Time to cut loose the loose cannon.With the NHL trade deadline looming, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says it’s long past time for Prime Minister Trudeau to retire Steven Guilbeault’s number for not being a team player.Speaking to a private Rotary Club function in Calgary on Tuesday, Smith said she’s had it with the Liberal environment minister and simply isn’t prepared to work with him in any capacity. Now she’s calling on the PM to send him to the back benches — for good.“We'd like to see a new environment minister at the federal level. Now I really did try, I've tried to work with that guy for over 18 months now. And I can tell you, he's just as ideological as the day he climbed Ralph Klein’s roof in opposition of fossil fuels,” she said.“But doesn't that just tell you something about somebody with his record is in the position of Environment Minister, and continues, I think, to show such derision to our province or resource sector and continues as well, I think, to announce just lunatic policies.”.It comes after Guilbeault’s latest outrage; ominously threatening criminal ’measures’ against Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe for refusing to remit carbon tax revenue from residents’ home heating bills.Speaking on Monday, Guilbeault accused Moe of being “immoral” and said Ottawa would not stand for any premier “breaking federal and criminal law.”.“This man clearly resents the West and our right to develop our resources, and he is entirely unfit to be environment minister. It is long past time he be replaced by the Prime Minister.”Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.That prompted Smith to level a Twitter (“X”) blast of her own titled ‘Steven Guilbeault & The Rule of Law’ emblazoned with the infamous orange jumpsuit.“Alberta stands with Saskatchewan and Premier Scott Moe in their fight against the unfair and unconstitutional region-specific and fuel-specific application of the carbon tax. We agree the retail carbon tax should be scrapped and will continue to take every effort to see that it is overturned.”“Further, it is utter hypocrisy to listen to Minister Stephen Guilbeault talk about the rule of law and unethical behaviour. This is the same man who scaled the CN tower illegally putting lives at risk, trespassed on the home of Ralph and Colleen Klein while Colleen was home alone, and tramples on the constitution of Canada on an almost daily basis as evidenced by his continued Supreme Court and federal court losses including on C-69 and plastics.”“This man clearly resents the West and our right to develop our resources, and he is entirely unfit to be environment minister. It is long past time he be replaced by the Prime Minister.”.That’s notwithstanding Guilbeault's disingenuous comments about not building roads or driving cars.“I think finally, people have realized what I began to have begun to see a few months ago, which was that we're not we're not dealing with somebody who's reasonable. Someone who has looked at the vast expanses of Alberta, of the country, and come to the conclusion that we don't need to buy cars anymore or build roads anymore. You can see why I'm now not the only one saying that the agenda of the government is off side,” she said..And it’s not just her ‘right wing ideology’ that’s to blame, as per comments from the Prime Minister in Edmonton two weeks ago.Smith said she has good relations with several members of the Trudeau cabinet and singled out two for praise: Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland and Industry Minister Francois Phillipe Champagne for getting the Trans Mountain pipeline and Dow Chemical projects done.”What we have to do is get something approaching balance and I think that that I've been able to have a good relationship with Francois Philippe Champagne, for instance, and with Chrystia Freeland to work with us, I think, to finally get the Trans Mountain pipeline to the finish line,” she said.“That is no small feat because she gets a lot of opposition from her cabinet. We also partner with them on the carbon capture utilization and storage tax credits that will help our Pathways group We've also partnered with them on Dow chemicals, petrochemical net-zero plans… the Heidelberg cement plant is also going to be net zero. So there's lots of things that we can work together on.“
