Lorne Gunter: No Sovereign Wealth in Carney's Canada Strong Fund
Over regulation — especially as it applies to the environment — has cost Canada upwards of $1 trillion in lost investment since the Liberals came to office in 2015.
Prime Minister Mark Carney walks to his office for a cabinet meeting on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on April 28, 2026. Photo by Blair Gable /Postmedia
What Makes a Sovereign Wealth Fund?
Do you know what is needed for a country to have a sovereign wealth fund like the one announced by the federal Liberals on Monday? It has to have sovereign wealth.
Norway has the world's largest sovereign wealth fund at nearly $2 trillion, which is just shy of all of Canada's entire GDP. It has been building for more than 35 years based on that Nordic country's oil revenue.
China has three funds in the range of $1 trillion each. Several Gulf states — Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — have national wealth funds of $600 billion to over $1 trillion. And the city state of Singapore has one that should exceed $1 trillion at some time in the coming year.
Comparing Real Funds to Carney's Fund
There are two things that jump out when comparing these real sovereign wealth funds with the one Prime Minister Mark Carney created Monday.
First, they are huge compared with Carney's Canada Strong Fund of $25 billion. Norway's fund is 80 times larger. The average of the others I mentioned above is 38 times bigger.
But the other difference, which is even more significant, is that all of those other funds have wealth as a base. To fund the Canada Strong Fund, the Liberal government is going to have to borrow the money, go even deeper into debt.
It is a propaganda trick to call this fund a "wealth fund." But I guess the more honest name, "sovereign debt fund" does not have the same pizzazz.
A Canada sovereign debt fund would also be less likely to attract private investors, like none. Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner said "Mark Carney wouldn't invest in Mark Carney's new fund."
So true. When Carney was in charge of Brookfield, one of the world's largest investment houses, he would never have fallen for his own Canada Strong Fund trick on behalf of his firm's clients.
But I guess the fact that the Canada Strong Fund is a hollow, political move is appropriate because the P.M. said his fund would underwrite the megaprojects being advanced by his Major Projects Office, which is itself a hollow, political device.
In the meantime, many of the non-tariff impediments to Canada's economy, over which the federal government has far more control, it has done little or nothing about. And when it comes to reversing many of the economic catastrophes of the Trudeau era, forget about it. They remain.
Canada's inflation continues to charge ahead. Its GDP growth continues to teeter. Living standards continue to fall below the levels of our G7 partners, particularly the U.S. Home ownership is still out of reach for many Canadians under 40. And our national debt continues to balloon.
Carney has promised to cut down red tape and remove interprovincial trade barriers that are stifling the Canadian economy, an economy he repeatedly claims we need to grow in order to reduce our dependence on trade with the Americans.
