ICBA Coffee & Construction

Wednesday, in the Canada Gazette, Ottawa took pipelines, transmission lines, oilsands projects and gas-fired power off the Impact Assessment Agency's desk. One regulator now instead of two. Then ICBA filed on the West Coast pipeline, Alberta broke ground twice in two days, and B.C.'s forest sector told the Premier it's at the breaking point. Episode 30 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: ☕ THE BIG ONE: Ottawa cuts a whole layer of federal review. Cross-border pipelines and transmission lines, offshore renewables, certain oilsands projects and gas-fired power now get reviewed by the Canada Energy Regulator ALONE. Same homework, one teacher marking it. And in Quebec, one assessment instead of two. What it doesn't touch: a single line of B.C.'s permitting. 🛢️ ICBA files with Minister Dominic LeBlanc: put the West Coast Oil Pipeline on Schedule 1 of the Building Canada Act by OCTOBER 1, and construction can start September 2027. $29–38 BILLION of construction spending in B.C. between 2026 and 2038. Up to 140,000 jobs nationally, as many as 70,000 here. One condition — every contract tendered open, competitive and labour-neutral. 📉 Why now: ICBA's 2026 Construction Wage and Benefit Survey found ONE IN FIVE member companies expect less work this year. The ones bracing for a drop forecast an average 25 per cent decline. 🚧 Two groundbreakings in two days, both in Alberta. The Origins carbon capture hub near Clive starts construction and runs by January 2027. NAIT breaks ground in Edmonton on a $779-MILLION, 625,000-square-foot Advanced Skills Centre — PCL building it, 29 trades and technology programs, room for 5,500 more students — and it went to construction a full year AHEAD of schedule. 🌉 Meanwhile in B.C.: 272 new trades seats at BCIT, and two new BC Hydro substations replacing Murrin (1947) and Dal Grauer (1952). A hundred thousand customers. In service 2031 and 2032. 🌲 "Breaking point." COFI, the BC First Nations Forestry Council and the Truck Loggers Association write David Eby asking for a forestry crisis action group and a freeze on new provincial costs. Their word for the sector's problems: HOMEGROWN. 💸 The kicker: Beedie and La Caisse put $1 billion down on Canadian industrial real estate, targeting $2 billion. Governments announce. Investors commit. 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Canada lost 42,000 jobs in August. Or did it? Monthly job numbers bounce like a pickup on a logging road. Meanwhile, ICBA filed its pre-budget submission with Ottawa this morning: 15 recommendations, starting with the number that explains the last decade — in 2014 a Canadian company invested 87 cents per worker for every U.S. dollar. By 2024, 54 cents. We stopped building capacity before Trump showed up. Episode 28 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: ☕ THE BIG ONE: ICBA's letter to Finance Minister Champagne. Cut federal project reviews to UNDER A YEAR for everyone, not just Bill C-5 favourites. Cut 149,000 federal regulatory requirements by 10% by end of 2027. Overhaul a tax system ranked 22nd of 38 in the OECD. Fix the ports before this fall's ILWU round — 24 days of shutdowns cost $19.2 billion in cargo and delayed 79% of ICBA members' projects. And open Ottawa's $331-million training fund to the 85% of B.C. and 88% of Alberta construction workers who aren't in a building-trades union. 📉 August jobs: Canada -42,000 against a forecast of +15,000. B.C. up to 6.5%, Alberta down to 6.8%, Kelowna at 9%. Why one month is noise and the quarter is the number that matters. 🌉 Shovels in on the North Coast Transmission Line in Prince George — roughly $6 BILLION for Phases 1 and 2, $3.9 billion from Ottawa and Victoria, 1,400 workers at peak, Phase 1 done mid-2030. Co-ownership deals with five First Nations still to be signed by year-end. 🛢️ Trans Mountain files a $3.97-billion expansion with the CER — 11 pump stations, 30 km of pipe, another 210,000 barrels a day by late 2028. The line ran 94% FULL in Q2, and nearly two-thirds of tankers since 2024 went to Asia. Plus Danielle Smith on why the U.S.–Venezuela oil deal makes the West Coast pipeline case stronger, with the national-interest decision due October 1. 💸 B.C. overstated its gas royalties by $1.46 BILLION over five years — about $300 million a year — because someone treated Canadian dollars as U.S. dollars in a spreadsheet. Treaty 8 First Nations flagged it in July. 🎙️ No show Monday — it's Labour Day. Back Wednesday. And a thank-you to the 265,000 people who build for a living. 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics Read more on today's stories: ICBA housing submission to Ottawa (the seven fixes): https://icba.ca/ab-blog/submission-what-we-told-ottawa-about-the-housing-pipeline-1 August jobs by province (CP/BNN): https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/business/economics/2026/09/04/heres-a-quick-glance-at-unemployment-rates-for-august-by-province/ August jobs by city (CP/BNN): https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/business/economics/2026/09/04/heres-a-quick-glance-at-unemployment-rates-for-august-by-canadian-city/ North Coast Transmission Line construction start (B.C. government): https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2026PREM0034-001026 NCTL coverage (Journal of Commerce): https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/infrastructure/2026/09/construction-begins-on-major-b-c-transmission-line-aimed-at-powering-northwest Trans Mountain $3.97B expansion (Chamber of Shipping): https://shippingmatters.ca/trans-mountain-proposes-4-billion-expansion-to-boost-oil-exports-to-asia/ Smith on the Venezuela deal (Varcoe, EnergyNow): https://energynow.ca/2026/09/varcoe-u-s-oil-deal-with-venezuela-significant-competitive-threat-to-alberta-oilsands/ B.C.'s $1.5B gas royalty error (Black Press): https://saanichnews.com/2026/09/01/b-c-says-1-5b-gas-royalty-accounting-error-result-of-spreadsheet-mistake/ ICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living. ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca #construction #bcpoli #abpoli #cdnpoli #Budget2026 #TransMountain #PrinceGeorge #BCHydro #skilledtrades #ICBA

WorkSafeBC has proposed the biggest expansion of its own authority in a generation. A new class of hazard that covers "the design and management of work" — your crew size, your schedule, your workload, your deadlines. A written risk assessment for every one of them. And a standard nobody can define until after a complaint gets filed. Employers got eight weeks to respond, in the middle of construction season. The deadline is October 9.Episode 27 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: WorkSafeBC's proposed Part 4.1 would make B.C. the only place in Canada where an officer can audit how you schedule your crews. Psychological-injury-only claims are already up 48 PER CENT since 2021 under the rules we have now. Construction accounted for 299 of the 28,593 violence-related claims B.C. accepted in a decade — about 30 a year, one for every 8,000 workers. This lands on 28,173 companies, 92% of which have fewer than 20 people.💸 The Bank of Canada held at 2.25% this morning — a seventh straight hold. Inflation's near 3%, but strip out gasoline and it's 2.2%. Next decision: October 28.👷 Internal trade ministers ratified a 30-DAY service standard on labour mobility applications, with free trade in services targeted by the end of the year.🚧 Alberta designated the Greenview Industrial Gateway a Designated Industrial Zone — 75 square kilometres in the Peace, only the province's second.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economicsRead more on today's stories:ICBA on the WorkSafeBC proposal: https://icba.ca/bc-blog/worksafebc-wants-to-regulate-how-you-run-your-companyICBA's full submission to WorkSafeBC (PDF): https://icba.ca/hubfs/Advocacy%20items%20etc%20(Jordan)/WSBC_Psychological%20Safety_Sept%201%202026%20FINAL.pdfICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living.ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca#construction #bcpoli #WorkSafeBC #WorkersCompensation #BCbusiness #abpoli #interestrates #Alberta #ICBA

Natural Resources Canada counted 504 major resource projects across the country — $633 billion of potential capital spending. ICBA Economics went and counted what's been announced since, and added another hundred billion. Call it three quarters of a trillion dollars sitting on the books. The only question that matters is how much of it actually gets poured. Episode 26 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: ☕ THE BIG ONE: $750 BILLION of resource projects on Canada's books, if they all proceed. ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson on the investment gap standing between announced and built — taxes, regulation, infrastructure bottlenecks, and not enough skilled trades. 🛢️ Natural resources are 16% of Canada's GDP, 1.8 million jobs, and more than half of everything this country sells to the world. More than TWO THIRDS of the people working in it hold a degree, a diploma or a trades ticket. 💸 In 2025, more foreign money came into Canada than left — the first time in a decade. But most of it bought companies and assets that already existed instead of building new capacity. Buying the building isn't the same as building the building. 🏠 B.C. capped 2027 rent increases at 2.2%. Asking rents across the province are already down 4.5%, and down 12.4% in ABBOTSFORD. The cap isn't what's binding — and CMHC has Vancouver housing starts sliding toward the low 20,000s by 2028. 🚧 Where the work is: construction starts on BCIT's $48-MILLION South Campus renewal in Burnaby, the $130-million Highway 7 four-laning between Maple Ridge and Mission is finished, and Ottawa puts $23.5 million into six B.C. airports — Masset, Prince Rupert, Smithers, Bella Coola, Kamloops and Fort Nelson. 🌉 Highway 1 reopened through the Fraser Canyon after 50 DAYS closed. Every load to the Interior went longer and cost more, and every extra kilometre came out of somebody's margin. 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Wednesday night, in the back of a downtown Vancouver White Spot, a couple dozen people were supposed to talk about the future of free enterprise in British Columbia. More than 60 walked in. Standing room only. Jordan Bateman was there — and he came out more optimistic than he's been in a long time. Here's the rant that came with it: the Eby record, the mess the BC Conservatives have made, and the one thing that actually matters. Episode 25 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: 📈 GDP grew 3.3 PER CENT annualized in Q2 — the fastest in more than three years, with business capital investment up 2.3% after five straight quarters of decline. The catch: that quarter closed June 30, seven weeks before the trade talks collapsed. 🇺🇸 Ottawa rewrote its counter-tariff list Thursday. Seafood came off after East Coast processors lobbied hard — and copper wire went ON at 50 PER CENT. Every wall, every panel, every service upgrade, every EV charger you rough in. Electrical contractors: your Wednesday quotes are already out of date, and September 8 is 11 days out. ☕ THE BIG ONE — THE RANT: David Eby's record laid out cold. A $7.7-BILLION deficit, the largest in B.C. history — bigger than any COVID deficit — and $13.3 billion budgeted this year. $4 BILLION of promised hospitals, schools and roads postponed; the minister calls it "slippage," contractors call it tenders that never came. 23 mills gone. Interfor running its head office out of Georgia. More people leaving B.C. for other provinces than arriving. Then the BC Conservative implosion — said with concern, not glee — and Jordan's bottom line: the brand name doesn't matter. The plan and the people do.  💸 Alberta flips a projected $9.4-BILLION deficit into a $2-BILLION surplus on US$88 oil. B.C. — sitting on gas, critical minerals and timber — is budgeting a $13.3-billion deficit. Same country. Same commodity cycle. Very different choices. 🔧 CAN'T REPLACE IT? TELL US. If a counter-tariff line will break your business — an American input with no Canadian, European or Asian substitute — ICBA is making that case in Ottawa and needs concrete examples. Write your MP, and email Jordan directly: [email protected] 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

No deal. Late Friday night, the Canada-U.S. trade talks collapsed — and at 12:01 Saturday morning, 50 per cent American tariffs hit roughly $20 billion worth of Canadian goods. Cement. Lumber, plywood, doors. Machinery. Even hockey sticks. Seventy years of building things together, and it's come to this.Episode 23 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. One story today, because it's that big — in three parts: what happened, what it does to your job sites, and where Canada goes from here. 💣 THE BIG ONE: 50% tariffs on $20 BILLION of Canadian goods, live since 12:01 Saturday morning — and this time there's no CUSMA workaround. Meeting the trade deal's rules of origin gets you nothing.🇺🇸 THE ESCALATION: Monday morning, President Trump threatened to double tariffs on Canadian cars, trucks and auto parts — 25 to 50 per cent — starting January 1. The temperature is not coming down.💸 THE PART SNEAKING UP ON YOU: Canada answers September 8, dollar for dollar — and the early list (American steel, appliances, agricultural equipment, electronics) walks straight onto your job site. The product-by-product schedule ISN'T FINAL yet — there's still time to tell Ottawa which American inputs your business can't replace.🔧 THE PLAYBOOK: reprice everything that crosses the border, shorten your quote life, put a tariff clause in every contract, and pull the HS codes on your top 20 inputs so you know your exposure instead of guessing at it. 🇨🇦 WHERE CANADA GOES FROM HERE: Team Canada — no joy in this fight, and the way out is to build. Knock down the trade walls between provinces, get our resources to tidewater, and move at the speed Ottawa just showed with its $70 BILLION Labrador clean-energy backing.👷 PLUS: ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson on the $650 BILLION B.C.-Alberta project inventory — and why the coming construction worker crunch could be 3-4 TIMES bigger than official forecasts. 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economicsICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living. ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca#construction #bcpoli #abpoli #tariffs #tradewar #canadianeconomy #BCconstruction #Alberta #TeamCanada #ICBA

Two pipelines. Two LNG plants. One housing market flat on its back. The next four months decide all of it — so Jordan Bateman went to the boss. Chris Gardner, president and CEO of ICBA, Canada's largest construction association, on the decisions coming at B.C. builders this fall and what has to happen to win them.Episode 22 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ DECISION SEASON: the West Coast Oil Pipeline — 1 MILLION barrels a day, Bruderheim to Delta — sits in the Canada Gazette right now. Comment window closes September 18. A national-interest designation could come as early as October 1. Chris on whether this window is real.🛢️ LNG Canada decides on Phase 2 by the end of 2026 — doubling Kitimat. Ksi Lisims is signing 20-year deals with German utilities. Woodfibre is past 70% built. What B.C. must do — or stop doing — before December.🏠 Ottawa's Build Canada Homes has committed 17,000 non-market homes and has about 1,900 under construction — while the private builders who put up nearly every home in Canada park their trucks. Chris walks through what fees, taxes and delays do to the math on one house.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

On October 1, every engineering bill in British Columbia gets seven per cent more expensive. Every architect's invoice. Every accountant's. Even the legislature's own finance committee says don't do it. In a first for the show, Jordan Bateman sits down with a guest from outside ICBA: Gavin Dew, MLA for Kelowna-Mission and the Conservative critic for Economic Development — a small-business owner who's read a payroll from both sides of the desk.Episode 21 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE OCTOBER 1 TAX: Budget 2026 expands the 7% PST to engineering, architecture, accounting and geoscience services — a tax on the paperwork before a shovel ever hits the ground. Dew has called it a stealth tax since spring; now the finance committee has recommended repeal. Can it be stopped in time?🖥️ The data centre boom is one province over. Alberta is running town halls for tens of billions in proposals while B.C. is barely in the conversation. 📉 The fall file: B.C. added 2,300 jobs in the past year. Alberta added 91,000. What the jobs critic hammers when the House comes back — and what employers watching should do about it.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Site C. Coastal GasLink. Trans Mountain. LNG Canada Phase One. The wave of megaprojects that carried British Columbia for a decade has finished — basically all at once. A second wave is lining up behind it. But lining up isn't the same as starting, and somewhere in between is a stretch where the phone stops ringing. Episode 20 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. A special regional edition: a full sit-down with Mike Davis, ICBA's Vice President, Regional, on the two-thirds of B.C. that gets too little attention from the media and government — Vancouver Island, the Okanagan, the Kootenays, the Interior and the north. In this episode: 🗺️ THE MOOD. Mike tours this province constantly. Are people optimistic or white-knuckling it? 🌲 THE FORESTRY TOWNS. Cranbrook. Vernon. Williams Lake. Prince George. 🚧 WHAT'S QUEUED. The North Coast Transmission Line. LNG Canada Phase 2. Ksi Lisims. Cedar and Woodfibre already under construction. A run of mine permits and expansions. The work is real — the question is when it starts. 🤝 MEET THE GENERALS AND OWNERS, VICTORIA. ICBA's reverse trade show comes to the Victoria Conference Centre on Tuesday, September 15. The general contractors and owners sit behind the tables; everybody else works the room. 1,000 people. 🎟️ Register for ICBA Meet the Generals & Owners — Vancouver Island: https://events.icba.ca/2026Victoria 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

A ten-billion-dollar pipeline just hired its first land crew — and the company is rooted in Fort St John. That's how it's supposed to work. Plus: five days to the tariff wall, Calgary builds a front door for trade, and Jock Finlayson runs the numbers on Canada's "move away" from fossil fuels. Episode 19 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: ☕ THE BIG ONE: the $10-BILLION Prince Rupert Gas Transmission project awards its first land construction agreement to Surerus Murphy — a joint venture rooted in Fort St John. The 750-km line to the proposed Ksi Lisims LNG site is owned by the Nisga'a Nation and Western LNG, with 15 of 20 First Nations along the route holding equity agreements. 🇺🇸 Five days to the tariff wall: August 19, the U.S. applies 50% duties to about $28 billion of Canadian exports . 🌉 Calgary, Rocky View County and the Canada Infrastructure Bank sign an acceleration agreement for the Prairie Economic Gateway — a rail-anchored inland port on the CPKC mainline that the Calgary Construction Association calls a multi-year runway of work. 🛢️ Jock Finlayson's reality check: fossil fuels are still more than 75% of Canada's energy supply — natural gas 41%, oil a third — while wind, solar and biofuels combined sit at 5%. Barely changed since the late 1990s. https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/finlayson-canadas-move-away-from-fossil-fuels-remains-greatly-exaggerated 🔥 And a check-in on the Okanagan, where crews are building control lines and Summerland's staged re-entry planning is underway. 🎙️ Guest week starts Monday: Mike Davis (ICBA VP of Regions), Wednesday: Kelowna-Mission MLA Gavin Dew on the October 1 PST hike, Friday: ICBA president Chris Gardner. Jordan's back live Monday, August 24.

B.C. just booked the biggest deficit in its history — $7.7 billion — and called it good news. How? One-time money, and $4 billion of hospitals and roads that simply didn't get built. Same week, Alberta swung from a $9.4-billion deficit forecast to an estimated $3.8-billion surplus. One of those is an economy. The other is an accounting trick.Episode 18 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: B.C. closes the books on a record $7.7-BILLION deficit — propped up by $2.6 billion in one-time tobacco money and $4 billion of "slipped" capital projects. Across the Rockies, economist Trevor Tombe estimates Alberta is running a $3.8-billion surplus with oil at US$83.🏠 Ottawa's new housing agency gets its first board chair. The scorecard so far: 17,000 units committed, about 1,900 under construction — while private builders lay off crews.🖥️ Alberta launches town halls and an information hub for its data centre boom. That's what getting to yes looks like.🔥 Plus a check-in on Summerland: the fire's growth is slowing, power is coming back, and a staged re-entry is in the works.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Twelve thousand people were ordered out of Summerland just after midnight Saturday. More than twenty thousand people across the Okanagan woke up somewhere else this morning. The people come first today — and then a July jobs report that says B.C. construction hit an all-time high, in the same month developers were laying people off.Episode 17 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ SUMMERLAND FIRST. The Bald Range fire went from 50 hectares to 5,000 in a single evening. What's confirmed, what's rumour — downtown Summerland is intact, and the fire barely grew Sunday. A lot of ICBA members build in the Okanagan. A lot of ICBA members are evacuated in the Okanagan. Same people. Right now, we just want everyone safe.📉 THE JOBS REPORT THAT DOESN'T SMELL RIGHT. StatCan says B.C. added 17,800 jobs in July and construction hit a record. StatCan's own margin of error on that number: plus or minus 12,100. Nearly 60% of the national gain was self-employment. And the payroll survey — the one economists actually trust — shows B.C. and Alberta construction payrolls FLAT. ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson is putting questions straight to Statistics Canada.👷 ALBERTA: THE MIRROR. Down 7,300 jobs in July — but up 91,000 on the year, the fastest growth in Canada, with construction up almost 11%. Same survey, same twelve months: Alberta up 91,000, B.C. up 2,300. That's not a gap. That's a verdict.🚧 WHERE THE WORK IS. The Fraser River Tunnel RFPs promised for "early August" — Infrastructure BC's own page shows none issued, and the second qualification window doesn't close until tomorrow. Nine years, zero lanes, budget doubled. Plus: Ottawa's new $100-million freight rebate for Canadian steel, nine days before American tariffs are set to hit our cement, paint and plywood.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Not that long ago, British Columbia was an economic leader in Canada. No more. Too much debt and bloat, not enough investment and revenue. In less than a decade, B.C. has gone from leader to laggard.Episode 16 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. A special edition: a full sit-down with ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson on From Leader to Laggard, the report he co-authored with consulting economist Ken Peacock.In this episode:☕ "THIS IS NOT A CYCLICAL DOWNTURN." Jock's own line — the province is in the grip of a structural slowdown. What's the difference, and why is the second one so much harder to climb out of? From 2022 to 2024 the government side of B.C.'s economy grew 6.6% a year. The private sector grew 1%.👷 THE 223,000 JOBS THAT DON'T EXIST. If B.C.'s private sector had kept growing the way it did before the pandemic, we'd have roughly 223,000 more private-sector jobs today. Since 2019, the province has added about 1.3 government jobs for every one private-sector job — more than double the national pace.💸 SOMEBODY PAYS. The public-sector wage bill has gone from $26.7 billion to $53.2 billion in seven years. Taxpayer-supported debt is on track to TRIPLE in six. Jock and Ken went looking for another province that ran up debt like this — any province, any time — and couldn't find one in half a century.🇺🇸 DON'T BLAME TRUMP. Everybody in Victoria wants this to be somebody else's fault. The report is blunt: blaming the tariffs is tempting, but B.C. was already on a weaker footing well before the trade fights started in 2025.📊 Read From Leader to Laggard — free — and subscribe to the ICBA EconoBot briefing: https://icba.ca/economics

A million barrels a day, Bruderheim to the coast. Ottawa started the thirty-day clock on it Saturday of the long weekend — buried in the Canada Gazette, with no release and no tweet. If you believe a project is in the national interest, say so in daylight.Episode 15 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: Ottawa moves to designate the West Coast oil pipeline a project in the national interest under the Building Canada Act. One million barrels a day from Bruderheim, Alberta to a deepwater port at Roberts Bank in Delta. Trans Mountain and Pembina are the partners. Comments close September 18; the target for designation is October 1. Plus a point-by-point answer to the "breakneck speed" crowd — because thirty-four days from public pitch to a legally required notice, on top of a six-week comment window, is not breakneck. It's the statutory process, followed to the letter.🇺🇸 THE RISK NOBODY NAMES: Canada is the fourth-largest oil producer on earth, and we sell almost all of it to one customer — a customer scheduled to drop a 50% tariff on twenty billion dollars of our goods in two weeks. So explain the calculation where access to the entire Pacific market is the risky option and staying hostage to Washington is the safe one.🛢️ WE ASKED. HE ANSWERED: Last show we asked whether cabinet solidarity means anything in David Eby's government, after a minister went public against her own cabinet's approval of the $2-billion Tilbury LNG expansion. Turns out the Premier already answered — he says his government is a "big tent," and that on her statement, "we worked together." He helped write it. Eleven hundred construction jobs a year, $260 million in tax revenue, a Musqueam equity stake — approved by his cabinet, then undercut by his cabinet, with his editing help.🚧 A BILLION DOLLARS FOR PIPE IN THE GROUND: Canada and Alberta sign roughly $938 million for water and wastewater infrastructure to enable new housing. Not a tender — a funding agreement. But servicing is the most binding constraint in this business, and every builder listening has had a project die on a servicing letter. Mains, lift stations, treatment upgrades, reservoirs. Watch your council agendas.🎙️ THIS FRIDAY — a special edition. ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson, one-on-one, on From Leader to Laggard: the debt, the missing private-sector jobs, and why he says blaming Trump for B.C.'s problems is the easy answer and the wrong one.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Nearly $318 billion of work. 1,030 projects. That's Alberta's Major Projects registry — this morning. The question isn't whether the work is there. It's who's going to build it.Episode 14 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. A special edition: our FIRST-EVER guest, ICBA Alberta President Mike Martens.☕ THE BIG PICTURE: $317.9 BILLION across 1,030 projects on the province's own registry — petrochemical, oil and gas, data centres, schools, Calgary office conversions, a fire hall in Lacombe. Is it a boom, or a pipeline that looks like a boom until you check the start dates?🖥️ TWO WAVES, ONE REGION: Meta's $13-billion data centre in Sturgeon County (3,000 workers at peak) and Dow's Path2Zero restart in Fort Saskatchewan ($10.1 billion, 4,500–5,500 at peak) — same trades, same corner of the province, overlapping windows🛢️ OIL AND GAS: Alberta, Ottawa and five oilsands producers sign the Pathways carbon capture memorandum. Is the confidence actually back — or is this still paper and not steel?🏙️ CALGARY'S CASE STUDY: 21 downtown office conversions, 2.68 million square feet of empty office becoming roughly 2,700 homes — while provincial housing starts cool from 55,800 to 46,000🔧 WHO BUILDS IT: The building trades unions are about 12% of Alberta's construction workforce. Open shop is everybody else. So why does federal trades money keep landing in the same 12%?🏗️ ICBA Meet the Generals & Owners — Edmonton, Tuesday, September 29, Edmonton Convention Centre. Western Canada's best day of business development. Register: https://events.icba.ca/edmonton

Interfor started as a coastal logging outfit in British Columbia in 1963. Sixty-three years later, its head office is packing up for Peachtree City, Georgia. Eighty-four per cent of its lumber sales are American now.Episode 13 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: Interfor moves corporate functions from Burnaby to Georgia. The mills went south years ago — now the head office follows. And the numbers behind it: 15,000 B.C. forest sector jobs gone since 2022, 21 mills closed since 2023, and a harvest running 32 million cubic metres against the province's own 45-million target. That's a 13-MILLION-cubic-metre hole. Every year.🛢️ CABINET NIMBYISM: The Eby cabinet approved FortisBC's $2-billion Tilbury LNG expansion in Delta — 1,100 construction jobs a year, $260 million in tax revenue, a Musqueam equity stake, cleaner marine fuel at the Port of Vancouver. Then a sitting cabinet minister went public against her own government's decision. What should have happened next? She should have resigned.🎯 WHY LNG IS THE NEW TARGET: The campaign against Canadian energy has moved off pipelines and onto LNG — and the tactics have moved too. Off the regulators, onto the banks, the pension funds and the insurers. Plus the part that complicates the story: Cedar LNG is majority-owned by the Haisla Nation, Ksi Lisims is being developed with the Nisga'a.🚧 WHERE THE WORK IS: RFPs for the first two Fraser River Tunnel work packages hit the market in early August. Nine years, zero lanes, and a price that's gone from $4.15 billion to $8.5 billion — but the work is real and the paperwork drops next week. Go get it.🎙️ THIS FRIDAY — a special edition. Our first-ever guest: ICBA Alberta President Mike Martens on the $318 billion sitting in Alberta's project registry, the data centre wave, Dow's Path2Zero restart, and who on earth is going to build it all.📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economicsRead more on today's stories:Interfor shifting corporate functions to Georgia: https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/canadian-lumber-company-interfor-migrate-120021442.htmlB.C.'s forest sector and the harvest gap: https://www.biv.com/news/bc-forest-sector-faces-another-tough-year-in-2026-11793817Canfor closing the Northwood pulp mill in Prince George: https://todayinbc.com/2026/07/15/canfor-closing-prince-george-northwood-pulp-mill-300-jobs-affected/Jordan Bateman on cabinet nimbyism and Tilbury: https://icba.ca/bc-blog/icba.ca-op/ed-cabinet-nimbyism-yet-another-ndp-hurdle-to-b.c.-prosperityThe Province's Tilbury decision: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2026ECS0043-000870Why activists are targeting LNG: https://energynow.ca/2026/07/the-new-target-why-anti-oil-and-gas-activists-are-making-canadian-lng-not-pipelines-their-next-major-target/Fraser River Tunnel procurement and federal funding: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2026TT0066-000796ICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living.ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca#construction #bcpoli #BritishColumbia #forestry #LNG #Delta #PrinceGeorge #housing #ICBA

She'd never set foot in Vancouver. She called into a Vancouver public hearing from Los Angeles anyway. Council asked her one real question. Six seconds of silence. Then a cough.Episode 12 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: A union machine hijacks Vancouver city hall — California callers who'd never been to Vancouver, AI-written scripts, "translators" who didn't speak the language, and a hotel union president defending it all. Real Vancouver families waited until 1 a.m. for their five minutes. Mayor Sim wants a Vancouver Charter fix — will David Eby move on it?🖥️ The data centre race: New York slaps a one-year moratorium on hyperscale data centres, the federal NDP wants Canada to copy it — and Alberta scoops up 92% of everything planned in this country. Vancouver? Come back in 2027.🏠 CMHC's mid-year forecast: housing starts keep falling, with B.C. and Ontario condos wearing the worst of it. What that means for framing crews, excavators and every builder's 2027🌉 Charlottetown wrap: tariffs bite August 19, "everything is on the table" — and Carney gets caught in his own spin on the Gordie Howe Bridge deal📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economicsRead more on today's stories:Dan Fumano on Vancouver council going off the rails: https://vancouversun.com/opinion/colu...The California callers and Sim's letter to Eby: https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/unite...New York's data centre moratorium: https://thehub.ca/2026/07/20/new-york...CMHC's 2026 mid-year Housing Market Outlook: https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/media-new...Carney on the Gordie Howe Bridge deal: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/carn...ICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living.ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca#construction #bcpoli #abpoli #Vancouver #BritishColumbia #Alberta #housing #datacentres #ICBA

Steel pipe, made in Canada, stacked in a yard in Prince George. This week, they started putting it in the ground. A pipeline actually getting built. Imagine that.Episode 11 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: Enbridge kicks off the $4-billion Sunrise Expansion near Prince George — 140 km of new pipe, 2,500 workers, Canadian steel, a Lheidli T'enneh partnership at the table — and even an NDP minister showed up. Have they finally got religion on oil and gas?⛏️ B.C. is permitting mines again: Mount Polley's tailings raise approved — a decade of industry leading on safety, and a world desperate for copper📉 From Leader to Laggard: Jock and Ken put the numbers on the table — 223,000 missing private-sector jobs, a public payroll that's doubled, and debt on track to TRIPLE in six years🦺 WorkSafeBC comes for the shotcrete crews — same risk should mean same rule, whether it's a truck or a hose📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Every premier in Canada is flying to Charlottetown. The Prime Minister joins them Thursday. What they decide about trade lands on your job site.Episode 10 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: Trade week — all 13 premiers meet in Charlottetown, then sit down with Prime Minister Carney Thursday. USMCA, steel and lumber tariffs, interprovincial trade — and whether David Eby shows up with something to build🏙️ Western Canada's TALLEST tower lands on Vancouver council's desk: Holborn's plan for 1,546 homes, a 920-room hotel and two rebuilt downtown blocks🗳️ B.C. politics gets a fourth party — Mike Bernier takes over CentreBC, and we do the vote-split math out loud🚧 Where the work is: DCN's July pre-bid list, plus a forecast for B.C.'s highest-ever nonresidential construction spending this year📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Every new home comes with a stack of hidden fees. Nobody shows you the receipt. Ottawa might finally make them.Episode 9 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show:☕ THE BIG ONE: Bill C-287, the Housing Cost Transparency Act — ICBA backs MP Brad Redekopp's push to make the building code system show its work: real dollar costs, published before they land in your mortgage⚡ Shovels go in this month on the North Coast Transmission Line — and Ksi Lisims LNG keeps stacking milestones on the road to a $20-billion final investment decision🚆 Where the work is: all eight Surrey Langley SkyTrain stations are under construction, and crews are welding rail🏥 Kamloops gets a win — the new acute treatment area opens at Royal Inland Hospital's emergency department🏗️ Bird Construction lands roughly $1 BILLION in new work in one announcement — nuclear, mining, energy and seven new Alberta schools📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics

Interest rates: frozen. Terminal 2: finally has a builder. And Beedie's moving dirt in Surrey. Episode 8 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman. On today's show: ☕ The Bank of Canada holds its key rate at 2.25% — what the freeze means for your operating line and equipment loans 🏗️ THE BIG ONE: The Port of Vancouver picks TerraMarine — Aecon, FlatironDragados, Van Oord and Carlson — to build the Roberts Bank Terminal 2 landmass and wharf. A decade of paperwork, and now the biggest port build in the country is real 🛢️ Pipeline week: Smith and Ford unveil the 3,300-km Northern Shield route from Hardisty to Sarnia — and Thursday, Calgary hears the next steps on the West Coast oil pipeline, with Mark Carney reportedly in the room 🚧 Beedie breaks ground on 60 acres and a million square feet of industrial space in Surrey 📉 A sentence we never thought we'd say: B.C.'s population is shrinking. ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson and Ken Peacock on what that means for everyone who builds 📊 Get the ICBA Economics briefing — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics Read more on today's stories: Terminal 2 contractor: https://canada.constructconnect.com/joc/news/infrastructure/2026/07/contractor-awarded-landmass-wharf-contract-for-roberts-bank-terminal-2-project Northern Shield pipeline route: https://canada.constructconnect.com/dcn/news/projects/2026/07/premiers-smith-ford-unveil-proposed-west-east-oil-pipeline-route Beedie in Surrey: https://storeys.com/beedie-south-campbell-heights-groundbreaking/ Jock & Ken's op-ed: https://icba.ca/economics-blog/op/ed-population-decline-exposes-b.c.s-growth-problem-1 ICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe, hit the bell, and send this one to somebody who builds for a living. ICBA is Canada's largest construction association — the voice of B.C. and Alberta's open-shop builders: https://icba.ca #construction #bcpoli #abpoli #BritishColumbia #Alberta #pipelines #PortOfVancouver #Surrey #ICBA Displaying coffee-and-construction-ep8-youtube-description.txt.

WorkSafeBC is holding its base rate at 1.55% for 2027 and calling it "rate stability." But the real cost of the system is 1.88% — and the gap is being covered by draining your surplus. Jordan Bateman breaks down the numbers WorkSafe doesn't want you to see, plus a break in the U.S. softwood lumber tariff and B.C.'s latest promise to speed up permits.

Alberta just landed a $13-billion Meta data centre — and built a power plant beside it so regular families don't get stuck with the bill. That's the model B.C. should copy. Jordan Bateman breaks down the smart way to power the AI boom, plus a fresh youth-jobs plan, and a new certification clock for crane operators.The news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta. New every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

The Massey Tunnel price tag just DOUBLED — $4.15 billion to $8.5 billion — and Ottawa's cutting a cheque to help cover the NDP's mistake. Episode 5 of ICBA Coffee & Construction breaks down what it means for the people who build British Columbia and Alberta.On today's show: ▶ Massey Tunnel: the $8.5 billion "we told you so" — how a funded, under-budget bridge became nine years, zero lanes, and double the price ▶ The West Coast Oil Pipeline: a million barrels a day, $35–44 billion, 140,000 jobs at peak — real, but only on paper ▶ The $20 billion Canada-B.C. deal: four LNG projects, the Red Chris mine expansion, and a $10-billion Roberts Bank port upgrade ▶ WorkSafeBC: claims costs up 22% in two years — why your premiums are about to become the storySubscribe to ICBA Economics — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economicsICBA Coffee & Construction drops every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Subscribe, and send this to one person who builds for a living.ICBA is the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association — Canada's largest construction association. Learn more: https://icba.ca#construction #bcpoli #abpoli

Three deadlines hit on Canada Day — and two of them land on every builder in BC and Alberta. Jordan Bateman breaks down the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta.In this episode:Alberta's million-barrel-a-day pipeline proposal is due July 1 at the federal Major Projects Office. Smith and Carney say they want to "get to yes" — the holdup runs through David Eby's BC.The CUSMA trade review opens the same day. ICBA Chief Economist Jock Finlayson's Mid-Year Update warns Canada is in — or on the cusp of — recession.The condo bailout: Pierre Poilievre asks the Commons ethics committee to investigate Ottawa and Victoria's plan to buy 2,200 unsold BC condos.📩 Subscribe to ICBA Economics — the most helpful email you'll get all week: icba.ca/economics 🎧 New episodes Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. Next up: Wednesday, July 8. 👍 If it was useful, subscribe and send it to one person who builds for a living.Read more at icba.ca/bc-blog#ICBA #Construction #BCpoli #ABpoli #Pipeline #Housing #CdnEcon

ritish Columbia just hit a record pile of unsold condos. The government's big idea? Buy them — with your money. Welcome to the condo bailout.Episode 3 of ICBA Coffee & Construction: the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta. The condo buyback, a premier racing home from China for a federal deal, and the construction-jobs number nobody wants to see.I'm Jordan Bateman, VP of Communications & Advocacy at ICBA. New episodes Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.**Chapters**00:00 — Cold open00:25 — The condo bailout03:30 — Eby cuts his China trip short for a deal with Ottawa06:00 — The construction-jobs number nobody wants to see07:45 — Kicker: oil drops, a break on your costs**Stories & sources**• The condo buyback — critics, numbers, and the market context — https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/canada-bc-partnership-condo-conversion-metro-vancouver-supply-criticism• Eby cuts China trip short for a B.C.–Ottawa major-projects MOU — https://www.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/article/bc-close-to-mou-with-ottawa-that-may-include-massey-tunnel-replacement-funding/• Ottawa nearing a major-projects deal with B.C. — https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-ottawa-nearing-major-projects-deal-with-bc-as-alberta-closes-in-on/• ICBA Economics — Construction Cools as Job Vacancies Crater — https://icba.ca/economics-blog/icba-econobot-construction-cools-as-job-vacancies-crater📩 Subscribe to ICBA Economics — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics▶️ Subscribe on YouTube and your favourite podcast platform so you don't miss an episode.If this was useful, send it to one person who builds for a living.#ICBA #construction #BCpoli #housing #affordability #resourceeconomy

B.C. approved a big new mine last week — then took a bow for the very law that froze everybody else's mine. That's where we start.Episode 2 of ICBA Coffee & Construction: the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta. A mine, a data-centre gold rush, and a pipeline deadline — and one question running underneath all of it: which governments actually let you build?Hosted by Jordan Bateman, VP of Communications & Advocacy at ICBA. New episodes Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.**Chapters**00:00 — Cold open00:25 — Red Chris mine gets the green light (and the DRIPA spin to ignore)03:15 — The data-centre gold rush — and who can actually power it05:40 — Pipeline! Alberta's July 1 deadline07:20 — The number that ties it together: B.C. 1.1% vs Alberta 2.3%08:40 — Kicker: Alberta puts a price tag on leaving📩 Subscribe to ICBA Economics — the most helpful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics▶️ Subscribe on YouTube and your favourite podcast platform so you don't miss an episode.If this was useful, send it to one person who builds for a living.#ICBA #construction #BCpoli #ABpoli #LNG #mining #resourceeconomy

Inflation's back, Alberta's pipeline clock is ticking, and B.C. just blew up another megaproject contract. Welcome to Episode 1.ICBA Coffee & Construction is the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta — fast, sharp, and straight up. New episodes every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday with Jordan Bateman.On this episode:– Inflation hits 3.2% — gas up 33%, groceries up again — and what it means on a job site– Alberta's nine-day countdown to a million-barrel pipeline proposal, and why David Eby's "same coast, different liquid" position doesn't add up– A $5-billion gold-and-copper mine stalled because the NDP fumbled its duty to consult– The Massey tunnel contract blowup — and how a funded 2024 bridge became a $9-billion-and-climbing hole in the groundChapters (adjust to your cut):0:00 Cold open: inflation's back0:30 Inflation hits 3.2%2:00 Alberta's pipeline countdown vs. Eby's veto4:30 KSM mine stalled — sloppy consultation, $5B price6:30 Massey tunnel: what did we get for it?📩 Want the economics behind the headlines? Subscribe to ICBA's twice-weekly EconoBot briefing — the most useful email you'll get all week: https://icba.ca/economics🔨 Learn more about ICBA, Canada's largest construction association: https://icba.ca🎧 Listen on your favourite podcast app: search for Coffee and Construction.If this was useful, subscribe and send it to one person who builds for a living.Follow ICBA: X @icbabc | LinkedIn: ICBA | Facebook: theICBA#bcpoli #abpoli #construction #pipelines #inflation #ICBA #resourceeconomy #BCndp