Exemptocracy in Action

Canada’s Mark Carney promised competent, nation-building governance. What we’re getting is something more familiar—and more corrosive.

In my previous piece on Mark Carney’s approach to power, I introduced the concept of Exemptocracy: a system where rules bend, exemptions multiply, and discretionary power flows according to political loyalty rather than transparent criteria, public interest, or economic merit. It is governance by favour and punishment, dressed up in the language of pragmatism and urgency.

Two recent episodes confirm this pattern with striking clarity. One involves a sitting MP whose riding saw funding slashed until she crossed the floor. The other features the Prime Minister openly telling a provincial premier that federal enthusiasm for major projects in his province depends on getting with the program on an unrelated priority. These are not anomalies of politics-as-usual. They are textbook illustrations of Exemptocracy in action.

What makes these two examples powerful is their specificity and directness. In both cases, senior figures in the Carney government, including the Prime Minister himself, linked the flow of federal resources—funding for a constituency and project approvals for a province—to alignment with the governing party’s agenda. There was no elaborate pretence of arm’s-length decision-making (perhaps because the governing Liberals know the press and media will not hold their feet to the fire or ask uncomfortable questions.) Just a clear message: play ball or watch the tap run dry or federal support go elsewhere.

In a recent podcast appearance and subsequent interviews, former Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu (now sitting as a Liberal) described how federal funding for projects in her Sarnia—Lambton riding was cut by more than half. She approached Evan Solomon, the Minister responsible for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario, on what she called a “begging mission” to restore it.

According to Gladu, Solomon’s response was blunt: the funding would flow more readily if she crossed the floor and joined the Liberals. She recounted the exchange with a mix of surprise and eventual acceptance, framing it as part of her decision to switch parties. The National Post reported her account in detail, noting the context of her frustration with being so long in opposition and her subsequent move.

This is not normal constituent service. It is the explicit politicization of regional economic development funding. Canadians are told the federal government behaves with “fairness” and “equity”, but the reality does not match the narrative. Ridings and communities are not supposed to lose access to federal programs just because their MP belongs to the wrong party, yet that seems to often be the case in Canada. When ministers treat taxpayer dollars as leverage for floor-crossing, they transform representative democracy into a patronage machine.

The implications go beyond one riding. They signal to every MP, provincial leader, business, and local stakeholder that access to Ottawa depends on demonstrated loyalty. Merit, need, and prior commitments take a back seat to partisan arithmetic.

This pattern of loyalty-driven deal-making extends beyond individual MPs to leaders of provinces. Consider the recent Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding signed in November 2025 and its Implementation Agreement finalized in May 2026. For American readers, this is Ottawa’s “bargain” with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith: in exchange for federal support for a potential new privately financed oil pipeline carrying Alberta bitumen to the B.C. coast for Asian export markets, Alberta agreed to stronger carbon pricing, major investments in carbon capture and storage (CCS), and closer alignment with Ottawa’s net-zero 2050 targets. But in order to get Alberta to agree to stop fighting Ottawa’s net-zero policies, Carney offered the possibility of a new oil pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast if several conditions are met, including mandatory CCS in the oil sands.

Soon after signing the Implementation Agreement, Prime Minister Carney addressed the Vancouver Board of Trade before meeting B.C. Premier David Eby to discuss the Alberta deal. Eby’s New Democratic Party has opposed Alberta oil pipelines since at least 2012. [1] During the Q&A, in the context of B.C. projects before the Major Projects Office, Carney delivered a pointed warning: “If things get stalled [in B.C.], we’re going to be spending more time elsewhere in the country because we need to move forward.” This was no vague comment — it was a veiled threat. Carney made clear that federal prioritization would shift based on provincial cooperation on the pipeline.¹

This is Exemptocracy applied intergovernmentally. Federal project approvals and investment enthusiasm become bargaining chips in unrelated policy disputes. Provinces are pressured to align on one file to avoid delays on others. The meaning of the “national interest” is like a flitting shadow; it is increasingly, capriciously, being redefined as whatever aligns with the Prime Minister’s Office’s prevailing political priorities at any given moment. Rather than a stable, enduring concept rooted in Canada’s long-term economic security and prosperity, the “national interest” is mutable, redefined by whichever trend or issue catches the fancy of Mark Carney on the day. Canadians are gradually being conditioned to accept that the ‘national interest’ simply means whatever Mark Carney and the current Liberal Cabinet say it is based on their priorities today.

Some will shrug and say: This is simply the reality of hardball politics. Sure, it may seem unsavoury, but in a competitive democracy, governments reward allies and pressure holdouts; it’s just the nature of power. Every party does it when they can. Why clutch pearls over political reality?

But this blasé attitude misses the point and the danger. What separates routine partisanship from Exemptocracy is the open systematization and normalization of transactional governance. When a Prime Minister and ministers openly, brazenly, explicitly tie funding taps and project queues to loyalty tests, they do not just play the game harder; they rewrite the rules, so the game itself becomes rigged by design.

Normal politics includes log-rolling and deal-making. This is something else: the erosion of any pretence that decisions rest on transparent criteria rather than personal or partisan fealty. Over time, it does not just breed cynicism, it crowds out competence, deters investment, and teaches communities and businesses that their economic fate depends less on merit than on keeping the right people happy.

A rules-based federation relies on predictable criteria, competitive processes, and insulation from day-to-day partisan warfare. When those erode, decisions become arbitrary, investment uncertainty rises, and public trust collapses.

This approach undermines Canadian federalism by treating provinces as junior partners whose legitimate priorities can be deprioritized for failing loyalty tests. It weakens democracy by making voters wonder whether their MP’s party affiliation determines their riding’s economic fate. It damages long-term prosperity by introducing significant political risk into investment decisions that should be based on viability, environmental standards, and economic return.

Rather than a stable, enduring concept rooted in Canada’s long-term economic security and prosperity, the “national interest” is mutable, redefined by whichever trend or issue catches the fancy of Mark Carney on the day. Canadians are gradually being conditioned to accept that the ‘national interest’ simply means whatever Mark Carney and the current Liberal Cabinet view as their priorities today.

Discretionary power concentrated in the executive is always tempting for those who hold it. But over time, it breeds cynicism, inefficiency, and resentment. Canadians across the political spectrum—especially those who once supported Liberal governments in hope of competent stewardship—deserve better than the transactional patronage driven governance of the Exemptocracy.

Mark Carney’s Exemptocracy is not an accident of circumstance. It flows from a theory of power that views rules as obstacles and loyalty as the highest virtue. The Gladu and Eby cases are early warnings of how this plays out in practice. One has to wonder if Premier Danielle Smith’s appeasement of Carney and the Liberals, with the mandatory Carbon Capture Storage for the oil sands companies, is a reasonable trade-off? Will the deal even last, or, like Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back, will Carney simply alter the deal whenever his next whim demands it?

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1. When the NDP-Green coalition took power in 2017, they vowed to use every tool in the toolbox to delay and stop the TransMountain Pipeline Expansion, to drive up the cost so high, the proponent would pull out. Even when the Federal Government took over the project, the NDP did not back down and continued to litigate, slow-walk regulations, and delay the project which contributed to ballooning cost overruns. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/timeline-key-dates-history-trans-mountain-pipeline-1.4849370