After spending most of last weekend in Calgary and having the privilege of speaking with scores of well-informed Albertans including a number of prominent political figures, I came away with an uneasy feeling that it is not generally recognized in Canada how politically vulnerable this country is and how vivid and well-founded are the public policy grievances of Alberta. Alberta was a conventional farming and ranching economy until the discovery of oil there in 1947. Today, mining, quarrying and oil and gas extraction account for a quarter of Alberta’s GDP, and 70 per cent of exports, with ancillary benefits to the construction, manufacturing, transportation and other industries.

For its first 30 years as an oil and gas producing jurisdiction, Alberta’s standard of living and per capita i

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