Adam Legge Appears Before House of Commons Natural Resources Committee on Canadian Energy Exports

Press Release

February 10, 2026

Business Council of Alberta President Adam Legge appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Natural Resources (RNNR) on Feb. 10, 2026, for the Canadian Energy Exports meeting.

The video and transcript below captures his address to committee members.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with the Committee today.

I will focus on what is the largest barrier to Canada supplying the world with energy — that is the Impact Assessment Act (a.k.a., Bill C-69) and major project permitting systems which stand in the way of billions of dollars of investment, and ultimately, improved prosperity for Canadians.

Simply put, the process, timeline, and political uncertainties inherent in this Act, and federal permitting systems, are such that few companies will risk the time and cost to apply for approval.

There are six key barriers embedded within the Act and system:

1. Late-stage politicized decision-making creates unpredictability for a years’-long, high-cost process.
2. Duplicative reviews and regulators because of departmental and jurisdictional overlap.
3. Excessive timelines which are unpredictable and prone to delays that impact construction timelines.
4. Regulators’ low risk tolerance causes reviews to stray from focusing on mitigating only the largest and unique material impacts.
5. Uncoordinated post-impact assessment permitting by multiple regulators can delay construction.
6. Lack of consultation clarity, which is unpredictable Indigenous consultations, weakens reconciliation efforts, Indigenous participation, and investor confidence.

I do applaud the current efforts of the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada to improve upon the existing regime. Bill C-5’s approach, however, creates a dual-track system of project winners and losers without fixing Canada’s broader approval challenges.

What’s needed is a comprehensive legislative overhaul of the Act to enable all major projects in Canada to be reviewed and approved quickly and efficiently with predictability and without political interference.

What does an ideal system look like? Well, in the next two months the Business Council of Alberta will release a major report on project approval reform, and will provide that report to this committee.

The following six key changes will create an optimal impact assessment and major project process:

1. Ensure projects are reviewed by the right level of government and regulator by:
   • Requiring projects built in a province be reviewed by that province, as of right;
   • moving approvals for all federal pipeline projects to the Canada Energy Regulator under the CER Act;
   • and ensuring “one project, one review, one decision.”
2. Removing late-stage political decisions by adopting a two-stage project authorization process where:
   • Stage one is an early political decision on whether a project is in the national public interest;
   • and stage two is an independent, apolitical determination of how a project can proceed by the regulator.
3. Reduce timelines and stop their extension by:
   • Creating an absolute maximum timeline of two years under the IAA with efforts to shorten that to be competitive with the United States;
   • shortening CER timelines to a maximum 250 days, with even shorter timelines for lower-risk projects;
   • and eliminating opportunities for political interference to extend timelines.
4. Right-size the scope of reviews by re-introducing the concept of standing, and focusing only on unique risks associated with the project.
5. Streamline permitting and conditions by making the designated regulator responsible for coordinating all federal permit reviews and decision-making, and aligning permit decisions with the final decision and impact assessment.
6. Clarify Indigenous consultation by:
   • Ensuring Crown consultation properly considers and utilizes business’s engagement as fulfilling aspects of the Crown’s duty;
   • ensuring consultation aligns with the maximum review timeline;
   • and building capacity for Indigenous communities to participate in, and benefit from, projects, and, if desired, own an equity stake.

We also ask government not to forget about cultural change. The system was designed to ensure bad things didn’t happen when major projects were built. Thousands of public servants were hired to carry out that mandate, but they viewed, and continue to view, their role as limited to their own zone of expertise or responsibility.

This has created challenges that have kept us — and risk keeping us — from achieving goals of prosperity and more meaningful economic reconciliation.

We need the process and public servants to view project approvals also through an economic and prosperity lens. Canada, and the public service, require a culture that ensures we build big and ambitious things, and we build them quickly and safely for the sake of Canadians’ well-being and prosperity.

These changes, both real and cultural, will enable project proponents and investors to have confidence in Canada as a place to invest while still protecting environmental, social, economic and Indigenous rights and domains. If we wish to enable Canada to grow its economy, diversify our global trading network, and make Canadians better off, these actions and changes must be made urgently.

Thank you.

To watch the full RNNR Committee meeting, please see the House of Commons’ website: https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/45-1/RNNR/meeting-23/notice

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