Prominent environmental advocates say they concurrently struggled to secure any back-and-forth with the Prime Minister to discuss environment-related legislation, despite fossil fuel and mining executives being granted repeated access. They say the imbalance reflects a prioritization of industry voices by Carney during the drafting of Bill C-5, many of whom stand to benefit from expedited industrial projects, while sidelining organizations pushing for stronger environmental protections in the face of imminent climate change.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere has been an unending parade of fossil fuel lobbyists in Ottawa, all getting meetings with various people, [including the] Prime Minister,\u201d Environmental Defence executive director Tim Gray, said. \u201cHe is hearing disproportionately from the industries that represented the 20th century economy, not the 21st century economy \u2026 as the rest of the world electrifies and moves towards a cleaner economy.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Suncor](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/ON-Aamjiwnaang-Osorio-083-Web.jpg\"\/)
Just two days after winning the April 2025 federal election, Prime Minister Mark Carney met with lobbyists representing Suncor Energy, Inc. While lobbyists for almost two-dozen natural resource companies secured meetings with Carney in his first 100 days, environmental groups say they\u2019ve been shut out. Photo: Carlos Osorio \/ The Narwhal<\/p>\n
Using open data<\/a> from the federal government\u2019s registry of lobbyists<\/a>, The Narwhal tracked every disclosed lobbying event, whether in person, over the phone, or in videoconference, with Carney between April 28 and Aug. 6, 2025 \u2014 his first 100 days in office after winning the federal election. (He was officially sworn in on March 14, after taking over leadership of the Liberal Party from former prime minister Justin Trudeau, but Parliament was dissolved soon after and the election triggered.)<\/p>\n Analysis of those records found that of the 44 organizations to have disclosed securing lobbying access with the new prime minister during that time, almost half, or 45 per cent, represented natural resource interests. Two days into his new mandate as prime minister, he had his first two disclosed lobbyist meetings, one with oil and gas producer Suncor, the other with pipeline operator and gas processor NorthRiver Midstream. During his first three-plus months, his office also met with steel manufacturer ArcelorMittal Dofasco and oil and gas industry groups like the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers and Pathways Alliance, which is a collective of major oilsands producers.<\/p>\n An additional 13 per cent of meetings were with lobbyists representing the interests of automotive and other industrial organizations, including Volkswagen, Stellantis, the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers\u2019 Association and the Cement Association of Canada. The remaining 40 per cent of organizations Carney met with were a mix of unions, business associations and other private interest groups.<\/p>\n Previous reporting from The Narwhal found that oil and gas companies successfully secured lobbying access to the new Prime Minister in his early days, including at an in-person gathering, as they pushed for him to knock down key Trudeau-era environmental policies<\/a>. Our analysis reveals the scale of that lobbying: in his first 100 days, Carney heard from representatives from the sector at a pace of roughly once every three days \u2014 though several of these instances occurred on the same day, and at the same meetings.<\/p>\n Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch, an Ottawa non-profit focused on making Canadian governments and corporations more accountable, said the lobbying disclosures likely represent a fraction of what natural resource companies have actually undertaken in the first months since Carney took office.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s really easy to lobby in secret when all you have to do is exploit one of a dozen loopholes<\/a> [in the Lobbying Act],\u201d Conacher said. He highlighted the absence of any requirement<\/a> for lobbyists to disclose unpaid lobbying, written communications like emails or texts, casual conversations (as opposed to \u201carranged\u201d communications), lobbying for tax credits or communications with regulatory agencies about the enforcement of laws that apply to one\u2019s business.<\/p>\n The Narwhal\u2019s analysis also does not include lobbying of senior government officials and cabinet ministers.<\/p>\n Environmental organizations unable to meet with Prime Minister Carney<\/p>\n The findings are very different for meetings between the prime minister and environmentalists, who say they have been unable to secure access. Analysis of federal lobbying records shows that of the 53 lobbying communications listed in the registry in Carney\u2019s first 100 days, none appear to be with an environmental advocacy organization.<\/p>\n After reaching out to the prime minister, Gray said Carney\u2019s staff told Environmental Defence he would not speak with them, but did not provide a rationale.<\/p>\n \u201cThe prime minister needs to hear what environmental organizations \u2014 which represent millions of Canadians \u2014 think about major projects and realignment of our economy,\u201d Gray said.<\/p>\n The Prime Minister\u2019s Office did not respond to questions from The Narwhal on natural resource lobbying and why access was not granted to environmental groups, including Environmental Defence.<\/p>\n Spokespeople from environmental advocacy groups Ecojustice, MiningWatch and Nature Canada told The Narwhal they had similar experiences: each reached out to the Prime Minister\u2019s Office in his first 100 days to discuss either mandate letters, pending legislation or prescient environmental issues. None were granted access.<\/p>\n When Carney won the federal election, Nature Canada director of policy Akaash Maharaj said the conservation charity was initially optimistic about the new prime minister\u2019s campaign commitments on nature protection. Then came some early cabinet announcements that Maharaj called confusing \u2014 in May, Carney bundled the portfolios<\/a> of Parks Canada<\/a> and Heritage Canada and created the new position of Secretary of State for Nature<\/a>.<\/p>\n Maharaj said Nature Canada reached out to the Prime Minister\u2019s Office multiple times, with Carney\u2019s office acknowledging the charity\u2019s emails but never extending an invitation to meet with him or his senior staff. Nature Canada representatives instead met with the Environment Minister and Secretary of State for Nature.<\/p>\n As natural resource industry representatives continued to gain access to the prime minister himself, Nature Canada doubled down: on Sept. 9, the charity penned an open letter<\/a> with seven other conservation charities to Carney\u2019s office and all Canadian premiers, stating that \u201ctariff responses and nation-building projects cannot be accomplished at the expense of [Canada\u2019s] natural heritage.\u201d In that letter, the charities reiterated their interests in meeting with the prime minister. As of Oct. 7, Maharaj said Nature Canada has not received a reply about their request for a meeting with the prime minister.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n Maharaj said the Prime Minister\u2019s Office did confirm receipt of a Sept. 3, 2025, letter from Nature Canada and eight other national organizations including Ecojustice and Environmental Defence. That letter did not ask for a meeting, rather urging Ottawa to limit \u201cnational interest\u201d designations under the Building Canada Act to projects that advance reconciliation, protect the environment and exclude fossil fuel development meant for export.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, Maharaj said the frequency of natural resource industry lobbying isn\u2019t surprising. But he pointed out that this outsized industrial influence stands in contrast to the reality of Canada\u2019s economy. Small- and medium-sized businesses employ more than three quarters of Canadians<\/a> and, according to Statistics Canada, Canada\u2019s natural resources sector made up just 3.4 per cent of all employee jobs<\/a> in the country in 2023. Maharaj said prioritizing access to already wealthy and powerful institutions and forgoing environmental standards in the midst of Trump\u2019s trade war is not in the interest of Canadians.<\/p>\n \u201cEventually the time of crisis will pass, but the effects of the decisions we make during this crisis will last for generations, especially for major national projects,\u201d Maharaj said. \u201cCanadians are right to say that during a time of economic anxiety, their focus has to be on the economic well-being of their family. But that is not incompatible with environmental standards, including standards that don\u2019t exacerbate climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n Updated on Oct. 16, 2025, at 11:48 a.m. ET: This story has been updated to correct a statement from a source that lobbying for tax cuts does not have to be registered and disclosed. Lobbying for tax cuts does have to be disclosed, while lobbying for tax credits does not.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prime Minister Mark Carney\u2019s first 100 days after winning the federal election were flooded with natural resource lobbyists,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":231244,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,79],"class_list":{"0":"post-231243","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-environment","9":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231243\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}