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Keep Canadian oil for Canadians

Writer urges government to use resources to meet Canadian needs first.

I have been researching Canada’s oil supply and consumption patterns as a result of the apparent eagerness of the government to open the tap to Asia. It seems that Canada currently imports close to 50 per cent of its annual needs, and exports nearly 60 per cent of its annual production.

It seems to me that if the economic prosperity of Canadians is really the first priority of the federal government, as we are reminded almost daily, we ought to be meeting our own needs first with Canadian oil, and selling what we have left over.  What logic, economic or otherwise, is there in remaining subject to global markets when it is not necessary?

Corporate ‘rip off’ rings a bell, doesn’t it?

Dirty or not, tar sands crude is Canadian property, and apparently nearly limitless in comparison to other sources. What makes economic sense in selling our own oil to other countries before we have met our own needs?  Wouldn’t it be nice if gasoline was still under a dollar per litre?  Where is a national energy strategy?

The pipeline should be going in the opposite direction.

 

 

William Lytle-McGhee