Rachel Notley takes pipeline go-ahead plea to Eastern Canada

Alberta Premier Rachel Notley urged an eastern Canadian audience to stand with Alberta and get a national pipeline built for the good of the entire country.

"Let's work together. Let's get to 'yes'on a pipeline," Notley said in an address to the the UnitedSteelworkers' national policy conferencein Montreal Friday.

"It's critical to the future of our country and to the well-being of every Albertan and every Canadian."

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Next week's Alberta budget is expected to have a deficit in excess of $10 billion. Low oil prices have kneecapped the Alberta economy. Royalties from oil and gas projects are expected to decrease by 90 per cent next year.

Notley has openly supported the proposed Energy East pipeline, which could take crude to refineries in Saint John, N. B., and the expansion of the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline to the west coast.

Shipping crude to coasts will benefit Canada

Notleysays shipping Alberta crude to the Atlantic and Pacific coasts would allow the product to get higher prices on world markets, which would benefit the rest of Canada.

However, the projects have run into opposition from Quebec and B.C. due to environmental concerns.

Notleytold the Montreal audience that hergovernment's new climate change policy should erase any doubts.

"Fights over Alberta's environmental record are no longer valid," she said."We have the best environmental and climate change policies of any energy-producing jurisdiction in the world.

"That's why I have said time again, we need to recognize that Alberta has changed and it's time toput the divisive battles of the past in the past."

Notley'sMontreal speech comes one day after she used a televised address to AlbertanstourgeCanadiansto support a national pipeline

On Saturday, the premier willalso deliver a speech tothe national NDP convention now underway in Edmonton. The Albertagovernment is fighting back against a pushtomove Canada away from fossil fuels and keep oil in the ground.

Mulcair raised eyebrows earlier this week when he pledged to support that policy if he remained NDP leader and the party tells him to do that. He faces a leadership review Sunday.