“Don’t block us — back us. Toss Bill C-48 in the garbage where it belongs.”

That was the request from Alberta Premier Rachel Notley Tuesday morning as she appeared before the Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications, which is studying the government’s proposed supertanker moratorium along British Columbia’s north coast. If passed, the bill would prohibit oil tankers carrying more than 12,500 metric tonnes of crude or persistent oil from stopping or unloading their cargo at ports along the coast.

The bill puts into law a voluntary ban that has been in place since 1985. It came in response to the completion of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline system. Crude and other persistent oils break up and dissipate more slowly in the marine environment and usually require a cleanup operation.

The bill enforces the moratorium with penalties of up to $5 million.

Notley opened her remarks by telling senators they may have noticed “Albertans are not the biggest fans of Ottawa these days. That’s the G-rated way to put it.”

Anyone wondering why need look no further than this bill.

“It’s not a tanker ban; it’s an Alberta ban. Let’s stop suggesting otherwise,” she said, noting “there is a glaring double-standard at the heart of this law.”

The proposed legislation would still allow LNG tankers to travel the same waters, which Notley said means it’s essentially a ban on energy resources produced in Alberta from getting to overseas markets. That said, Ottawa banning tankers along the north coast will only lead to American investors moving Canada’s product by rail to Alaska.

“We’ll lose jobs. We’ll take a discount on our products, and the same waters you’re trying to protect will still be affected because you have no ability to stop the U.S. from going through those waters,” she said.

“Once again we will make American shareholders rich while Albertans lose out … It’s a stampede of stupid.”

As it is, she said a lack of pipelines not only means Alberta can’t sell abroad; “it means we can barely move what we produce now.” While the Trans Mountain expansion is on track, she said Keystone XL and Line 3 remain snarled in the American legal system.

“Bill C-48 essentially makes us hostage to their fortune. We shouldn’t be creating a blanket ban on potential projects in the West when projects aimed south aren’t yet clear of roadblocks. It makes no sense,” Notley said.

A “blunt tool” that’s “not connected to science in any way,” the bill removes investment interest and removes any incentive to innovate technology, either in the patch or in shipping.

In December, a delegation of First Nations chiefs from British Columbia descended on Parliament Hill with a different message, however. They told senators if they allow supertankers through their territory, reconciliation efforts will be sunk.

“If you want reconciliation to continue, especially with the Haida, this tanker ban has to be put in place immediately,” said Peter Lantin, president of the Haida Nation and special adviser to Coastal First Nations.

“We are at a pivotal time in our shared history with Canada,” said Marilyn Slett, chief of the Heiltsuk Nation and president of the Coastal First Nations.

“This Act to prevent oil-tanker traffic on our coast has been at least 40 years in the making. For the First Nations of the northwest coast, its passage into law would mean we have taken another step in building our nation-to-nation relationship with Canada.”

As the committee heard Tuesday, however, it could compromise other relationships in the process. Jeremy Harrison, Saskatchewan’s minister of trade and export development, said by denying Western oil producers access to tidewater, this bill only serves to make “an already bad situation worse.”

“There is no precedent for a tanker ban of this kind in Canada. A similar ban does not exist, nor has one been considered for any other Canadian coastlines … where oil tankers routinely operate today,” he said.

Notley said instead of blocking LNG, Hibernia off the coast of Newfoundland and crude tankers in the St. Lawrence Seaway, the government is backing them, which makes the blocking of B.C.’s northern coast all the more divisive.

“In Alberta all we’re asking for is the same treatment for the same products on two different coasts, because right now there is a clear inconsistency between the way we are treating product on the East Coast versus the way we are treating product on the West Coast,” she said.

“In short, we need to end this double standard. We need to treat all Canadians equally.”

Follow @_HollyLake