Conservative leadership candidate Kellie Leitch has turned her right-of-centre brand of populism onto Canada’s pipeline protesters, vowing to increase penalties for illegal protests and calling for environmental lobbying to be recognized as a political activity.

In a Facebook messaged posted Tuesday, Leitch outlined a five-point plan in response to the political backlash against oil pipeline construction happening from B.C. to Quebec. She calls for higher penalties against violence and vandalism, “ensuring those who provide support for the aforementioned actions are charged.” She wants to create a new joint police force to target environmental protests and to classify environmental lobbying as political activity “to get international money out of the process.” She is also calling for unspecified changes to regulations to “ensure Canada’s ability to compete in the marketplace.”

The missive comes as coastal First Nations and environmentalists in B.C. prepare to protest the approval of Kinder Morgan’s $6.8-billion Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, and following protests in the Montreal area against TransCanada Corp.’s proposed 4,600-kilometre Energy East pipeline.

Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr was criticized last week for saying police and military forces would be used to counter illegal pipeline protests, which he later said was not meant as a threat against protesters. Violent protests in North Dakota over the Dakota Access pipeline in recent months have gripped the attention of those in indigenous communities who oppose oil development.

Leitch only mentions Energy East specifically in her Facebook message.

“We will not tolerate acts of violence or vandalism from those who want to illegally stand in the way of the economic prosperity of Canadians,” she writes. “There is a place for legitimate protest, but we will lock up the agitators and activists who resort to vandalism and violence when they do not get their way.”

It’s unclear to what degree her five-point plan would differ from current law. For example, some forms of environmental lobbying are considered political activity because they involve requests to government to change policy.

The legal classification of environmental lobbying as a political activity is important for non-profits as it determines how much of their budgets can be devoted to lobbying while maintaining their tax exemptions as charities.

The new security “force” that Leitch proposes would be “comprised of specialized components from the RCMP, CSIS, CRA and DFAIT to coordinate investigations, freeze bank accounts, and lay charges to ensure that those who seek to illegally disrupt natural resource development projects are brought to justice.”

These departments already coordinate security threats to pipeline infrastructure, though it’s unclear whether working together on pressing charges would amount to a change in practice. Depending on the seriousness of a demonstration, protesters are handled by police forces at every level of government.