Journalists are taught to punch up, not down. That’s what makes me hesitate, sometimes, when criticizing the arguments made by Alberta’s most prominent separatist leaders. Yes, they represent a clear threat to our politics, our prosperity and our national unity. But they’re also some of the most wildly misinformed people I’ve ever encountered and their arguments practically defeat themselves. 

Whether it’s up or down, though, it’s time to do some punching. Let’s focus on a specific (and spectacularly stupid) argument they keep making: that Alberta could be just like Norway. Over on the nonconsensual deepfake website that calls itself X, David Parker — the one-time confidante and political ally of Alberta premier Danielle Smith — tried it out for size. “Alberta has the same population as Norway,” he posted, “but we are much poorer, despite having way more natural resources than Norway, because we are tax slaves for Ottawa.”

He’s hardly the only one making this comparison. Nadine Wellwood, a pro-independence speaker and author, floated it at a recent pro-separatism talk she gave in small town Alberta (Buck Creek, to be specific) alongside Queen’s Law professor Bruce Pardy and podcaster Jason Lavigne. “Have you heard of this country called Norway?” she asked the crowd. “It’s kind of Alberta-ish: oil and gas, small population of five million. And it has the largest sovereign wealth fund right now of anywhere in the world.”

Here are some other things Norway has: a 78 per cent effective tax rate on upstream oil and gas operations, substantial public ownership in the sector (including its largest company, Equinor), massive electric vehicle subsidies, and a consumption tax of 25 per cent. That’s an awful lot of socialism for a movement that seems to reflexively recoil at the very suggestion of shared sacrifice and taxation. If a Liberal government — heck, even a Conservative government — proposed even one of those policies, or others that have been critical to the growth of Norway’s substantial sovereign wealth fund, Alberta’s separatists might spontaneously combust from the rage. 

It’s not just far-right agitators who entertain this fantasy about Norway. I remember sitting on a panel at the Calgary Stampede in 2023 with the CEO of a mid-sized oil company and hearing him suggest that if Norway and Qatar could increase their oil production, why can’t Canada? I gently explained that Canada had, in fact, been increasing its oil production, and that his peers would scream bloody murder if they had to pay even a fraction of the taxes that are levied on Norway's oil operations. He didn’t have much to say after that. 

Personally, I’m all for Alberta turning itself into Norway. It’s a country whose oil industry has made significant improvements in its carbon emissions, with its massive Johan Sverdrup field now producing barrels with less than 1 kg of embedded carbon dioxide per barrel. In Alberta, by way of comparison, the average barrel has anywhere from 32 kg to 70 kg, and those figures have barely budged for more than a decade now. 

It’s a country that also knows how to save the money it’s made from oil and gas exploration and exploitation. Its sovereign wealth fund is now worth more than US$2 trillion, and it continues to invest those funds almost exclusively outside the fossil fuel industry. It’s able to do that, of course, because it actually taxes its citizens for the services they receive. It’s a novel concept, I know. 

Alberta separatists keep citing Norway's success as an example of why they could do it alone. As usual, they have no idea what they're talking about.

And it’s a country that continues to embrace ambitious climate targets. The country’s Climate Change Act, which was passed in 2017, sets a 2030 target of 50 to 55 per cent reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels on the way to a 2050 target of 90 to 95 per cent reductions. It’s driving those reductions with a carbon tax, one that’s expected to hit US$220 per tonne by 2030. 

In Alberta, meanwhile, the province has made little progress on emissions reductions and continues to resist any attempt by Ottawa at implementing climate policies. It’s also facing yet another predictable string of massive deficits due to falling oil prices and the government’s outright hostility to diversifying its sources of revenues. A modest five per cent provincial sales tax would go a long way towards balancing the budget and allowing the province to start saving more meaningfully for the future. But the odds of a Conservative premier implementing a PST — a “political suicide tax,” as it’s often called here — are vanishingly small. They’re the ones, after all, who have made it politically suicidal through decades of anti-tax politicking. 

So no, an independent Alberta, if such an abomination ever came to pass, would have almost nothing in common with Norway. If anything, it would be its antithesis: a country that reviles taxation, scorns the idea of mutual benefit and shared sacrifice, treats climate change like a conspiracy theory and bets everything on oil. I’d like to believe that Alberta’s separatists could learn a thing or two from Norway, but then learning isn’t really their thing either.  

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