HOUSTON: There’s no love lost between them. And it’s purely professional between Alberta and Ottawa’s environment ministers.
While she wasn’t sad to hear the news that Steven Guilbeault will be turfed from his job as Justin Trudeau’s climate change hatchetman, Alberta’s Minister of Environment and Special Places, Rebecca Schulz couldn’t help but add insult to injury by declaring him unfit to be a cabinet minister of any kind, in any capacity.
She even went as far as to call him “toxic.”
“Steven Guilbeault should not be in cabinet period. And whether or not Guilbeault is in Environment or Heritage Canada, the problem remains. Guilbeault’s pernicious and toxic influence must be rooted out completely, or we will continue to pay the economic cost of lost jobs and lost investment because of the decisions this man-made,” she said in an emailed statement to The Western Standard.
“He must go.”
The bad news, from Alberta’s perspective, is that he appears to be sticking around in some capacity in Mark Carney’s new cabinet, which is expected to be announced on Friday, as payback for supporting the Liberal contender’s leadership run.
Throughout his tenure as Canada’s environment minister, Guilbeault’s relationship with Alberta has been anything but smooth.
A former Greenpeace activist, Guilbeault has been at the center of some of the most heated disputes between Ottawa and Alberta, particularly over energy policy, emissions caps, and the future of oil and gas.
From the moment he was appointed to the role in 2021, Guilbeault’s aggressive push for federal climate policies — including emissions reductions, net-zero electricity mandates, and methane regulations — put him on a collision course with Alberta’s leadership, which saw his environmental agenda as a direct attack on its economic engine and constitutional jurisdiction over natural resources.
One of the most contentious battles emerged over Ottawa’s proposed emissions cap on the oil and gas sector. Schultz complained she was almost coerced into signing a non-disclosure agreement before he’d tell her details at the COP-28 climate summit in Dubai in 2023.
Guilbeault framed the cap as a “necessary step” to meet Canada’s climate commitments, while Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and her predecessor, Jason Kenney, denounced it as an unconstitutional overreach that would devastate the province’s economy.
Smith went as far as to publicly call for Trudeau to fire him on multiple occasions.
Guilbeault, undeterred, continued to defend the policy, insisting that Alberta had no choice but to “align” with national and global climate goals. He even suggested that if Alberta refused to comply, Ottawa could criminally charge government officials — a statement that only further inflamed tensions.
His visits to the province were often met with protests and his public statements frequently drew sharp rebukes from Smith’s government.
The minister’s personal history as a climate activist — he was famously arrested in 2002 for scaling former premier Ralph Klien’s house to ‘install’ solar panels — only deepened skepticism among Alberta leaders about his willingness to work collaboratively with the energy industry.
As tensions escalated, Smith’s government introduced the Sovereignty Act, a legislative tool aimed at pushing back against federal policies it deemed harmful to Alberta’s interests.
Though not named directly, Guilbeault’s policies were a major catalyst for the act’s creation, underscoring how deeply the province’s leadership viewed Ottawa’s environmental approach as a threat.
With Trudeau stepping down and Carney set to take over, Guilbeault’s future in government remains uncertain.
Reports he will be removed from the environment portfolio even though he will remain in cabinet is a testament to his support for Carney during his leadership run even as Carney vows to scrap Guilbeault’s signature carbon tax.
Whether his exit from the environment file will ease tensions between Ottawa and Alberta remains to be seen, but his tenure as Canada’s climate chief will not soon be forgotten. Not by Schulz or Smith.