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Those comments were not well-received in Alberta, where Kenney responded directly during a speech to an industry association in Calgary. “If you are so opposed to the energy that we produced in Alberta then why are you so keen on taking the money generated by the oilfield workers in this province and across western Canada?” he said. “You cannot have your cake and eat it too. Pick a lane.”

Blanchet shot back on Wednesday afternoon after his party’s first caucus meeting in Ottawa. “You know what, I like my cake … and I will do what I think about it,” he said. “I think he can, as far as I’m concerned, have his own oil and do whatever he wants with it.”

The squabble gave Kenney another opportunity to voice his displeasure about Quebec benefitting from Alberta oil revenue through the federal equalization program, despite opposing oil and gas development. Blanchet countered that Kenney is distorting how equalization works by making it seem as though Alberta writes a cheque to Quebec — in fact, equalization payments come from federal revenue.

Blanchet, whose party supports an independent Quebec, was broadly dismissive of rumblings in favour of Western independence. “Is the desire to extract petroleum from the ground in western Canada in itself a motivation to want to achieve independence? I will let them ask themselves that question,” he said. “But evidently, it’s not a motivation that will get enthusiastic support from the Bloc Québécois.”