Harper's memoir excerpt recalls Edmonton years and the 1980 energy shock
In an excerpt from his memoir, Stephen Harper describes his early Alberta years and how the National Energy Program shaped his politics.
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Former prime minister Stephen Harper's memoir, Here for Canada: The Memoirs of the 22nd Prime Minister, is being released this week. Postmedia's Alberta community publications were given permission to publish an excerpt with an Alberta connection.
In it, Harper describes moving to Alberta in the late-1970s oil boom, when he thought finding work would be easy. He says he moved from Edmonton to Calgary in the summer of 1981, having been in the province almost three years by then. He writes that he came to see Alberta as his home province.
Harper writes that the federal government's National Energy Program, introduced by the Trudeau government, caused Alberta's unemployment rate to rise by about 10 per cent in six months. He says that experience shaped his view of government's role in the economy and pushed him toward a conservative philosophy.
The excerpt also covers election night in Calgary on Jan. 23, 2006, when the Conservatives won 124 of 308 seats, ahead of the Liberals' 103. Harper became Canada's 22nd prime minister after that vote.
The National Energy Program ran from 1980 to 1985 and sought Canadian energy independence, but was strongly opposed by the private sector and oil-producing Western provinces.
