Carney’s pick for CEO of the new “Major Projects Office”.
If investment follows efficiency, why is Canada expanding bureaucracy while the U.S. scales industry at 10x the pace?
In a recent post, Joseph Connors raised concerns about Carney’s selection of Dawn Farrell to lead the proposed “Major Projects Office.” (Read his full post here: New "Major Project Office")
He cites her record at Trans Mountain and TransAlta, issues around transparency, project costs, and her connections to Brookfield as reasons for doubt about the appointment and the broader direction of federal governance.
What worries me more is not a background check issue, but the approach Ottawa is taking... Adding bureaucracy is never the answer.
I looked into pledged industrial investment during the first 6 months of Trump’s and Carney’s terms. Full disclosure: I used AI to pull the data, then cross-checked the sources to confirm accuracy. These figures are from official corporate announcements — not government talking points.
🇺🇸
United States (Trump):
• Corporate/project pledges total ≈ US$2.8 trillion.
• Major projects: Apple $600B, NVIDIA $500B, Project Stargate $500B, Micron $200B, IBM $150B, TSMC $100B, J&J $55B, Eli Lilly $27B, Hyundai $21B+, Amazon $34B, and many more.
🇨🇦
Canada (Carney):
• Corporate/project pledges total ≈ C$45B (~US$33B).
• Major projects: LNG Canada Phase 2 (~C$33B), Blackstone floating LNG (~C$10B), Port of Montréal Contrecœur (~C$1.6B), Foran Mining (~C$350M), GE-Hitachi SMR centre (~C$70M).
Per capita comparison:
• U.S. pledged ≈ US$8,100 per resident (US$2.8T / 342M people).
• Canada pledged ≈ US$790 per resident (US$33B / 42M people).
🚨Per capita, the U.S. is attracting 10x more investments with 30% less people working in the federal public service.
Instead of focusing on enabling business and projects at scale, Canada is adding new bureaucracy (Build Canada Homes agency, Major Projects Office).
I've seen it firsthand how a government handles money and it's not pretty. Budget 'administration' often swells toward 60% of the total budget. Imagine if only 40% of Canada’s $41B defence budget actually reached defence — that’s the scale of the problem. We cannot afford to add agencies, red tape, and more bureaucrats!
I consult businesses, improve processes, and optimize operations to increase productivity for a living. When I look at a process, or one of its steps, one of my first questions is always:
“Do we need this?”
Ottawa today seems more interested in adding people, bloating processes, and creating agencies than identifying and solving the root cause of the problem.
If you’re not bringing back 10% of what you’ve deleted — you're clearly not deleting enough. — Elon Musk
