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Taxpayers are out an estimated $45 million a year because the former Tory regime balked at enacting a law that would have meant most of the fees paid by oil and gas companies for access to public lands went into government coffers instead of private pockets, according to a new study.

The report by the Alberta Land Institute found that about half the money the province has been forgoing by not proclaiming a 1999 bill, which would have limited so-called “cowboy welfare” or surface rights payments by the energy industry, is going instead to a tiny minority of those who hold grazing leases.

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“The top two per cent of leases collect as much as 50 per cent of the total compensation paid to leaseholders,” the study said.

“The government of Alberta will have to determine if the magnitude of the revenue involved would be worthwhile to invest in other programs.”

Cliff Wallis, spokesman for the Alberta Wilderness Association, said he was shocked at the report’s finding.

“You might call them fat cats sucking on the public teat,” Wallis said.

“It points to the need for much greater transparency so the public can determine if windfall profits are being made by some ranchers on what are public lands.”

Larry Sears, chairman of Alberta Grazing Leaseholders Association, said the government shouldn’t be looking at new regulations to govern a few outliers who get large payments.