility that built cuttingedge electric vans could anchor a new, madeinCanada electricvehicle program, one built for ordinary Canadians, not just corporate fleets or luxury buyers, writes Colin Simpson.

This article was written by Colin Simpson and was published in the Toronto Star on January 3, 2026.

COLIN SIMPSON COLIN SIMPSON IS DEAN OF THE CENTRE FOR CONTINUOUS LEARNING AT GEORGE BROWN COLLEGE.

When General Motors shut down BrightDrop production at the Ingersoll CAMI plant this fall, Oxford County lost more than a thousand skilled jobs and a vital piece of Ontario’s manufacturing backbone.

Yet this does not have to be another chapter in the long decline of Canadian auto production.

The same facility that built cuttingedge electric vans could anchor a new, madeinCanada electricvehicle program, one built for ordinary Canadians, not just corporate fleets or luxury buyers.

For decades, CAMI has been part of Canada’s industrial DNA. Generations of workers have built vehicles that ended up in driveways across North America.

When GM converted the plant to produce BrightDrop electric delivery vans, it seemed to mark a new beginning, proof that Canada could lead the EV transition.

Instead, the market shifted, orders stalled and production ceased. The lights dimmed once more in Ingersoll. But those lights could, and should, come back on.

The frustration in the community is real.

Mike Van Boekel, chair of Unifor Local 88, which represents roughly 1,100 laidoff CAMI workers, recently said the union is ready to occupy the idled plant if GM attempts to remove equipment.

“The ball’s in GM’s court. If they don’t remove equipment, we won’t seize the plant,” he said, emphasizing that such a move is not his preferred option.

Van Boekel and Unifor’s national leadership have been working with the federal and provincial governments to persuade GM to assign a new vehicle to the site without success so far.

Canada has pledged to move toward zeroemission vehicles over the next decade, but policy targets alone will not get us there. Affordability and access will.

Imports from Asia and Europe remain costly and vulnerable to tariff swings. American EVs enjoy heavy domestic incentives. Meanwhile, most Canadians still cannot find an electric vehicle under $45,000, and middleincome buyers are being left out of the shift.

That is the gap Ingersoll can fill. Reopening CAMI to produce an affordable, practical EV designed and built in Canada would not only revive a skilled workforce but also give the country a sustainable business model for longterm competitiveness.

The plant already has the equipment, supply connections, and trained employees to get moving quickly. The infrastructure is there. The expertise is there. The opportunity is there. What is needed now is leadership and a business plan rooted in value, not virtue.

Imagine a compact hatchback or small crossover with a 300kilometre realworld range, built for our winters and our budgets.

Heated batteries, coldweather preconditioning, corrosion protection, a price tag under $40,000. This is the kind of vehicle that could replace the second car in millions of driveways or serve as the first EV for families who have been priced out of the market.

It is also the kind of product governments themselves could use.

If Ottawa and Queen’s Park want to strengthen domestic manufacturing, they can start by purchasing Canadian.

Committing to buy the first 25,000 units for fleets such as Canada Post, provincial utilities, school boards, and municipal services would give a reborn CAMI steady demand from day one. It is a proven approach.

Quebec’s and British Columbia’s early public orders for electric buses helped launch entire local industries.

This plan makes economic sense. Reusing existing facilities avoids the billiondollar costs of new construction. The Oxford County supply chain remains largely intact. Ontario’s energy rates are stable, and Canada’s electricity grid is among the cleanest and most reliable in the world.

Each job saved or recreated in Ingersoll supports several more across suppliers, transport, and service industries. For taxpayers, it is not a subsidy, it is a strategic investment that pays dividends in employment, trade balance, and technological knowhow.

Critics will argue that governments should not pick winners. But every country that succeeds in EV manufacturing, from the United States to South Korea, does exactly that.

The difference is how smartly they do it. A reborn CAMI would serve real domestic demand, compete in a price segment where the market gap is widest, and use the tools Canada already has in place.

This is not nostalgia for a lost auto town. It is an argument for sound economics. It is about making sure the transition to electric transportation supports local jobs, local suppliers, and local consumers instead of sending opportunity offshore.

Ingersoll does not need another “whatif” headline. It needs a reason to believe in its future, and so does the country. We already have the plant, the talent, and the tools. What we need now is the resolve to connect them.

If Canada is serious about building affordable EVs, protecting skilled manufacturing, and keeping value inside our borders, the path runs straight through Oxford County. The electric future does not have to be imported.

It can be made right here at home.

Flash floods kill at least 17

This article was written and published by the Toronto Star on January 2, 2026.

The season’s first heavy rains and snowfall ended a prolonged dry spell but triggered flash floods in several areas of Afghanistan, killing at least 17 people and injuring 11 others, a spokesperson for Afghanistan’s national disaster management authority said Thursday. Mohammad Yousaf Hammad, spokesperson for Afghanistan National Disaster Management Authority, said the floods also damaged infrastructure in the affected districts, killed livestock, and affected 1,800 families, worsening conditions in already vulnerable urban and rural communities.

2026 forecast: M&A, AI, EVs, (and more)

This opinion was written by Eric Reguly and was published in the Globe & Mail on January 2, 2026.

**Canada could strike a deal this year to build the Swedish Saab Gripen E-series fighter jet and the Saab GlobalEye surveillance plane on Canadian soil.**

The Globe’s European bureau chief predicts there will be less free trade and more mergers and acquisitions this year

In gambling casinos, the house edge, depending on the game, is typically one to five per cent. With that in mind, I will be happy if half of my predictions for 2026 prove accurate, or even largely accurate. Here goes, and happy new year from snow-free Rome.

PLANE LOGIC

Canada will do a deal to build the Swedish Saab Gripen E-series fighter jet and the Saab GlobalEye surveillance plane on Canadian soil, presumably at a Bombardier factory in Ontario or Quebec. The Canadian military has not warmed to the Gripen, largely because it fears the expense of running a dual-fighter fleet. It wants Canada to stick with the U.S.made F-35 stealth fighter jets, of which 16 are on their way, with options for another 72.

The generals are betting that Prime Minister Mark Carney doesn’t have the courage to anger U.S. President Donald Trump by adding the Gripen at the expense of some or many F-35 orders. But Saab has said that building the Gripen and GlobalEye in Canada would create 10,000 jobs, or possibly more if the Canadian factories pump them out for Ukraine and other export customers.

The chance to develop the largest military aerospace R&D talent pool and supply chain since the death of the Canadian developed Avro Arrow interceptor in 1959 will be too hard to pass up. Yes, Mr. Trump will get angry and possibly retaliate, but so what? Anger and retaliation are his default positions.

LESS FREE TRADE

The Trump-directed trade wars won’t flare up again in 2026, since tariffs are not a universal win for the U.S. They trigger retaliation from other countries and put upward pressure on consumer prices; the U.S. President wants inflation to fall in the run-up to the midterm elections in November. But a tariff lull does not mean the trade storm is over, at least in North America.

The U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement is up for review in 2026. Mr. Trump and his MAGA backers will demand a U.S.-centric replacement. No surprise there; the 25-per-cent tariffs on Canadian autos, steel and aluminum that hit in 2025 were a forewarning that Canada is doomed on the trade front. The USMCA won’t go without a fight, but it will go.

MERGER MANIA REDUX

Mergers and acquisitions are coming off a banner year. Harvard’s 2025 M&A review said that compared to 2024, deal volume is expected to rise by almost half in the U.S. alone to US$2.3-trillion, equivalent to Canada’s gross domestic product. Global volumes should rise by about a quarter. There is every reason to believe the frenzied pace will continue in 2026.

Interest rates in the U.S. and elsewhere are coming down, making financing costs cheaper. The U.S.’s anti-consolidation stance is vanishing (which is not to say antitrust reviews are history). Europe is practically begging for global champions in defence, banking, pharmaceuticals, energy and other industries, meaning regulatory reviews will be given the light touch there, too.

My guess is that mining and banking are the sectors to watch. The lunge for critical metals, especially copper, means that megadeals will remain on the agenda. A blockbuster merger between Glencore of Switzerland and Britain’s Rio Tinto is not out of the question, nor is the takeover of Anglo American , considering its purchase of copperheavy, Vancouver-based Teck Resources has received shareholder approval.

On the resources front, my other guess is that once-mighty BP , the former British Petroleum, is not long for this world as an independent player. The company has had too many value-destroying reversals (black-togreen and vice versa) to play in the big leagues – its market value is less than one-fifth of Exxon’s .

In the financial world, watch out for the Canadian banks. They are huge, even by global standards. Royal Bank of Canada is worth US$240-billion, closing in on Wells Fargo’s value. It’s only a matter of time before RBC and its Canadian rivals pounce on big targets in the U.S.

AI’S SOCIAL BACKLASH

The joy of the artificial intelligence industry’s stunning growth and investment returns will be replaced in 2026 by fear and loathing over job losses. Nothing puts a smile on the faces of CEOs and company shareholders more than sinking labour costs, and AI is putting the curve in the right direction for them.

The Financial Times reported this week that Morgan Stanley forecasts the European banks alone will eliminate 200,000 banking jobs, equivalent to 10 per cent of their payrolls, by 2030, as AI takes over. The job cuts are expected to come within the central services divisions, such as back-office roles. Repeat in other industries.

I predict that AI-related job cuts will see strikes in 2026, as employees demand contracts insulated from the technology. Automation has sparked labour agitation in the past, including the Luddite rebellions in the early 19th century and, in 2023, the Hollywood strikes, where writers and actors demanded work clauses that curtail AI use.

TESLA’S BATTERY WILL DRAIN

Elon Musk’s Tesla had a pretty good year. The shares were up nine per cent, giving the electric vehicle giant a market value of US$1.5-trillion. A repeat performance in 2026 is highly unlikely. Mr. Trump has no love for EVs, even if his bromance with Mr. Musk seems to have been restored. The U.S. federal tax credits for EVs are on their way out, and rules to reduce or eliminate vehicle emissions are being scrapped.

In the European Union, gas and diesel cars were given a new lease on life just a few weeks ago with the dilution of the 2035 zeroemissions requirement. Meanwhile, Chinese EVs are coming on strong pretty much everywhere except Canada and the U.S., where 100-per-cent tariffs banish them from showrooms. They have moved up the quality chain fast and are cheaper than Teslas.

Musk’s nightmare scenario – a Chinese ban on Tesla sales on national security grounds, because the cars are equipped with all sorts of cameras and sensors – has gone from the unimaginable to the possible.

U.S. LNG exports hit record highs as Ottawa seeks to boost Canada’s output

This article was written by Brent Jang and was published in the Globe & Mail on January 2, 2026.

**The Cedar LNG site in Kitimat, B.C., is set to be completed in 2028. Cedar has applied to B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office to export up to 3.75 million tonnes a year.**

Canada’s southern neighbour is looking to solidify top global ranking as Ottawa seeks to boost output

U.S. exports of liquefied natural gas are reaching record-high levels, while Ottawa seeks to expand Canada’s modest LNG output in the quest to rank among the top six countries globally within five years.

The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), a U.S.-based research group, forecasted that there will be roughly 140 million tonnes of LNG export capability from the U.S. by the end of 2026, or about 10 times greater than anticipated capacity from Canada.

Eight U.S. LNG export terminals have opened since 2016, and another four are slated to be operating by 2028, including the first exports from Golden Pass LNG in Texas within weeks.

IEEFA analyst Clark Williams-Derry estimates that there were a record-high 109 million tonnes of LNG exported from the U.S. in 2025. He made the estimate after crunching the numbers from Kpler, a provider of real-time global data and analytics.

The U.S. has now been the largest exporter of LNG in the world for three consecutive years. American exports are headed for fresh highs in 2026, with the final tally dependent on the pace of startup at Golden Pass and expansion at the Corpus Christi LNG terminal in Texas, Mr. Williams-Derry said.

By contrast, LNG Canada became the first Canadian export terminal for the fuel when it began shipping to Asia from Kitimat, B.C., in mid-2025.

As the U.S. trade war persists, Ottawa has been striving to smooth the way for economic diversification and reduced dependence on American customers.

Prime Minister Mark Carney announced in September that LNG Canada’s Phase 2 expansion plan made the list of major projects of national interest to be considered for fast-tracking.

In November, he said Ksi Lisims LNG in Northwest British Columbia has been added by Ottawa to the growing roster of plans submitted to the Major Projects Office, which has the goal of expediting a wide range of developments in sectors such as energy, mining and infrastructure across Canada.

Canada is the fifth-largest natural gas producer in the world but recently ranked near the bottom of 22 countries exporting LNG.

The U.S., Australia and Qatar have been by far the world’s largest LNG exporters. Russia ranks fourth, followed by Malaysia.

It is unclear exactly how high Canada might move up the global rankings because several countries already have projects under construction and will expand their exports over the next five years, according to the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

CAPP predicts that Canada could become a key LNG player, with exports of the fuel having the potential to place the country in the top six in the world by 2030.

In 2013, there were more than 20 LNG proposals in British Columbia.

Today, only two smaller B.C. projects – Woodfibre LNG near Squamish and Cedar LNG in Kitimat – are under construction in Canada.

Construction on Woodfibre is scheduled for completion by late 2027 while Cedar is slated to be finished by late 2028.

In what the industry calls nameplate capacity, LNG Canada’s Phase 1 has the initial ability to export 14 million tonnes a year, though the Shell PLC-led project could increase it to 15 million tonnes annually through operating efficiencies at the Kitimat site located on the traditional territory of the Haisla Nation.

Woodfibre has a nameplate capacity of 2.1 million tonnes a year while Cedar has applied to British Columbia’s Environmental Assessment Office for permission to export up to 3.75 million tonnes a year.

If Ksi Lisims gets built, that would add another 12 million tonnes a year of exports.

LNG Canada’s Phase 1, Ksi Lisims, Cedar and Woodfibre could have a combined export capacity totalling nearly 33 million tonnes annually by 2030.

If LNG Canada forges ahead with its Phase 2 plan to double the Kitimat terminal’s capacity by the early 2030s, Canada would solidify its position as a major exporter of natural gas in liquid form.

“We continue to work in close collaboration with all levels of government to find a pathway to a Phase 2 expansion while navigating a complex global trade and tariff environment,” LNG Canada said in a statement.

Industry analysts expect LNG Canada to make a final investment decision by the end of 2026 on whether to proceed with Phase 2.

The contentious Coastal GasLink pipeline, operated by TC Energy Corp., is supplying natural gas from Northeast B.C. to LNG Canada and also will be used for Cedar.

Proponents of energy projects have had to deal with a range of issues such as volatile commodity prices, cost overruns, court battles and protests from citizens’ groups and climate activists.

“New Canadian LNG diverts resources away from real climate solutions such as renewable power generation and a clean transportation system,” said Steven Haig, a policy adviser at the International Institute for Sustainable Development.

In a recent report, IEEFA warned about a looming LNG glut on global markets.

“Market developments in 2025 indicate that policymakers and consumers in Asia are already responding to key LNG challenges in ways that could significantly slow future demand growth,” said the report co-authored by Christopher Doleman and Sam Reynolds.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Michael Harvey estimates that LNG Canada exported more than 2.3 million tonnes of LNG to Asia between the startup in late June and mid-December.

Ksi Lisims is expected to make a final investment decision in 2026. The Nisga’a Nation, Houston-based Western LNG and a group of natural gas producers called Rockies LNG are partners in the Ksi Lisims project near Gitlaxt’aamiks, B.C.

“We’ve learned a lot of stuff to better position ourselves as Indigenous nations to take our rightful place at the helm of this economic shift,” said Andrew Robinson, chief executive officer of the Nisga’a Lisims government.

BC Hydro is proposing the North Coast Transmission Line project, in collaboration with First Nations, that would run along the route of its current line between Prince George and Terrace in British Columbia. With the eventual addition of spur lines, the goal is to supply or increase electricity to customers such as the Port of Prince Rupert, mining companies and the proposed Ksi Lisims project.

A recent study by the Pembina Institute, titled Power Struggle, said limited supplies of hydroelectricity in B.C. should be earmarked for areas that provide the most economic benefit such as critical minerals, and not for fossil fuels such as LNG.

“Maybe going all-in on LNG isn’t the best way,” said Will Noel, a senior analyst at the Pembina Institute who co-authored the study with Ian Sanderson and Janetta McKenzie.

But Nisga’a leaders have touted Ksi Lisims and the associated Prince Rupert Gas Transmission (PRGT) pipeline project as prime examples of economic reconciliation.

Construction of the 750-kilometre PRGT project, which is coowned 50-50 by the Nisga’a and Western LNG, would be across Northern B.C.

The Gitxsan Nation has traditional territories that the natural gas pipeline would cross. A group of Gitxsan hereditary chiefs has expressed conditional support for PRGT.

“We’re thinking about future generations,” said Catherine Blackstock, whose Gitxsan hereditary chief name is Geel.

But Kolin Sutherland-Wilson, a spokesperson for the Gitxsan house group named Tsi’basaa, said there is considerable opposition to PRGT.

Indigenous hereditary chiefs belonging to the Gitxsan and Gitanyow Nation previously signed benefit agreements to support PRGT, but Mr. Sutherland-Wilson said those deals are lacking substance. “The whole thing is just wishy washy,” he said.

Environment, economic prosperity can coexist

This opinion was written by Tim Gray and was published in the Globe & Mail on January 2, 2025.

It will require bold leadership to get to a better future

As we move into 2026, the landscape of environmental advocacy in Canada has changed dramatically. Canada’s closest neighbour and biggest trading partner is driving massive political and economic restructuring, which has created unease among Canadians at a collective and personal level.

These new threats have also forced public attention away from clean energy, climate change, chemical and plastic pollution and urban sprawl. Unfortunately, many polluting industries have seized this moment to maximize their profits, lobbying decision-makers to roll back progress and carry out attacks on long standing environmental protection rules and legislation.

These industries argue that it’s for the greater economic good. But is it? Evidence from history shows that societies succeed in the long term when they integrate protection of the environment into economic and social development strategies. In fact, for the first time in human history, scientifically conclusive evidence is telling us that economic progress must be grounded in what is best for the environment.

As we move into 2026, my prediction (and my hope) is that Canada will take the opportunity to get some key things right to chart a course toward a better future.

The federal government has been hyper focused on nation building projects. In 2026, watch for these projects to start aligning with clean energy, climate action and protection of nature. Prioritizing projects like highspeed rail, offshore wind farms, clean steel and better public transit will keep us in our nation building era without leaving the environment behind.

The fossil fuel industry has worked hard to block renewable energy projects. Fortunately, the price of solar, wind and battery storage systems has dropped so dramatically that it will become increasingly difficult to convince citizens to stick with expensive and polluting gas and oil. In 2026, expect to see a continuing shift from gas furnaces to heat pumps and from gas plants to renewable energy production projects.

As we change the way our homes are powered, big changes will also come to the rules that guide how those homes are built. In place of regulations that have prevented midrise buildings, we can anticipate that cities and towns will recognize that the housing crisis will be partly solved by encouraging more of this type of building. This will allow us to densify existing neighbourhoods.

Making our neighbourhoods denser and more walkable will hopefully mean fewer private cars on the road. But when we do need to drive, those cars should be electric. This year, we’ll be moving toward more affordable EVs and hope for a major government push on charging infrastructure. There is no future for Canadian automakers and the jobs they provide if Canada sits out the move to EVs. In 2026, EVs will be back in style as both consumers and governments recognize that they are less polluting and better value.

Speaking of value, 2026 is the year we think we’ll finally see the Ontario government put a price on non-alcoholic drink containers through an expanded deposit-return program. This will greatly increase recovery and recycling rates. It’s not hard to do, and eight of the other 10 Canadian provinces already have successful programs in place.

It will also be the year that the jig is up on the long-hidden truth about the risks of polyfluoroalkyl chemicals (PFAS), also known as “forever chemicals.” These include developmental effects, cancers and disruption of hormone regulation. These chemicals are found in a plethora of everyday products, including non-stick coatings, menstrual products and furniture. Fortunately, after long delays, we can watch for federal bans on at least some of the most egregious PFAS uses this year. We must continue to push for action on all of them.

Finally, the cynical Alberta-federal government MOU that undercuts Canadian climate action will run up against rocks of its own making. Oil demand is expected to peak by the end of this decade, meaning the massive increases in oil sands production and a risky bitumen pipeline to the British Columbia northwest coast make no economic sense. These projects will never move forward. We’ll be reading the MOU’s epitaph well before the year’s end.

The predictions I’ve laid out here can become a reality, but it will require bold action from our leaders. This year, let’s hold them accountable and ensure that Canada moves in the right direction. Here’s to a 2026 where clean water, a safe climate and healthy communities ground all our efforts to create economic and social prosperity.