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Share Your Story - Peter Fournier

How I got the NEB moved to Calgary

In November 1989, TransCanada PipeLines Limited announced it was moving its head office to Calgary. At the time, I was Manager, Regulatory Affairs at the Canadian Petroleum Association [now CAPP]. Two days after the announcement, a Sunday, I was in the Maple Leaf Lounge at Calgary airport, waiting for a flight to Ottawa [to attend an NEB hearing], and ran into Mrs. Bobby Sparrow, MP for Calgary South [and Chair of the PC Alberta caucus], also on her way back to Ottawa. I said "Bobby, now that TCPL is moving to Calgary, it's time we moved the NEB to Calgary also". During the flight, she quizzed me on my suggestion, and by the time we reached Ottawa, she was quite enthusiastic. She asked me to write up the reasons why the NEB should be moved, and I subsequently provided her with several pages of notes.

In mid-December, I was attending a Christmas reception at the home of Elaine McCoy, my MLA for Calgary West, and briefed her on my proposal, suggesting it was an idea with great benefits for Alberta. She called over Harold MacMillan, then Chairman of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce [and former Chair of the Northern Pipeline Agency], and I repeated my idea to him, citing the benefits I saw from the move for Calgary and the oil and gas industry. I provided a set of my "notes" both to Elaine and to Harold. Harold was immediately taken by the proposal, and devoted much of 1990 championing the move.

In my notes, I suggested there were benefits for everyone if the move was made. For the Federal Conservative Government, an announcement would bolster its image in Western Canada, where there had been few recent visible rewards for the West notwithstanding the large number of Western Conservative MPs sent to Ottawa to help form a government. For Alberta, I noted that the recently introduced cost recovery procedure meant that a large portion of the NEB's annual operating costs were being recovered mainly from regulated pipelines. As pipeline tolls were being deducted by the oil and gas industry from the sales price for oil and gas, to determine the 'netback' price upon which provincial royalties were calculated, a portion of the NEB's costs were in effect reducing the royalty income of the Alberta government. If the NEB was located in Calgary, the province would be able to recover some of that cost through its provincial income tax on employee's salaries. Finally for the Chamber of Commerce, the addition of NEB employees to the Calgary workforce would bring direct and indirect benefits for the Calgary economy, which was experiencing one of its periodic downturns.

Throughout 1990, a fairly intense lobbying effort, advocating that the NEB be moved, was pursued by the various interests. It is notable, however, that the oil and gas industry itself took no part. While I had at an early date informed my employer, the CPA, of my initiative, it was quickly determined that the association would not publically take any position in light of potential negative 'optics' a position of support might convey.

Notwithstanding pressure from the West, especially from the Alberta caucus, the idea captured little interest for the rest of the Mulroney government. Indeed, when the decision to move the NEB was announced as part of the spring 1991 federal budget, there was no mention of it in the printed version of the budget released after the Finance Minister's presentation. The announcement had literally been 'penciled' into the Minister's text at the last minute. The story came out later. That morning, at the government caucus meeting held prior to the release of the federal budget, Alberta members had expressed strong opposition to another of the 1991 budget's provisions, and gave their agreement to support the disputed provision only on condition that the government agree to the move of the NEB to Calgary.

In April, after the announcement, the City of Calgary assembled a team of officials to travel to Ottawa to 'sell' the city and to urge NEB employees to make the move. Included were education, health, and commercial representatives. As part of that team, I organized a group of five former NEB employees who had moved to Calgary, to try to help persuade NEB staff to "go West".

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Date Modified:

2011-10-26