The News Rundown
- Canada has struck an important agreement to export liquefied natural gas to Germany, two senior officials with direct knowledge of the agreement said Tuesday, a breakthrough for both nations trying to diversify their strategic trade alliances away from the United States.
- Under the agreement, Canada will commit to exporting up to one million metric tons of liquefied natural gas a year from a terminal on its Pacific Coast in British Columbia to Germany, starting in the early 2030s, for a two-decade horizon.
- The deal had long been in the works, with Prime Minister Mark Carney looking for new markets for Canada’s important energy resources, and the German government seeking new sources of energy supplies. Carney had suggested talks on this agreement were afoot during an August visit to Berlin together with a delegation of representatives from Canada’s energy industry.
- The German economy, a huge energy consumer, has had to seek new suppliers since cutting itself off from Russia after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and is now hurting further because of the disruption caused by the conflict in the Middle East.
- Publicly and privately, German officials have said they need to find a diverse set of suppliers for imported gas, to avoid overreliance on a single country, like the United States.
- “It makes us more competitive and more secure on the world stage,” Friedrich Merz, the chancellor, said this winter before traveling to the Persian Gulf, partly in search of oil and gas supply agreements.
- The Ksi Lisims LNG project, which is set to be used for the Germany exports, has been approved for operation by the government but not yet fully financed. Its proposed daily capacity would make it the second largest of the eight Canadian L.N.G. projects that have been proposed or are now under construction.
- The main competitor for Canadian liquefied gas are terminals in the United States on the Gulf of Mexico.
- Most of the commentary on this story posits the idea that the Germany-bound gas could follow a number of different routes or combinations of routes, depending on market conditions at any given time, for example it could go through the Panama Canal or the Suez Canal.
- Many don't realize that this deal could actually amount to a LNG swap on the market between markets, where gas could be indirectly sold to Germany. That approach is a complex global system that is meant to allow buyers of gas optimize their trade routes to lower every party’s costs.
- For example, Canadian gas could be exported to a country in Asia, the cheapest and fastest route from British Columbia. That Asian country could then swap its own supply of gas from a European seller such as Norway to Germany, which would also bring down the cost for the Germans.
- 4 years ago, at the onset of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when then Chancellor Olaf Scholz came to Canada to look for a deal on LNG, former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was emphatic that Canada was not looking to sell its resources. He said at the time: "One of the challenges around LNG is the amount of investment required to build infrastructure for that. There has never been a strong business case because of the distance from the gas fields, because of the need to transport that gas over long distances before liquefaction."
- He then tried selling Scholz on the idea of exporting cleaner energy sources, like green hydrogen, to help solve the continent's energy crunch. This of course was a hallmark of the Trudeau era of no resource development when Canada's economy floundered because we could not get our resources to market. The economy was then instead propped up by immigration and real estate, both being unsustainable, and could not last.
- Canada announced this week that we are now in a 'technical recession', which is the only G7 country to see such a contraction of its economy.
- The Canadian economy is in a “vulnerable position,” according to at least one economist, and although the latest GDP data revealed a technical recession by some definitions, not all economists are ready to declare one formally just yet.
- Statistics Canada said Friday that GDP in the first quarter of 2026 fell 0.1 per cent on an annualized rate, and follows a revised one per cent annualized decline in the fourth quarter of 2025. A technical recession is most commonly defined as two consecutive quarters with negative economic growth.
- Environmentalists say Ottawa's decision to effectively greenlight another LNG terminal jeopardizes Canada's climate goals, which were already on shaky ground because the government has moved to tweak or curtail some past environmental policies.
- While the Nisga'a Nation backs the project and holds a significant ownership stake, some local Indigenous groups worry about the emissions and ecological destruction associated with a project like this.
- In truth, it's far less controversial than another one that's being planned: an oil pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast. That project faces an uphill battle.
- A day before provincial leaders from across Western Canada enter the second day of their annual meeting, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith called for her counterparts to work together with a "spirit of collaboration" when it comes to oil and gas projects.
- Smith said: “Let's remember these ports are not British Columbia's ports, they're Canada's ports, and in being Canada's ports, that means they’re our ports too. In the spirit of collaboration, that's the attitude that all premiers should take to this."
- B.C.'s coast is Canada's coast, said Eby, who noted he's committed to working with Alberta and the federal government in the region. However, he said he must stand up for things British Columbians care about, like having a seat at the coastal pipeline table as well as lobbying Ottawa to maintain the north coast tanker ban.
- In any case, with this deal, it's clear that the Trudeau era ban on resource development was clearly wrong and that there was a business case after all. If we had developed sooner, Canada would likely not be in a recession now.
- Supplementals:
- Access to information requests obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation published in the National Post show that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s in-flight catering for three 2025 International trips totalled just about $200,000.
- The items included “luxury Normandy butter cups”, beef tenderloin, and a $25+ bottle of red wine.
- The latest Canadian Food Price Report says that an average family will spend $17,571 per year on food which over 10 or 11 years gets you close to the catering for these three outings.
- The outings include the trip to Rome and Vatican City, a trip to the UK after being sworn in, and a trip to the Netherlands for the NATO summit.
- The most costly was the Vatican trip at almost $94,000 which included items like veal escalope, herb and smoked Gouda omelettes, creme brûlée, and chocolate mousse.
- The trip to the UK cost $52,610 and included red wine braised beef with a choice of edamame ragu or pearl onion and rosemary roasted red potatoes, while the return menu featured pan-seared salmon with lemon and herb couscous and broccoli.
- The NATO summit trip cost about $49,000 offering beef tenderloin, Scottish salmon, and the mentioned “luxury Normandy butter cups.”
- A 2021 chardonnay from Inniskillin Montague Vineyard Chardonnay, reasonably priced at around $30 across Canada, was available on every flight, but more red options included Le Clos Jordanne Le Grand Clos Pinot Noir, which retails for $55 at the LCBO or the Meyer Family Vineyards Pinot Noir which commands a $56 price tag.
- The return trip from the Vatican is interesting when we look at the breakdown of the costs.
- The “VVIP Meals” reserved for Carney and his family cost a total of €3,226 or about $5,188CAD. Now obviously the front cabin meal service line items are going to cost more but this gives an idea of what the “VIPs” of the VIP transport aircraft are being served and how much it costs.
- Philip Proulx, Former Director of the Executive Office and Global News journalist David Akin tried to calm people down online by saying that everyone on the plane gets the same thing, the costs go to other things like airport fees, and the food isn’t that great!
- That’s minimizing the problem here because $5200 in airport catering going one-way is astronomical when you consider the costs of the regular meals and how much it’s costing for a small portion of those travelling onboard.
- Many laughed when Donald Trump had McDonald’s with a choice of sandwich, McNuggets, and fries brought aboard Air Force One or his own campaign plane, but maybe he and his crew had the right idea?
- The trip from Ottawa to Rome was a little more modest and fits in the bounds of what one would expect in terms of costs with VVIP dishes costing only $725.
- The VVIP catering for the return from the NATO summit cost €2,890 or about $4,648CAD.
- The VVIP catering for the return from London cost £1,167 or $2,166CAD. Interestingly of note on this flight £1,050 on bottled water not included in the VVIP catering price. That is about $1,949 on bottled water.
- While the journalists attempting to minimize this say it’s airport fees, the airport fees for the NATO trip cost €2,920 or about $4,696CAD out of the total $49,000 bill.
- Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre said, “[Mark Carney] spends $200,000 of taxpayers’ money on deluxe in-flight dining for just three flights. While a record number of Canadians line up at food banks.”
- Airfare and airports are expensive. More so when you contract with luxury catering companies. Pretzels and water probably don’t cut it for a transatlantic flight with the Prime Minister but air travel and the food services for Canada’s highest officials has long been a problem.
- The media will try and hand wave the issue away but maybe there’s a simpler way?
- Supplementals:
- The Supreme Court of Canada has handed down a decision that has given the BC NDP a clear avenue towards winning their appeal in the Cowichan case, and resolving the question of Aboriginal title over private lands that has been plaguing BC and the BC NDP's polling numbers for the better part of a year.
- A New Brunswick ruling that Aboriginal title cannot be declared over private land has been allowed to stand by the Supreme Court of Canada. Niki Sharma, B.C.’s attorney general said the high court’s refusal to hear an appeal by the Wolastoqey First Nation in the case has given British Columbia an avenue to win its appeal in the landmark Cowichan Tribes case.
- In the Cowichan ruling last August, the B.C. Supreme Court ruled that the Cowichan Tribes have Aboriginal title over a portion of land in Richmond along the Fraser River, that Aboriginal title is a “senior interest” compared with fee-simple title, and that sections of B.C.’s Land Title Act that establish fee-simple title as “indefeasible” do not apply to Aboriginal title.
- The mayor of Richmond, B.C., meanwhile said private property owners in the Cowichan Tribes title area should “breathe a little easier” in light of the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling.
- In the New Brunswick decision that has been allowed to stand, an Appeal Court judge said in December that a declaration of Aboriginal title over privately owned lands “would sound the death knell of reconciliation with the interests of non-Aboriginal Canadians.”
- The Crown-Indigenous Relations Department of the federal government said the Wolastoqey decision allowed by the Supreme Court of Canada to stand on Thursday was an important ruling, adding that “private property rights are fundamental.”
- A spokesperson said: “Canada takes note of the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the Wolastoqey case. In the case, the courts found that Aboriginal title could not be declared over privately owned lands. This important New Brunswick Court of Appeal decision will inform arguments in other cases, such as the Cowichan case in British Columbia.”
- The Lyackson First Nation was among the “modern-day successors” of the historic Cowichan Nation covered by the Cowichan ruling. Hereditary Lyackson Chief Shana Thomas said the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision had not shaken her “full confidence” in the Cowichan decision.
- “We definitely are within our rights to pursue that justice, and we have the evidence, we have the history, we have the oral evidence, we have the colonial records, we have all that we need to stand up to any challenge that we face, and I feel quite confident in the Cowichan Nation on this matter,” said Thomas.
- While the provincial government is confident of this being an easy path for their appeal, a more sobering perspective was provided by Dwight Newman, professor of constitutional law at the University of Saskatchewan and a regular commentator on Indigenous litigation in B.C.
- “The outcome in the (New Brunswick) case is moderately positive for those hoping to see a change in the Cowichan result. But only moderately so. The New Brunswick decision is not binding in B.C. [where the] courts could yet go a different path than the New Brunswick court did, and then the Supreme Court of Canada may have to look at everything again. Moreover, the New Brunswick decision says only that the outcome of Aboriginal title litigation cannot be a title declaration over privately owned lands,” continued Newman.
- Thursday marked the second time in a week that Sharma celebrated the implications of a Supreme Court of Canada decision.
- On May 21, she advised the legislature that the high court had granted the province’s application for leave to challenge a B.C. Court of Appeal decision on the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act.
- The court previously ruled that the Act made all provincial laws immediately subject to the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It then overturned the province’s mineral claims legislation as incompatible with UNDRIP principles. The province argues that the Court of Appeal overreached in its interpretation of the legislation.
- Regardless of how this latest Supreme Court decision impacts the cases on Aboriginal title, The DRIPA case is not likely to be heard until next spring. The judge in the Cowichan case has reserved decision on an application to reopen the case from a major Richmond landowner. Any appeal to higher courts is long way distant.
- The BC NDP may welcome the train of events as providing short- to medium-term relief from the months-long political imbroglio over Aboriginal rights and title, private property and DRIPA. But it could also mean months — if not years — of additional uncertainty regarding the prospects for investment in the provincial economy.
- In short, this story is far from over, and could quite possibly remain as an election going into 2028.
- Supplementals:
Firing Line
- Mark Carney addressed a business audience in New York that was a disguised attempt to get Canada/US trade relations back on track.
- While speaking in New York Carney sought closer US-Canada ties in sectors such as autos and minerals, praised American values and the mutual benefits of partnership, and called on china to take greater responsibility in the global financial system.
- Carney slightly modified the words from his Davos speech saying that while the world is undergoing a “rupture” as the US transforms its commercial relationships, working closely with Canada in specific sectors, including aluminum, automobiles and critical minerals, would strengthen both countries.
- In the speech Carney also said something that you would not have expected a Canadian leader to say as recently as last week and if you’d said it during last year’s election, you’d have been branded a traitor.
- He said while speaking of our shared interests in many sectors, "That is mutual strength. Canada Strong will help make America great again. The examples are legion where we should work together and compete with the world together.”
- He also is pushing for the idea of “fortress North America” which has been championed by Ontario and the Americans which prioritizes continental co-operation in the face of Chinese economic threats.
- He also had high praise for the US calling it the “most dynamic, resilient, and inventive country the world has ever seen… whose founding values of liberty, democracy, justice, and openness should continue to serve as guides to its future and the future of the world.”
- He still believes that Canada must stand strong on its own and that there should be a new bilateral relationship with “a different Canada, a stronger Canada, a more confident Canada that can deliver what the US needs on more equitable terms.”
- If we turn the page back to last year’s election, the entire presiding idea that the relationship with the Americans was done and we’d be looking for partners elsewhere in Europe, Asia, and more particularly China. But now it seems as though the goal of American partnership is back on the menu.
- Carney was also selling Canada’s energy and specifically leaning into electricity that could be sold to the Americans to power AI. He also wants to collaborate on our defence and space sectors.
- Recently while speaking in Toronto he mentioned that Canada is open to deeper integration with the United States but this comment got little coverage.
- CUSMA reviews are supposed to start on July 1 but issues such as the online streaming act, dairy quotas, and provincial bans on US liquor are seen as sticking points.
- We’ve discussed at length the streaming act and its problems. We’ve also pointed out supply management as an issue that would help Canadian dairy prices. And of course you had Premiers like Ford, Eby, and Kinew who went all in on American liquor bans.
- These are issues we can move on to get negotiations started and based on what the Prime Minister had to say this week, maybe the government will.
- But this doesn’t change the fact that this is a complete 180 in how the situation was being presented a short time ago. This collaborative approach using Canadian leverage is exactly what the Conservatives campaigned on last year but were panned as Trump-lite.
- Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said, “on the one hand he says that we are in the middle of a rupture with the United States. While on the other he says he wants to make America, in his words, 'great again.' He can't seem to decide if integration with the U.S. is a strength or a weakness.”
- This is exactly the situation that has developed. Are we helping to make America great again or must we be elbows up and do anything to stick it to the Americans?
- We’ve long said that the Prime Minister and his government were elected under false elbows up pretences and the realities of the world would come home to roost.
- Whether Canadians see this story will depend on what the media sees as best for their bottom line.
- Supplementals:
Quote of the Week
rupture - breach of peace or concord
Word of the Week
"That is mutual strength. Canada Strong will help make America great again. The examples are legion where we should work together and compete with the world together.” - Prime Minister Mark Carney on the mutual strength of Canada and America.
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Show Data
- Episode Title: Ruptures and Deals
- Teaser: Canada makes a deal to export LNG to Germany, Carney’s inflight meals incur huge costs, and the Supreme Court decides Aboriginal title does not apply to private property. Also, Carney wants to help make America great again.
- Production Code: WC-470-2026-05-30
- Recorded Date: May 30, 2026
- Release Date:
- Duration: 1:05:20
- Edit Notes: Show note insert at start, cough at start of Shane first story, pause at end of Shane first story
Podcast Summary Notes
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Duration: XX:XX