The News Rundown
- The province has announced that B.C. Hydro is buying a gas-fired power facility called Island Generation near Campbell River on Vancouver Island which "will ensure the long-term reliability of power on the Island". Island Generation is the largest power generator on Vancouver Island.
- B.C. Energy Minister Adrian Dix said the facility is currently used for about 15 days during peak energy use, usually in winter, and the province intends to keep it that way. Dix says: "British Columbia's economy is growing. Securing Island Generation will help ensure we have capacity to support that growth. We felt this was a good time, an important time, to maintain this [facility] for B.C. Hydro. The alternative was not to continue."
- The facility uses natural gas to produce power, but Dix said that doesn't mean the province is steering away from its clean energy goals.
- He emphasized that 98 per cent of B.C.'s energy comes from renewable sources, which the province continues to invest in, and facilities like these are only used as backup when absolutely needed. Dix says rising demand due to economic growth means that B.C. will need 20 per cent more power by 2030, and 50 per cent more power by 2050.
- According to Capital Power's website, the company that currently owns the Island Generation facility, the power plant is already contracted to supply power to B.C. Hydro. Dix said concerns about its long-term viability led to the purchase. Ajay Kumar, B.C. Hydro's Senior vice-president of integrated planning, said the Crown corporation had been looking at purchasing the facility since 2002.
- Missing from today’s announcement is any detail on what BC Hydro actually paid for Island Generation, or what it will cost ratepayers going forward. The question remains why the province forced itself into buying the facility.
- Campbell River Mayor Kermit Dahl said the announcement was good news for his city: "Throughout discussions and uncertainty about the future of this facility, the City of Campbell River has been clear and consistent: this asset matters. It matters for reliability. It matters for emergency preparedness. It matters for local jobs, and our municipal tax base. And it matters for our ability to attract future industrial investment to our community."
- Larry Neufeld, Shadow Minister for Energy for the BC Conservatives said: “You cannot electrify everything and pretend natural gas doesn’t matter. Buying back a gas plant they once wrote off is proof their own plan couldn’t keep the lights on. It’s a step towards more energy reality, but the government needs to go further and scrap the impending province-wide ban on natural gas under CleanBC.”
- Due to looming power shortages outstripping the grid's current capacity, taxpayers are now funding the multi-million dollar buyout of a fossil-fuel facility the government explicitly told the public was unnecessary. Critics point to this as an admission that the province's current green energy strategy was fast-tracked without realistic infrastructure planning.
- Mainstream media news framing focused almost entirely on the BC NDP's line of "ensuring long-term reliability" and "supporting a growing economy". Instead, the reality is that this is a direct policy reversal. Under the NDP’s aggressive electrification mandate, BC Hydro intentionally sidelined this 275-megawatt gas plant, restricting its operations to an average of just 15 peak winter days a year. Now, facing a massive self-inflicted electricity deficit, the government is forcing taxpayers to purchase the exact fossil-fuel facility they spent years claiming was obsolete.
- The underlying cause of the buyback is a quiet admission by BC Hydro executives that B.C. will face an energy shortage of 500 megawatts by 2030—enough to power 500,000 homes.
- A June article shows that not only was the province looking for an agreement with Island Generation, but also McMahon Cogeneration, a gas-fired facility in Taylor in northeastern B.C. B.C. Hydro is currently bound by regulations to phase out all fossil-fuel power plants by 2030.
- The 950-megawatt Burrard thermal generating station in Port Moody was decommissioned in 2016 and is currently being dismantled, while the utility had planned to stop buying electricity from Island Generation in October and McMahon a few years later, when their contracts expired.
- Under the Clean Energy Act, the province must produce all its own power, but sticking to that rule undermines its regulated target to electrify the entire grid with renewable sources.
- The expansion plans come as swings in extreme weather have repeatedly driven B.C.’s electricity demand to record highs. During the 2021 heat wave, the province saw its peak demand spike to a record 8,568 megawatts. That record was broken in 2024, when a powerful cold snap increased peak demand to 11,300 megawatts.
- Some places are more vulnerable than others. Vancouver Island generates roughly 40 per cent of its electricity locally—half through hydroelectric stations and half through independent facilities. The remaining 60 per cent is imported from the mainland via underwater cable systems. The Island Generation gas plant makes up about a quarter of all local capacity.
- Barry Penner, a former B.C. Liberal cabinet minister who now chairs the Energy Futures Institute, said B.C. Hydro’s move to keep gas-fired plants operational is a “dose of reality,” and the “most explicit recognition that we need natural gas” as the province races to build renewable energy projects. “There’s limited time and limited options to meet peak demand by 2030. That’s a very tough timeline. Clearly, there’s been a change in thinking at B.C. Hydro.”
- According to Penner, the move to keep gas-fired power plants as part of B.C.’s energy mix shows the entire CleanBC climate plan is built on a major flaw: the assumption that the province has a cheap, endless supply of clean electricity.
- Independent energy analysts point out that the BC NDP fast-tracked policies forcing consumers to switch to heat pumps and electric vehicles without securing the grid infrastructure to handle the load. Instead of exporting clean energy, B.C. has routinely been forced to import dirtier coal-fired and gas-fired power from the United States and Alberta to cover domestic deficits, greenwashing the actual environmental footprint of the province.
- A major structural story that receives almost no mainstream coverage is how the Eby government has systematically dismantled independent oversight of BC Hydro by the BC Utilities Commission. We actually just talked about that last week on Western Context, where the province manufactured opposition from within Eby's own cabinet to distract from the province bypassing the energy regulator to award the Tilbury LNG project expansion a key regulatory bypass certificate.
- A recent cabinet order completely reversed a BCUC directive that would have required BC Hydro to clearly disclose on residential utility bills how domestic rates are being cross-subsidized by external power trades. This effectively leaves everyday British Columbians in the dark about the real cost of their power.
- While the government boasts about keeping residential energy rates relatively stable, they hide the looming fiscal cliff. The $16-billion Site C megaproject, which Eby recently renamed the "John Horgan Dam" after his late predecessor as premier, and the most expensive publicly funded project in B.C. history, is introducing massive asset depreciation charges. In order to suppress rate hikes ahead of the upcoming election cycle, the NDP is relying on accounting tricks—such as those deferral accounts—meaning future generations will face compounding rate hikes to pay off today's artificially low bills.
- While the Eby government spent years virtue-signaling through its sweeping CleanBC mandates, by penalizing natural gas home heating and enforcing a rapid switch to electric vehicles, they completely failed to build the grid infrastructure required to support it. And now, the province has forced itself into a position where we are going to have an almost impossible time of supplying our province's power in the very near future.
- Nothing illustrates the total lack of future planning better than the government's sudden pivot in June 2026, when Energy Minister Adrian Dix confirmed the province is seriously reconsidering two massive, legacy hydroelectric mega-dams—Site E on the Peace River and a dam on the Homathko River. Both of these projects have been legally prohibited since 2010 due to environmental and Indigenous concerns.
- The fact that the NDP is suddenly dusting off 1970s-era mega-dam blueprints while simultaneously buying up natural gas plants proves their modern, "electrification-first" strategy was built entirely on ideology rather than engineering reality.
- Supplementals:
- “It’s just a weird vibe… it makes my heart sad”, said Sarah Batchelor of Calgary. Batchelor is a 49-year old music teacher and is “irked” by the sight of Alberta flags.
- Global News and other media outlets picked up on a story initially run by The Canadian Press.
- In response to the Alberta flag Batchelor has put a Canadian flag up and says that several neighbours have followed.
- The story in the media comes to the conclusion that both Alberta and Canadian flags have taken on a new meaning as the referendum vote gets closer this October.
- Batchelor ultimately believes that the residents are duelling over separatism symbols and in the end “we need to be just as loud with our voice.”
- It wasn’t long ago that the Canadian flag was a symbol of the convoy protest across Canada that parked in downtown Ottawa in early 2022.
- It also wasn’t long ago that the Canadian flag was flown at half mast for weeks on end to atone for Canada’s perceived genocide against indigenous peoples.
- The Canadian flag and citizenship itself has been de-valued by a series of systems at the federal level not serving Canadians and leaning too hard on low-skill, temporary, or just too many immigrants.
- These angles raise questions because in the story, The Canadian Press says, “the reasons for the referendum are in dispute.”
- Albertans asked for a vote, the courts said no, the province is giving the people the option to have a vote about whether or not court cases should be fought to enable such a vote. It is as simple as that.
- This story though as it usually goes with content fed through The Canadian Press wire service leaves many angles un-turned.
- One of which involves the union workers of Sobeys. Recently that union filed a grievance after it was found that several stores in the province were displaying the Alberta flag.
- The flag was displayed for products where the supply chain used Alberta goods. Online social media posts found a similar flag portrayal in Nova Scotia and presumably it’s not a problem over there.
- The United Food and Commercial Workers union said that Sobeys is “alienating those customers and employees who love Canada by displaying a flag that represents separation.”
- This discussion in the media raises an interesting idea: do flags represent the political party in charge?
- Does the Canadian flag become toxic under a Conservative government?
- Does the American flag become more preferred under a Democratic president?
- It’s an interesting line that was set in the story because Ted Kaye who is part of the North American Vexillological Association said that flags are the ultimate icon of tribalism.
- Teeing this up from the beginning the Canadian Press set up a story about tribalism, consulted an expert, spoke to two people on the pro-Canada side, and emerges at an inferred conclusion that the Alberta flag represents Alberta separatism today.
- But in one sentence they actually say that the current Alberta flag was created in 1967 to honour the 100th anniversary of Confederation.
- The story as a whole aims to present a view that Alberta flags are objectionable but in doing so given the tone and innuendo used actually end up sowing more division in the province.
- This is the type of media reporting that will lead to the creation of more separatists, more momentum and turnout, and ultimately dismissing the movement risks suppressing the pro-Canada side come October.
- The media is doing no-one any favours.
- Supplementals:
- Multiple unnamed sources have confirmed that Prime Minister Mark Carney is looking to appoint a new envoy to head up Canada's embassy in China. This new top diplomat would be tasked with working with China, with Carney seeking a business-friendly relationship with Beijing as he looks to diversify trade away from the United States. He has set out to double non-U.S. exports globally over the next decade, and China looks to be a big part of the Liberal government's plan.
- Martin Cauchon, a vice-chair of the Canada China Business Council lobby group and former Liberal cabinet minister is likely to be the frontrunner for the job, but the sources say other high-profile names that have been under consideration include Canadian Olympic Committee chief executive officer David Shoemaker, former Newfoundland and Labrador premier Brian Tobin and former B.C. premier Christy Clark. Before joining the COC, Mr. Shoemaker spent seven years as CEO of NBA China.
- Cauchon wants the job and is considered one of the leading candidates, particularly because of his extensive business ties to China. As vice-chair of the Canada China Business Council, he has developed relationships with leading figures in China.
- Cauchon was spotted in late July having lunch in Ottawa with Jennifer May, the former ambassador to China, who is now foreign and defence policy adviser to the Prime Minister. Ms. May, a career diplomat, was the first woman to serve as Canada’s ambassador to China, one of the country’s most important diplomatic missions after Washington.
- Media in China and Hong Kong have said that President Xi Jinping might visit Ottawa in September, alongside a planned trip to Washington for a high-level summit with U.S. President Donald Trump. It would be the first time a Chinese head of state has visited Canada in about 16 years.
- If the Prime Minister selects someone other than a career diplomat as his next envoy to Beijing, it will be a return to a practice employed by former prime minister Justin Trudeau.
- He appointed former Liberal cabinet minister John McCallum as his first ambassador, only to fire him when Mr. McCallum publicly argued that the U.S. extradition request for Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou was seriously flawed. Ms. Meng’s arrest in Vancouver in December, 2018, led to China detaining two Canadians on trumped-up espionage charges and imposing sanctions on Canadian agriculture products.
- Dominic Barton, who succeeded Mr. McCallum in September, 2019, also came from outside the foreign service. He was formerly the global managing partner of McKinsey & Company, a business consultancy.
- In January, Carney travelled to Beijing to forge what he called a new strategic partnership with China. As part of the deal, Carney agreed to import up to 49,000 Chinese electric vehicles in 2026, a number that will rise annually over five years, in exchange for Beijing reducing punishing tariffs on Canadian canola, seafood and peas. In May, Wang Yi visited Ottawa, marking the first visit to Canada by a Chinese foreign minister in a decade.
- This realignment of priorities with China comes amid a long history of Chinese state foreign interference in our country. Beijing has also been accused, through the public inquiry and by Canada’s spy agency, of harassing diaspora communities and stealing this country’s technology.
- The Canadian government has since claimed to put in place significant safeguards, including expanded national-security reviews for foreign investments. The reviews focus on 11 sensitive technology sectors. Ottawa also banned federal research funding for universities co-operating with Chinese military institutions.
- As a result of the public inquiry, the government also set up a mandatory registry for people undertaking “influence activity” on behalf of foreign powers and gave Canada’s top spy agency more authority to combat threats.
- The changes were largely a result of months of reporting by the media on Chinese foreign interference and disinformation campaigns, drawing on confidential national-security sources and leaked secret documents.
- By appointing a former politician aligned with business to the ambassador role and not a trained diplomat who can speak Mandarin and knows the problems of foreign interference, Carney is signalling a return to a 1990s corporate-first relationship with China, risking corporate capture of Canadian foreign policy.
- Sam Cooper, one of our favourite investigative journalists uncovering real news in this country, wrote an article for The Bureau in April that investigates how corporate, rather than democratic, interests drove a significant Canadian foreign policy pivot toward China, highlighted by Mark Carney’s praise for the Canada China Business Council which was headed by Martin Cochon, who Carney is now considering as the top diplomat to China. The piece argues this strategic "China Reset" was orchestrated by private elites within the Power Corporation orbit, favoring economic integration over national security concerns.
- The July 2025 CSIS Declassified Report, explicitly labels China as the "most active state conducting foreign interference activities in Canada, in scale and scope". The final report from the Foreign Interference Commission led by Justice Marie-Josée Hogue, also highlighted structural gaps in Canada’s ability to counter Beijing's institutional reach when it was released in 2025.
- Earlier this year, it became clear that Carney’s approach to issues such as the reported use of forced labour by China is one of not discussing such issues in public. Carney had to publicly defend recent floorcrossing Liberal MP Michael Ma after Ma made highly dismissive comments regarding Chinese forced labor during an active committee hearing. This provides a concrete example of the administration minimizing human rights concerns to preserve bilateral harmony. Speaking of Ma, there's also been speculation that the prime minister was even considering appointing floor-crossing MPs to diplomatic files as political rewards.
- Regardless of Mark Carney's urge for a trade reset, Canada is still highly vulnerable to cognitive and democratic subversion by China, and needs to tread carefully when it comes to dealing with Xi Jinping's government. In diversifying from the US, the government needs to take care that they aren't shackling Canada to an even worse trade partner.
- Supplementals:
Firing Line
- In the past on Western Context we covered the government’s decision to cut a program that provided temporary health care coverage to refugees and asylum seekers. The cut was news to many that such a lucrative program existed, a program where asylum seekers and new refugees could go to the doctor, enjoy many benefits Canadians have to pay for, pay at most $4 for prescriptions, all for free while Canadians pay out of pocket or pay insurance deductibles.
- This week it was announced that the Carney government would be restoring some funding to the Interim Federal Health Program effective July 31.
- Full coverage was restored for items and services like feeding supplies, respiratory devices, implantable hearing aids, nursing home care, and hospital based rehabilitation.
- These changes were revealed by the program’s insurance provider, Medavie Blue Cross. The government says it affects a very small number of beneficiaries, about 6000 people.
- The article discussing these changes in the Toronto Star spoke to someone they call “Olivia” because of fears that using her real name would endanger her family.
- Oliva’s daughter has severe health challenges including cerebral palsy, epilepsy and severe scoliosis. They arrived in Canada 3 and a half years ago from Uganda, they came into Canada claiming asylum. Since mid-2023 they have lived in Canada while they wait for their case to be heard.
- The fact that Olivia and her daughter are classed as asylum claimants rather than refugees says all we need to know about this program.
- According to Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada, the IFHP provided healthcare coverage to 623,365 eligible beneficiaries in fiscal year 2024–2025, including 440,537 asylum claimants, and the total expenses were $896.5 million.
- A Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) report from May said spending on supplementary benefits like medication, vision care, dental care, and counselling grew from $95 million in 2019–2020 to more than $457 million in 2024–25.
- The PBO report said that around 74,000 failed refugee claimants were still eligible for health care coverage in Canada. This included 22,682 people scheduled for removal from Canada by the Canada Border Services Agency that were “temporarily suspended due to factors such as litigation stays.”
- Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner who is opposition Immigration Critic said that “the IFHP extends [coverage] to things not covered for most Canadians, like drug prescriptions, eye care, physiotherapy, home care and speech therapy.”
- Rempel Garner highlighted that since 2018, 100,000 Canadians have died while waiting for healthcare and 1 in 5 do not have a family doctor.
- One might say that the government is just being compassionate but it’s about the reputation the country sows abroad the it comes to our refugee and asylum program.
- Last October, well after Mark Carney was Prime Minister and the government put in charge, IRCC Canada published social media posts saying, “Thinking about moving to Canada? Did you know Canada has public health care? Learn how it works, who can get it and what services are covered.”
- Now the government claims that between January and May of this year there were 66% fewer people coming to Canada by way of asylum claims compared to 2024.
- The issue though is that even last summer, the country still saw over 12,000 asylum claimants in the monthly of July alone. Each one of these people that chooses to stay gets full asylum and refugee benefits.
- Over those 12,000, more than 5,200 were at an official port of entry. That means that there is a steady flow of those actively seeking to come to Canada for that purpose and we should question whether or not that’s something our country is fine with.
- During that same period, July 2025, 292 were apprehended between ports of entry. While once our southern border was the issue with thousands coming monthly, now they’re just coming through our ports and arriving like anyone else to the country.
- Refugee and asylum claimants who have had their claims found to be eligible and passed a medical exam can work in Canada.
- Common reasons as to why a claim may not be eligible include having a previously rejected or withdrawn claim, already having refugee protection, arriving from the US under the safe third country agreement (this was Roxham road), missing deadlines, or being inadmissible for criminal reasons.
- This story in the media as presented by the Toronto Star paint the picture of a poor mother and daughter with medical concerns. However, the story not being told here is that despite Canadians being told that the number of permanent residents, students, and temporary workers would go down, we““ are still bringing in thousands of people who can live and work in Canada.
- This has been a taboo topic for far too long, the consensus on immigration in this country was broken by the Trudeau government, and now it’s time for an honest conversation on the state of immigration in Canada.
- Supplementals:
Quote of the Week
“You cannot electrify everything and pretend natural gas doesn’t matter. Buying back a gas plant they once wrote off is proof their own plan couldn’t keep the lights on. It’s a step towards more energy reality, but the government needs to go further and scrap the impending province-wide ban on natural gas under CleanBC.” - Larry Neufeld, Shadow Minister for Energy for the BC Conservatives, on BC’s reversal on natural gas plants.
Word of the Week
Tribalism - a strong loyalty to your own social or political group, often with a negative view of outsiders.
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Show Data
- Episode Title: Tribal Politics
- Teaser: BC Hydro buys a natural gas power plant, flags are becoming divisive in Alberta, and Carney looks to appoint a business person to head the Beijing embassy. Also, Canada restores some health coverage to refugees.
- Production Code: WC-480-2026-08-08
- Recorded Date: August 8, 2026
- Release Date: August 9, 2026
- Duration: 1:06:31
- Edit Notes: Mute before story 3 start
Podcast Summary Notes
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