Steelworkers unite behind the pipeline vision Canada’s politicians keep ignoring
A morning outside Algoma Steel revealed something rare in today’s politics: a simple idea that working people overwhelmingly agree on.
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Tonight, on The Ezra Levant Show, Ezra reports from Algoma Steel in Sault Ste. Marie, with a question for steelworkers that seems almost too obvious to ignore: Why doesn’t Canada build a pipeline using Canadian steel, made by Canadian workers, for a Canadian project?
With U.S. tariffs hammering the sector and Ottawa’s half-billion-dollar bailouts failing to save a thousand incoming layoffs, the industry is desperate for real customers — not more subsidies, handouts, or political promises. So he asked the people who know the stakes best: the workers themselves, heading into their early-morning shift.
It didn’t take long to see where they stood. One after another, workers told Ezra the same thing: a pipeline built with Algoma steel would be “a perfect idea,” “great for the community,” “good for Canadians,” and exactly the kind of real, long-term demand the mill needs. Many had no time for the politics that killed Northern Gateway, Energy East, and Keystone XL — projects that together could have poured billions into this industry. Their view was grounded in something simpler: pipelines are made of steel, Algoma makes steel and Canada needs both.
Only one passer-by pushed back, not on the pipeline idea, but on Rebel News. Even he conceded that a pipeline might be “a good point.” His concern was that the debate around tariffs, bailouts, and layoffs had already become too politicized. But that’s precisely the problem: the situation is political. Tariffs were political. The green conversion demands placed on Algoma were political. The $500 million in public funds were deeply political. To pretend otherwise is fantasy.
And if a company wants enormous public support, it shouldn’t recoil when the public, through journalists, asks questions. Algoma management may not like scrutiny, but workers clearly welcome an honest conversation about real solutions.
The security team didn’t share that enthusiasm. After ordering us off property — twice — and calling the police without evidence we’d trespassed, it became clear that the corporation prefers public money without public accountability.
GUEST: Alexa Lavoie's report from on the ground in Guadeloupe investigating the Christmas tragedy that took place.
COMMENTS
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Lynne Osborne commented 2025-12-12 11:07:18 -0500Sadly in Canada there is an army of negative development non profits funded by governments and other parties both foreign and domestic. They don’t have to disclose who is meeting their payroles. Industry, the people who actual do something, are under full disclosure rules. Also, to fight off the “stakeholders” industry has to dip into its own resources. Most companies view the cost and effort not worth while. Trudeau and his Northern Gateway cancellation is all people need to warn them off investing in this country. Instead of building Canada our steel industry has shipped their products south where people actually do something to make a living. Trump has put a wobble in that option. Canada is ill prepared to use its own resources for its own purposes. In some cases local options might just be illegal. Want any meaningful project started in Canada, Ottawa is going to have to proote it and fund it. -
Ruth Bard commented 2025-12-11 22:20:20 -0500I’ve read that you can’t make virgin steel without a blast furnace. Electric arc tech isn’t hot enough. So Algoma will be making trinkets, but nothing important.
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Matt Abrahams commented 2025-12-11 22:14:22 -0500No Ezra, If they build a pipeline (which they won’t), they’ll use Chinese steel like they did for that stupid bridge!
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Bernhard Jatzeck commented 2025-12-11 20:46:25 -0500I doubt that PET lost much sleep over the steelworkers that were affected when Thomas Berger scuttled the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline.
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Bruce Atchison commented 2025-12-11 20:34:41 -0500Flush the management! Algoma’s bosses don’t care about their workers. If they did, they’d advocate for Canadian steel projects like pipelines. Thanks to the brain-dead management, a thousand families will have a miserable Christmas. I doubt the brass will feel the workers’ pain.
