The Crown Goes to Town
During today's Throne Speech, spare a thought for how peace and security can occur in places where natural resources are plentiful and peaceful co-existence is in short supply
When King Charles III begins to read today’s Speech from the Throne, spare a thought for the biggest and smallest among us, from one end of New Brunswick to the other.
To the south is Irving Oil, Canada’s largest oil refinery, the sole purchaser of close to 70 per cent of all New Brunswick imports.
In 2024 it imported $11.6 billion of crude, slightly more than all Nova Scotia imports.
Of the crude that arrives by tanker through the Bay of Fundy, just over half came from the United States, followed by Nigeria and Saudi Arabia.
Last year, we would have considered the United States a trusted partner; today, we will hear from Canada's King or Prime Minister that it is not.
Federal Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Tim Hodgson said as much in a May 23rd speech to the Calgary Chamber of Commerce encouraging Alberta oil and gas leaders to play their part in the ‘one economy’ project by helping secure Canada’s energy supply.
“Eastern Canada needs better supply security,” he said. “We need to reduce our exposure to foreign energy, in a world where we may not be able to rely on trade agreements with our southern neighbours.”1
Cue Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew, who has listed a second deep-water port on Hudson’s Bay to complement the existing port in Churchill, Man. as a potential path north for landlocked Alberta crude and Canada’s critical minerals.
Could Western oil come East by tanker and reduce Irving Oil’s and, by extension, Atlantic Canada’s, dependence on foreign suppliers?
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That sounds like one of those ‘Projects of National Interest’ Prime Minister Mark Carney talks about and to which Minister Hodgson will fast-track via the new Major Federal Projects Office, with an assist from Industry Minister Mélanie Joly.
In an interview with The Logic, Joly said Carney told her she has 60 days to cut red tape and speed approval processes for government programs, such as the Strategic Innovation Fund (SIF) and the Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) tax incentives.2
Both programs are meant to drive research, development and investment in Canada, with an emphasis on advancing new technologies and processes in pursuit of economic sovereignty.
Something like a massive deposit of pozzolan might fit the bill.
Pozzolan is a material found in volcanic rock that has little value on its own but is an important additive for cement production, reducing CO2 emissions and creating stronger cement and concrete at a lower cost.
In 2019, Guy Rousseau, president of Rimouski, Que.-based cement company Cimbec Canada, discovered a significant deposit of the cement-strengthening mineral near an existing quarry in the old mill town of Dalhousie.
Dalhousie, like its major employers, no longer exists.
The municipality was dissolved and merged with neighbouring Charlo to create the new community of Heron Bay in 2023 as part of the New Brunswick government’s municipal restructuring.
Since 2022, the community has been locked in conflict over whether to develop Rousseau’s find.3
That same year, Rousseau began to explore developing New Brunswick’s pozzolan deposit, partnering with Réjean Carrier, president of Carboniq, Inc., a consulting engineering firm from the Montreal region specializing in greenhouse gas reduction and carbon capture for industrial processes.
They created EcoRock Dalhousie, a $300-million project to convert the existing quarry into a pozzolan mine that, according to initial estimates, could operate for 30 years.
The Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) was there at the start too with an initial $1.93 million loan to assess the size and quality of the deposit and initial environmental surveys, part of its national net zero initiatives.
The insults and threats started that year too, as residents of this small community of 3,200 people lined up behind social media barricades in a now too-familiar entrenchment of ‘yes’ and ‘no’ sides.
It’s even divided the seven-member Heron Bay town council, which on May 20th, voted unanimously to indefinitely suspend Mayor Normand Pelletier for violating council’s code of conduct to direct indecent, abusive or insulting words at other members.4
The pro-mine Pelletier, who had been mayor of Dalhousie since 2016, was quoted in a March 11th story by journalist Martin Patriquin in The Logic, that his three anti-mine council colleagues “Don’t have a fucking clue what they’re doing.”
Meanwhile, the multi-year approval process continues.
In March, EcoRock created a steering committee of residents of Heron Bay and nearby Eel River Bar band council to hear from all sides and attempt to negotiate a way forward to ‘harmonious coexistence.’5
The Restigouche Regional Service Commission, which oversees local economic development is now examining the project, as is the Government of New Brunswick via Natural Resources Minister John Herron.
So much anger and distrust in such a small community, something to remember as we listen and parse the King’s Speech.
It is easy to blame Canada’s lagging productivity and inability to approve massive development projects on former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but that ignores the culpability of industry and other levels of government to build and sustain our nation.
While Facebook groups and Reddit pages may have accelerated citizen anger, neither created it.
We got here the old-fashioned way; we earned it.
From Saint John, home to New Brunswick’s largest industrial developments, to Dalhousie, a small town on the province’s northern tip, residents are well-versed in the give-and-take of industrial development.
So too are residents of Churchill, Man., the area near Ontario’s Ring of Fire and all the other places where natural resources naturally exist.
The places where talk of the Crown is always in reference to land, and where the eternally sought balance between economic development and environmental protection exists not as theory, but as fact.
It’s why we need leaders at all levels – federal, Indigenous, provincial, and local – that recognizes industrial development is complex and should not be boiled down to an either/or, two-tribes-go-to-war structure.
When people in a town of 3,200 people are slashing tires and exposing their genitals on camera, something has gone horribly wrong.6
Leadership that is willing to design new processes and procedures that redirects the conversation from well-trod paths into new territory where greater openness and honesty can take root.
This is and never will be a town council meeting or public session, which over the past decade has devolved into empty, performative spectacles that satisfy no one and further deepen divisions.
Just go watch a Saint John Common Council or Heron Bay Council meeting on YouTube for further evidence.
The hundreds of hours that residents, proponent employees and public servants now spend pouring over documents, attending meetings and being maligned on social media isn’t simply a waste of time; it’s cruel.
We need to stop doing this to each other.
Finally, if we are to realize the vision King Charles III will read aloud today, we need to recognize the most important leaders aren’t benighted by the Crown; they are chosen by the town.
Not because of titles but because community members recognize them to be leaders who share and defend their values.
No one can lead effectively by simply declaring they’re in charge; they need others to believe it too.
U.S. President Donald Trump doesn’t act alone; he is backed by close to 40 per cent of the electorate, Silicon Valley oligarchs, a compliant U.S. Congress and like-minded autocratic world leaders.
Canada’s relationship with the United States has changed because regular Canadians recognize that our values have diverged, and so too must our relationship.
It’s what elected Mark Carney prime minister, and it is why today’s Speech from the Throne will be delivered with great pomp and circumstance, to differentiate to Canadians and the world that we are changing.
Today is about the sovereignty of the Crown; may all our tomorrows focus on bringing peace, order and good government to town.
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Tim Hodgson, Speech: Minister Tim Hodgson at the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, Natural Resources Canada, May 23, 2025, https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2025/05/speech-minister-tim-hodgson-at-the-calgary-chamber-of-commerce.html.
Laura Osman, Carney has given me 60 days to cut red tape, says the new industry minister, The Logic, May 23, 2025. https://thelogic.co/news/carney-has-given-me-60-days-to-cut-red-tape-says-the-new-industry-minister/
Martin Patriquin, The $300-million discovery that tore a small Canadian town apart, The Logic, March 11, 2025. https://thelogic.co/news/the-big-read/dalhousie-pozzolan-mine-facebook/
Martin Patriquin, Mayor at centre of mining spat relieved of duties for explosive comments, The Logic, May 23, 2025. https://thelogic.co/news/dalhousie-heron-bay-pozzolan-mine-mayor-suspended/
Community Relations, EcoRock, accessed May 27, 2025, https://www.ecorock.com/en/communaute.
Martin Patriquin, The $300-million discovery that tore a small Canadian town apart, The Logic, March 11, 2025. https://thelogic.co/news/the-big-read/dalhousie-pozzolan-mine-facebook/