Weekly Roundup - July 10, 2026
Top Federal Stories
This week, Prime Minister Mark Carney became the first sitting prime minister to visit Saudi Arabia in 26 years. In Jeddah he met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and signed a memorandum of understanding establishing the Canada-Saudi Arabia Coordination Council to deepen cooperation in sectors including defence and trade. The visit caps years of repair work after the 2018 dispute that saw the Saudi government expel Canada's ambassador and freeze trade talks. When asked about the kingdom's human rights record, Carney said "engagement is not endorsement" and described lecturing countries from afar as satisfying but ineffective.
The Saudi stop followed the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, where Carney expanded and extended the Latvia mission to 2031. Canada's NATO deployment to Latvia, aimed at deterring Russian aggression on NATO's eastern flank, will be increasing deployed personnel to as many as 2,600. The Prime Minister also announced an $800 million contract with Norwegian defense contractor Kongsberg. Days earlier he had named Germany's TKMS the preferred bidder to build Canada's next submarine fleet, with contract talks expected to take six to 18 months. As the summit wrapped up, the American delegation seemed less upbeat. President Trump remains unhappy with NATO over Greenland and Iran and threatened to end trade with Spain.
On the Canada-U.S. file, the July 1 CUSMA review deadline has passed without the certainty that Canada’s exporters were hoping for. The United States declined to extend the agreement as Canada and Mexico had proposed, leaving the agreement on annual reviews until it expires in 2036.
Despite the constant tension with the United States, opportunity continues elsewhere. Japan's ambassador says his country sees enormous potential in Canadian oil now that Ottawa has referred Alberta's proposed West Coast pipeline to the Major Projects Office. Currently, Japan gets more than 90 per cent of its oil from the Middle East and the U.S. war with Iran has significantly disrupted that supply. Alberta is already in talks with Japan about refining infrastructure suited to its heavy crude.
The first Chinese-built EVs have landed in Canada bringing with them new national security concerns. Under Chinese law, vehicle data, from routes to phone contacts to camera footage, can be accessed by the state. Canada's former national security adviser, Jody Thomas, called it a plausible espionage risk, warning people in the military, government or sensitive industries may not want to buy one. Still, Chinese EVs have earned a reputation abroad for good build quality at prices well below American, European and Japanese competitors.
Top Alberta Stories
As Calgarians prepare to retire their cowboy boots for another year, Premier Danielle Smith put a few kilometres on hers, moving from pancake breakfasts to a series of major policy and investment announcements.
This week, Meta announced it will build its first Canadian data centre in Sturgeon County, committing more than $13 billion to a one-gigawatt artificial intelligence facility northeast of Edmonton. The project is expected to create approximately 3,000 construction jobs and 300 permanent positions, and the company says it will invest an additional $60 million in local infrastructure. The announcement reflects Alberta's ambitions to become a hub for AI and data infrastructure but has also reignited debate over the province's "bring your own power" approach. Under the policy, large data centres are expected to secure or build their own electricity generation rather than rely on Alberta's grid. Supporters argue the model protects ratepayers and grid reliability while attracting investment, while critics question whether it will lead to increased natural gas generation, higher emissions, and additional infrastructure costs.
On Sunday, Smith stood alongside fellow Canadian Premiers Doug Ford, Scott Moe, and Tony Wakeham at a Transportation and Economic Corridors Stampede event. While unity was in the spotlight, the separation referendum process continued to move forward in the background. Elections Alberta has begun verifying the signatures collected by the Stay Free Alberta petition following a court decision allowing the review to proceed while legal appeals continue. Organizers say they submitted nearly 302,000 signatures, well above the threshold required to trigger government action. Although Premier Smith has repeatedly said a binding vote on separation cannot take place this fall, the issue continues to shape Alberta's political landscape ahead of the October 19 referendum. Elections Alberta expects to complete its verification by July 27.
On Thursday, the Government of Alberta announced it is accelerating 41 school projects through its $8.6-billion Schools Now program, including 16 in Calgary and 11 in Edmonton. 19 projects have now been approved for construction funding, and another 22 are advancing from planning into the design stage. Together, the projects are expected to create or modernize more than 39,000 student spaces. While school boards welcomed the announcement, they also noted enrolment pressures remain significant and many schools already operate at or above capacity. With an election on the horizon, ensuring school infrastructure keeps pace with population growth will remain one of the government's biggest challenges.
Top Ontario Stories
Ontario put its weight behind a west-east oil pipeline this week. In Calgary on July 6, Premier Doug Ford and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith unveiled the proposed route for the Northern Shield Energy Corridor, a roughly 3,300-kilometre line connecting Hardisty, Alberta to Sarnia, Ontario by running near Regina and Winnipeg and arcing north of Toronto. The pipeline would feed Sarnia's existing refining and petrochemical base, move an estimated 500,000 barrels a day, with room to expand to 800,000, and would be built with Canadian steel. The project grows out of a memorandum of understanding signed last summer among Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan on an east-west energy and rail corridor. Ford framed the project as a way to move Canadian energy to markets in Canada and abroad, and to make the country more secure, united and resilient.
For all the ambition, the corridor remains a proposal on paper. A feasibility study is underway and expected to conclude by year-end, and no private-sector proponent has committed. The politics are far from settled; Aamjiwnaang First Nation near Sarnia says they were not consulted, though Ontario has now initiated its duty to consult with Indigenous partners and communities. For Ontario's industrial base, the corridor is a resource-security project; connecting Sarnia's refineries to a domestic alternative to Enbridge's Line 5 that runs through Michigan and Wisconsin would provide relief from the on-again-off-again fight to keep the vital west-east pipeline operational.
With the legislature in recess until October 27, the watch now shifts to municipal campaigns, especially Toronto, where the mayoral race is heating up ahead of the October 26 vote. As for Premier Ford, he is finding that a break from the legislature won’t mean a quiet summer. Personal support workers with the Canadian Union of Public Employees rallied outside his Etobicoke office over Ontario's new personal support worker registry, part of a broader run of union demonstrations that has already reached Ford Fest and the premier's Muskoka cottage.
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